BEGINNINGS OF ARCHITECTURE AND VISIT TO PARIS
Wren’s work as an architect seems to have begun in 1661, when, at the
instance of John Evelyn, the King sent for him to come from Oxford
to serve as assistant to Sir John Denham, Surveyor-General to His
Majesty’s Works. Denham was a moderate poet, but no architect, and
his appointment was merely an excuse for giving him a salary. John
Webb, “Inigo Jones’s man,” had been serving Denham as an assistant
and was naturally distressed at the interposition of Wren. This is no
place to attempt to estimate Webb’s place in English architecture. He
is put very high by some critics, but Evelyn’s description of him as
“Inigo Jones’s man” is probably fair. He had attempted unsuccessfully
to obtain the succession to Inigo Jones, and, on this second failure,
he seems to have retired from practice. The neglect of him in Wren’s
favour may have been a personal hardship, but nobody will believe
that English architecture was the sufferer. Webb belonged to another
generation, and the indolent Charles had a right perception when he
summoned the scientist to shape the architecture of the new era of the
Restoration.
In relation to Wren’s later and definitive appointment as
Surveyor-General, there is a reference in Pepys’ Diary which I never
read without a sense of personal relief.
On March 21st, 1668-9, Pepys met Hugh May, very grieved that he had
failed to secure the reversion of the Surveyorship of the King’s Works,
on the recent death of Sir John Denham, “by the unkindness of the Duke
of Buckingham, who hath brought in Dr. Wren, though, he tells me, he
hath been his servant for twenty years together,” and so on, “and yet
the Duke is so ungrateful as to put him by, which is an ill thing,
though Dr. Wren is a worthy man.” It was a lucky escape for English
architecture, but it is difficult to believe that Buckingham, or indeed
anybody, even in such venal times, would have denied to Wren the post
which he filled so perfectly, in favour of so sorry a fellow as Hugh
May. It is worth noting that when May died in February, 1683-4, his
post as Controller of the Works at Windsor Castle fell to Wren. If May
had never been in charge at Windsor that Castle might have been spared
the indignity of the Upper Bailey, which he designed of an ugliness so
surpassing that Wyattville’s remodelling, dreary as it is, was a vast
improvement.
How May saw the duties and opportunities of Surveyor-General of the
King’s Works is shown by his consoling thoughts recorded by Pepys. The
King was kind to May and promised him a pension of £300 out of the
Works (presumably an euphemism for out of Wren’s emoluments), and that
would be better than the place, because, owing to the lack of money, he
would have had to disoblige most people, being not able to do what they
desire to their lodgings.
There are many documents to show that Wren dealt assiduously and
successfully with the daily task of “lodgings” and other trivialities
belonging to the interminable routine of his post, but it is evident
that Hugh May would have done that and no more. It was an escape.
For the first two years of Wren’s new appointment as Denham’s
assistant, he received no commissions for public works, and when the
King, at the close of the war for Tangier, offered him the task of
designing the mole and fortifications he wisely declined on grounds of
health. The letter of invitation was, it is worth noting, written by
his cousin, Matthew Wren, the bishop’s son, who was secretary to Hyde,
the Lord Chancellor. Wren’s decision lost him a good salary and risked
the reversion of Sir John Denham’s post of Surveyor-General, which
was promised him if he would go to Tangier; but we may be thankful
that he resisted even so honourable an exile, and he seems not to have
suffered by it. His early labours at old St. Paul’s will be described
in the proper chapter, but his first original work in architecture
dates from early in 1663, if we except a doorway at Ely Cathedral,
of the same year. On April 29 he submitted to the Royal Society his
model for a theatre to be built at Oxford for the public acts of the
University. The Sheldonian struck a note that was to become typical of
Wren’s work, for he was not afraid to adventure on a flat ceiling with
a span of no less than 68 feet. It was a cunning piece of construction
and covered in a chamber of great interest but of uncertain design.
