Kensington Palace, the birthplace of the Queen: being an historical guide to the state rooms, pictures and gardensLaw, Ernest
History
Kensington Palace, the birthplace of the Queen: being an historical guide to the state rooms, pictures and gardens
Law, Ernest
Kensington Palace (London, England) -- Guidebooks; Victoria, Queen of Great Britain, 1819-1901
There is no storey above this gallery, but only a span roof; and it was
originally--we do not know exactly when--a true "gallery" in the old
English meaning of the word, that is, a long chamber with windows on
both sides. The window spaces or recesses, on the right or west side,
still remain behind the panelling, and are exactly opposite the existent
windows on the left or east side. We may observe, also, that the room
seems at one time to have terminated just beyond the sixth window,
reckoning from the entrance, the line of the wall behind the wainscot on
the right, setting back at this point about a foot; while on the left
side, both inside and out, there is a straight joint in the brickwork,
and a break in the line of the wall.
Wainscoting and Carvings of Queen Mary's Gallery.
The wainscoting, as we have already indicated, was fixed here in the
early years of the reign of Queen Mary. The panels, which are very thin
and of unusual breadth, nevertheless have remained but little twisted or
buckled to this day, owing to Wren's particular and invariable
insistence that only the best seasoned wood should be used in all the
work under his charge. In the course of the restorations, it has,
however, been necessary to take it all to pieces in order to repair the
injuries of nearly two centuries of misusage and neglect. Here, as in
the staircase, are to be noticed the extreme richness in grain of the
old oak, and its deep warm tone of colour.
From the old enrolled parchment accounts of the years 1689-1691, we find
that Henry Hobb and Alexander Forst were the joiners who made the
wainscoting, as well as the "shashes," shutters, window-boards,
chimney-pieces, picture frames, shelves, etc.; while Nicolas Alcocke,
William Emet, and Grinling Gibbons carved "1,405 feet Ionick medallion
and hollow cornish; 942 feet of picture frame over the doors and
chimneys, and 89 feet of astragall moulding, about the glasses in the
chimneys." Another item of payment in the same accounts, also relating
to the work here, is the following:
"To Gerard Johnson, Cabinet maker, for severall pannells of
wainscot, covered with looking-glass for chimney pieces in the
King's dining-roome, the gallerie, and over the doors, and for
putting them up--£100."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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