Architectural Posters of England and the Netherlands

Architecture between London and Amsterdam

These five architectural posters bring together two monumental London churches, English country houses and the historic canal façades of Amsterdam. They show how Gothic, Baroque and planned urban development found expression in very different types of building.

AP 571 and AP 239 · London, St. Paul’s Cathedral

After the Great Fire of London in 1666, the medieval St. Paul’s Cathedral was left in ruins. Christopher Wren was appointed to rebuild it in 1668; work on the new cathedral began in 1675 and the building was officially declared complete in 1711. Because Wren directed the 35-year project throughout, the result has an unusually coherent architectural character. The poster focuses on the monumental west front and great dome, making the building’s clear symmetry and classical articulation immediately visible.

AP 712 and AP 023 · London, Westminster Abbey

The present Westminster Abbey largely dates from the reign of King Henry III. In 1245, he began replacing the eastern part of Edward the Confessor’s Norman abbey church with a new Gothic structure. Construction continued over several centuries, but later master masons followed the original concept closely enough to create a remarkably unified building. The west front shown on the poster was completed only in 1745: its Portland stone towers were designed by the architect Nicholas Hawksmoor and finished by his successor, John James.

AP 113 · British Country Houses, 1620–1720

This collective poster arranges numerous English country houses as comparative elevation drawings. During the seventeenth century, the country seat increasingly developed from a defensive manor into a residence intended for representation; wealthy merchants and politicians joined the aristocracy as patrons of grand houses. English Baroque emerged towards the end of the century. It absorbed European influences while generally retaining greater restraint and classical order than Italian Baroque. Placed side by side, the elevations make symmetry, emphasised central blocks, lateral wings and changing rooflines particularly easy to compare.

AP 110 and AP 403 · Herengracht and Keizersgracht in Amsterdam

Both posters are based on Caspar Jacobsz. Philips’s drawn and etched series of façades along the Keizersgracht and Herengracht, published in Amsterdam by Bernardus Mourik between 1768 and 1771. These dates refer to the production of the prints, not to the construction of every house represented. Philips recorded the canal streets as continuous sequences of individual fronts, preserving an exceptionally precise image of the city at that time. Laid out in the seventeenth century, Amsterdam’s Canal Ring combined hydraulic engineering, transport planning and regularly divided residential plots. Its varied gabled façades also reflect the prosperity Amsterdam gained through international maritime trade.