Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
The brick-built Grade II listed 'Queen Anne Summerhouse', Old Warden
Park, Old Warden, Bedfordshire, built for Sir Samuel Ongley, a director of the
South Sea Company, is believed to date from 1710-14, though it first appears
on an estate map of
c
.1736 (Briden, 2005, 2). The Summerhouse is rectangu-
lar on plan with round towers to each of the corners, though sadly derelict
and awaiting restoration, is undoubtedly a fine example of eighteenth-century
gauged brickwork. All four façades are in gauged work of ashlared orange-
red bricks that are of 'exceptional quality' set in a white lime:fine sand mor-
tar. Following contemporary practice the bricklayers laid the gauged work as
a half-brick façade in accurate Flemish bond, including cut and rubbed radial
bricks for the towers, rarely tied-in to the backing brickwork, as can be seen on
a partial collapse of the façade at the top of the south-west tower. Where neces-
sary the bricklayers also used 'dummy joints' to create aesthetic quarter-bond.
By these dates, however, the fashionable use of gauged work for whole fronts
was fast declining, perhaps due to cost as much as, in the opinion of some,
architectural indigestion (Cruickshank and Wyld, 1975, 185).
Georgian brickwork could also be accentuated with terracotta enrichments
modelled to resemble stone, which came to prominence again during this period.
The most famous factory was that founded by Eleanor Coade in the 1760s, pro-
ducing the high-quality 'Coade stone' from 1767 until 1835. This artificial stone
product was particularly prized for embellishments to openings, for arches with
vermiculated voussoirs, rusticated with brick, and for a wide range of sculptured
keystone motifs (Fig. 94). The use of gauged work declined, becoming confined
to arches, aprons and other dressings, as this period drew to its close.
Figure 94
A close-up of a gauged
arch of malm cutter
voussoirs and rusticated
blocks and a keystone
of 'Coade Stone', at the
entrance of 7, Bedford
Square, London; a
development built
c
.1775-83.