In the same year, 1663, was begun the Chapel of Pembroke College,
Cambridge, a thank-offering made by his uncle, Bishop Matthew Wren,
for coming safely through his long imprisonment. Pembroke Chapel is a
fine achievement of much greater artistic interest than the Sheldonian,
and, being completed long before the theatre, was no doubt the model to
which people turned, in Wren’s early days of architecture, as the proof
of his real capacity in his new profession.
In 1665 he was called in by Trinity College, Oxford, to design a new
inner court with the definite instruction that he was to build a
quadrangle. Wren protested that this idea was wrong, but showed his
skill in dealing with troublesome clients thus early. Writing to Dr.
Bathurst, then President of Trinity, he said: “I am convinced with
Machiavel, or some unlucky fellow, ’tis no matter whether I quote true,
that _the world is generally governed by words_. I perceive the name
of a quadrangle will carry with it those whom you say may possibly
be your benefactors, though it be much the worse situation for the
chambers, and the beauty of the college, and of the particular pile of
building ... but, to be sober, if any body, as you say, will pay for a
quadrangle, there is no dispute to be made; let them have a quadrangle,
though a lame one, somewhat like a three-legged table.”
Wren had his way: the Trinity court is three-sided. Elmes, in his _Life
of Wren_, says that the additions to Trinity College, Cambridge, were
going on at the same time, but this is a characteristic and obvious
blunder, for the letter from Wren to the authorities of Trinity, quoted
by Elmes, refers to the filling of the library arches with “relieves
of stone, of which I have seen the effect abroad in good buildings.”
Wren’s journey abroad did not take place until the summer of 1665, and
occupied about eight months. He started for Paris in the first week
of July, bearing a letter to the Earl of St. Albans, who represented
English virtuosity in the French capital. So much we know from the
reprint in _Parentalia_ of a letter which returned thanks to a friend
for getting him the introduction; but the chief value of it for us is
that Wren took the opportunity to record some of his impressions. He
was enchanted with the collections of rarities that he saw, and no
doubt pleased himself with infinite conversations about science and
philosophy with the scores of distinguished men he must have met. But,
unhappily, he was too busy to keep a diary or to write home at length,
and we have to be content with a few, albeit precious, _obiter dicta_.
“... I hope I shall give you a very good Account of all the best
Artists of France; my Business now is to pry into Trades and Arts, I
put myself into all Shapes to humour them; ’tis a Comedy to me, and
tho’ sometimes expenceful, I am loth yet to leave it.”
Wren had a delightful and fruitful visit.
“I have,” he wrote, “busied myself in surveying the most esteem’d
Fabricks of Paris, and the Country round; the Louvre for a while was
my daily Object, where no less than a thousand Hands are constantly
employ’d in the Works; some in laying mighty Foundations, some in
raising the Stories, Columns, Entablements, etc., with vast Stones,
by great and useful Engines; others in Carving, Inlaying of Marbles,
Plaistering, Painting, Gilding, etc., Which altogether make a School
of Architecture, the best probably, at this Day in Europe. The College
of The four Nations is usually admir’d, but the Artist hath purposely
set it ill-favouredly that he might shew his Wit in struggling with an
inconvenient Situation.” This last is a shrewd bit of criticism which
did not apply to Wren’s own work, for he always made the best of his
opportunities.
It was the Abbé Charles who introduced him to Bernini, “who shew’d me
his Designs for the Louvre and of the King’s Statue ... his design of
the Louvre I would have given my skin for, but the old reserv’d Italian
gave me but a few Minutes view; it was five little Designs in Paper,
for which he hath receiv’d as many thousand Pistoles; I had only Time
to copy it in my Fancy and Memory; I shall be able by Discourse, and a
Crayon, to give you a tolerable account of it.”
He had evidently planned to spend at least six months in studying
French architecture, for he wrote: “My Lord Berkley returns to England
at Christmas, when I propose to take the Opportunity of his Company,
and by that Time, to perfect what I have on the Anvil: Observations of
the present State of Architecture, Arts and Manufactures in France.”
