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Christopher Hussey: a bibliographical tribute, by J. Mordaunt Crook, published January 1970 in Architectural History the journal the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain (vol. 13, article, pp.5-29)   View Online

Christopher Hussey CBE MA FSA HONARIBA, who died on 20 March 1970, was the doyen of English architectural historians. By any standards, he was an extraordinarily prolific writer. The high points of his literary career were undoubtedly The Picturesque (1927) - a brilliant 'essay on a way of seeing' which opened the eyes of a whole generation; English Country Houses: Early, Mid and Late Georgian (3 vols, 1955-58) - the product of forty years' research; and The Life of Sir Edwin Lutyens (1950) - a biographical classic written with all the wit and sympathy which its subject deserved. But it was week by week in the pages of Country Life that Hussey built up his reputation. Landscapes, country houses, town houses; medieval cottages, Georgian seats and Victorian public buildings, as well as the new-built classics of the Modern Movement, Hussey described them all. His range was remarkable, and his expository power unfailing. More than anyone it was Hussey who made Country Life, in Lord Runciman's words, 'the keeper of the architectural conscience of the nation'. Of course he travelled a royal road: Scotney Castle, Eton and Christ Church. But he put these inherited advantages to excellent use, delighting in the appreciation of architecture by a wider and wider audience. His whole life was really a triumphant vindication of the English amateur tradition. During his lifetime architectural history was transformed from a species of belles lettres into a serious academic discipline. Almost accidentally, Hussey played a crucial part in this process. Rather more consciously, he helped to turn preservation from a minority cult into a major national concern.

Wiston House remodelled, by Roger White, published January 1984 in Architectural History the journal the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain (vol. 27, article, pp.242-254)   View Online

Sussex is not normally considered a particularly rewarding county for the historian of eighteenth-century architecture. In terms of great house building its heyday was the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, a period which produced a notable string of mansions along the northern foot of the Downs - Glynde, Danny, Wiston, and Parham, among others. To the more refined sensibilities of the eighteenth century the county was little short of primeval. Thomas Fuller's judgement in 1662 ('A fruitfull County, though very durty for the travellers therein, so that it may be better measured to its advantage, by days journeys then by miles') was endorsed with interest in the next century by Horace Walpole, who reckoned that 'the whole country has a Saxon air, and the inhabitants are savage, as if King George the 2nd was the first monarch of the East Angles'

Earl De La Warr and the Competition for the Bexhill Pavilion, 1933-34, by Russell Stevens and Peter Willis, published January 1990 in Architectural History the journal the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain (vol. 33, article, pp.135-166)   View Online

Among the distinguishing architectural features of the red-brick seaside town of Bexhill, East Sussex, is the startling white form of the De La Warr Pavilion. It is a building of some significance, partly because it represents the aspirations of British proponents of modern architecture in the 1930s in its appearance, its use of advanced constructional techniques (it was one of the first all-welded steel framed buildings in Britain) and its social function as an entertainment centre which aimed to provide amusement and simultaneously improve people's mental and physical fitness. The architects of the Pavilion, Erich Mendelsohn and Serge Chermayeff, had formed their partnership in 1933 when Mendelsohn had been forced to leave Berlin and emigrate to Britain; subsequently they triumphed in an open competition of 230 entries which provides a fascinating commentary on the ideological debate among British architects of the time, not least because of the architectural range represented by the designs which failed to win an award.

Lancing College Chapel: a Question of Attribution, by John Elliott, published January 1996 in Architectural History the journal the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain (vol. 39, article, pp.114-123)   View Online

Conventional knowledge has long credited five architects with varying degrees of responsibility for the design of Lancing College Chapel; the main personae being Richard Cromwell Carpenter (1812-55), his pupil William Slater (1819-72), Carpenter's son Richard Herbert Carpenter (1841-93), Temple Lushington Moore (1856-1920) and Stephen Dykes Bower (1903-94). Of these Richard Herbert Carpenter is usually cited as the key individual, being identified as the one who originated the executed design. However, recent research has shown that while R. H. Carpenter played an important role in converting an architectural dream into structural reality, it was the less well-known William Slater who was responsible for conceiving much of what Carpenter later developed. This paper recounts the results of these researches, reconsiders the origins of the designs, and sketches their evolution during the nineteenth century.

A Pantheon for Horses: The Prince Regent's Dome and Stables at Brighton, by Geoffrey Tyack, published January 2015 in Architectural History the journal the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain (vol. 58, article, pp.141-158)   View Online

Domed rotundas have fascinated and challenged architects and engineers for the last two millennia. Examples can be found throughout the world, most commonly in religious and commemorative buildings, but also in the palaces and bath complexes of ancient Rome and in more recent government and legislative buildings. In modern times technological advances have allowed new and increasingly ambitious kinds of rotunda to be built - markets and exchanges, greenhouses and conservatories, concert and exhibition halls, sports arenas. The roots of this latter development lie in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and one of the pioneering buildings still survives in the unexpected setting of the Royal Pavilion gardens at Brighton.
The Brighton Pavilion has always been mainly associated with two people: George, Prince of Wales (the Prince Regent), who commissioned it, and John Nash, the architect who gave it its present exotic appearance. But it is easy to forget that the most distinctive features of the Nash exterior - the Indian-style domes and minarets - took their stylistic character from a building that was completed before he became involved with the Pavilion. This was the royal stables, designed by William Porden for the Prince, built in 1804-08, and now an arts complex.