Elizabethan Architecture

Elizabethan and Jacobean architecture— the uniquely strange and exciting buildings built by the great and powerful, ranging from huge houses to gem-like pavilions and lodges designed for feasting and hunting—is a phenomenon as remarkable as the literature that accompanied it, the literature of Shakespeare, Spenser, Sidney, Marlow, and others.

In this beautiful and fascinating book, Mark Girouard discusses social structure and the way of life behind it, the evolution of the house plan, the excitement of English patrons and craftsmen as they learned not only about the classic Five Orders and the buildings of Ancient Rome, the surprising wealth of architectural drawings that survive from the period, the inroads of foreign craftsmen who brought new fashions in ornament, but also the strength of the native tradition that was creatively integrated with the “antique” style. Behind the book is a vivid consciousness of the European scene: Italy, France, central Europe and above all the Low Countries and their influence on England. But the principal argument of the book is the unique individuality of the English achievement.

The result of new research and fieldwork, as well as a lifetime’s observation and scholarship, this remarkable book displays Girouard’s unique sense of style and his enduring excitement for the architecture of the period.

Elizabethan and Jacobean architecture— the uniquely strange and exciting buildings built by the great and powerful, ranging from huge houses to gem-like pavilions and lodges designed for feasting and hunting—is a phenomenon as remarkable as the literature that accompanied it, the literature of Shakespeare, Spenser, Sidney, Marlow, and others.

In this beautiful and fascinating book, Mark Girouard discusses social structure and the way of life behind it, the evolution of the house plan, the excitement of English patrons and craftsmen as they learned not only about the classic Five Orders and the buildings of Ancient Rome, the surprising wealth of architectural drawings that survive from the period, the inroads of foreign craftsmen who brought new fashions in ornament, but also the strength of the native tradition that was creatively integrated with the “antique” style. Behind the book is a vivid consciousness of the European scene: Italy, France, central Europe and above all the Low Countries and their influence on England. But the principal argument of the book is the unique individuality of the English achievement.

The result of new research and fieldwork, as well as a lifetime’s observation and scholarship, this remarkable book displays Girouard’s unique sense of style and his enduring excitement for the architecture of the period.

Library Journal

In Elizabethan Architecture, Girouard, author of other works on English architecture and a professor at Oxford, comes full circle to chronicle the style that he first wrote about as a Ph.D. student nearly 45 years ago. This is a history not of the cozy, half-timbered vernacular buildings of the period but rather of the high Elizabethan style of grand country houses such as Hardwick Hall (see Maurice Howard's The Building of Elizabethan and Jacobean England for a history of a broader range of building types). The text of this weighty tome provides a close examination of patrons and builders, the rise of classicism and Flemish influence through published sources and immigrant craftspeople, the lingering influences of Gothic architecture, and the symmetrical plan and form of Elizabethan and Jacobean country houses. Numerous photographs, plans, details, and period drawings round out the 500-plus pages. VERDICT If you are interested in high Elizabethan-style country houses, this is the book for you. The text is thorough, the illustrations copious, and the end result is a readable, accessible book on a subject not treated in this much detail anywhere else.—Amy Trendler, Ball State Univ. Libs., Muncie, IN

Freelance architectural historian and writer, and identified in many minds with the best writing and scholarship on Egnlish architecture. Author of numerous Yale books.