THE
ARCHITECTURE OF THE
EIGHTEENTH CENTURY
John Summerson
The
architecture produced between 1700 and 1800 represents a classic perfection
which no later age has equaled. The first half of the eighteenth century
was pervaded by the spirit of the Baroque, epitomized most completely
in palaces and churches: Schonbrunn in Vienna, the Winter Palace in
St. Petersburg, the dazzling theatrical churches and Residenzes of
Germany and Central Europe. After 1750 architecture turned away from
Baroque toward Neo-classicism, whose most characteristic types included
private houses, institutional buildings and planned towns—Bath, Philadelphia and Washington, with their theaters, museums, hospitals
and banks. Summerson provides a succinct and elegant summary of the
entire period, bringing into focus not only the stunning beauty of
these buildings, but also the background of ideas from which they
sprang.
The
architecture produced between 1700 and 1800 represents a classic perfection
which no later age has equaled. The first half of the eighteenth century
was pervaded by the spirit of the Baroque, epitomized most completely
in palaces and churches: Schonbrunn in Vienna, the Winter Palace in
St. Petersburg, the dazzling theatrical churches and Residenzes of
Germany and Central Europe. After 1750 architecture turned away from
Baroque toward Neo-classicism, whose most characteristic types included
private houses, institutional buildings and planned towns—Bath, Philadelphia and Washington, with their theaters, museums, hospitals
and banks. Summerson provides a succinct and elegant summary of the
entire period, bringing into focus not only the stunning beauty of
these buildings, but also the background of ideas from which they
sprang.