Unhappily, his sight-seeing seems to have absorbed all his time in
Paris, and when he got back the torrent of work carried him along and
made impossible the fulfilment of the final promise of this letter.
Wren had an easy pen, and it is sad to think that what he had “on the
Anvil” never got into the muddled mass of manuscript from which his son
compiled the _Parentalia_. What would we not give for more portraits of
French architects and artists like his thumb-nail sketch of Bernini,
that “old reserv’d Italian” whose plans for the Louvre never went any
further? In the result, we have lost the observations which would
have been a great addition to the literature of architecture. He did
not confine himself to the buildings of Paris. “The Palace, or if you
please, the Cabinet of Versailles call’d me twice to view it; the
Mixtures of Brick, Stone, blue Tile and Gold make it look like a rich
Livery: Not an Inch within but is crowded with little Curiosities of
Ornaments: the Women, as they make here the Language and Fashions,
and meddle with Politicks and Philosophy, so they sway also in
Architecture; Works of Filgrand, and little Knacks are in great Vogue;
but _Building certainty ought to have the Attribute of eternal, and
therefore, the only Thing uncapable of new Fashions_. The masculine
Furniture of Palais Mazarine pleas’d me much better where is a great
and noble Collection of antique Statues and Bustos.”
[Illustration: PLATE II
WREN AS A MAN OF FORTY.]
Probably Wren had little sympathy with the efforts of that typical
Frenchman Philibert de l’Orme to invent new Orders a century earlier;
and is there a finer epigram of architecture than the phrase in italics?
But his travels took him wider than Versailles.
“After the incomparable Villas of Vaux and Maisons, I shall but name
Ruel, Courances, Chilly, Essoane, St. Maur, St. Mande, Issy, Meudon,
Rincy, Chantilly, Verneul, Lioncour, all which, and I might add many
others, I have survey’d; and that I might not lose the Impressions of
them, I shall bring you almost all France in Paper, which I found by
some or other ready design’d to my Hand, in which I have spent both
Labour and some Money.”
Would that Wren’s collections and drawings had been preserved with
something of the faithfulness which makes the Adam collection at
Sir John Soane’s Museum such a mine of information on one of Wren’s
greatest successors. One reference is helpful as showing the source of
much of Wren’s detail, though the work itself is informing without his
note:
“I have purchas’d a great deal of Taille-douce, that I might give
our Country-men Examples of Ornaments and Grotesks, in which the
Italians themselves confess the French to excel.”
It would have been better if Wren had relied more on English decorative
motives.
Unfortunately there is silence in the letter on the purpose of the
jaunt abroad. Was the stay in Paris the prelude to an intended visit to
Italy, or was it an end in itself? It is odd that he should not have
followed the example of Inigo Jones and studied the Renaissance at its
source, but there is no written evidence that he ever projected an
extension of his journey southwards. The effect of the Paris journey
was to give a French accent to Wren’s work throughout his life, and to
dilute the current of Palladian influence, which was not fully renewed
in England until the Earl of Burlington, William Kent, and others
returned to Inigo Jones and his Italian master as the fountains of
inspiration.
It is useless to speculate as to how Wren would have developed on a
fuller Italian basis. His art would have been more informed: he would
almost certainly have avoided the technical uncertainties that mar some
of his finest achievements: but he could hardly have lost the freedom
and inventiveness which make him one of the most individual of English
architects.
One of the results of Wren’s French orientation might have been that of
becoming a follower of Vignola rather than Palladio. In spite, however,
of Mansard’s work at Maisons and Blois, Wren, probably from the
influence of his great predecessor, Inigo Jones, remained on the whole
faithful to Palladio and the Ancients. As we shall see, the two-order
system of the exterior of St. Paul’s was a practical necessity, and not
an artistic preference. There is evidence enough from his work that he
did not regard architecture as bound up with the application of Orders
to building, or as the only means of salvation.