Batty Langley

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Batty Langley

Batty Langley (Twickenham

Twickenham

Twickenham is a town in west London, England.It is the principal town, by population, within the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames....
, Middlesex, baptised 14 September, 1696 – London

London

London is the capital of both England and the United Kingdom, and the most populous municipality in the European Union. An important settlement for two millennia, History of London goes back to its founding by the Roman Empire....
1751) was an English

England

Garden designer

The term garden designer can refer either to an amateur or a professional. Amateurs design their own gardens. Professionals design other people's gardens....
and prolific writer, who produced a number of engraved designs for "Gothick

Gothic Revival architecture

The Gothic Revival is an Architectural style which began in the 1740s in England. Its popularity grew rapidly in the early nineteenth century, when increasingly serious and learned admirers of neo-Gothic styles sought to revive Middle Ages forms in contrast to the Neoclassical architecture styles which were then prevalent....
" structures, summerhouses and garden seats in the years before the mid-18th century.

The eccentric landscape designer, who gave some of his numerous children names like Euclid

Euclid

Euclid , floruit 300 BC, also known as Euclid of Alexandria, was a Greek mathematics and is often referred to as the Father of Geometry. He was active in Alexandria during the reign of Ptolemy I ....
, Vitruvius

Vitruvius

File:Vitruvius.jpgMarcus Vitruvius Pollio was a Ancient Rome writer, architect and engineer , active in the 1st century BC. By his own description Vitruvius served as a Ballista , the third class of arms in the military offices....
and Archimedes

Archimedes

Archimedes of Syracuse was a Greek mathematics, physicist, engineer, inventor, and astronomer. Although few details of his life are known, he is regarded as one of the leading scientists in classical antiquity....
, even attempted to "improve" Gothic

Gothic art

Gothic art was a Medieval art art movement that lasted about 200 years. It began in France out of the Romanesque art period in the mid-12th century, concurrent with Gothic architecture found in Cathedrals....
forms by giving them classical proportions.

He was the son of a jobbing gardener of Twickenham, and bore the name of David Batty, a patron of his father's.

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Encyclopedia

Batty Langley (Twickenham

Twickenham

Twickenham is a town in west London, England.It is the principal town, by population, within the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames....
, Middlesex, baptised 14 September, 1696 – London

London

England

Garden designer

Gothic Revival architecture

Euclid

Vitruvius

Archimedes

Gothic art

He was the son of a jobbing gardener of Twickenham, and bore the name of David Batty, a patron of his father's. He inherited some of his father's clients in Twickenham, then a village of suburban villa

Villa

A villa was originally an upper-class country house, though since its origins in Roman Republic times the idea and function of a villa has evolved considerably....
s within easy reach of London by a pleasant water journey on the Thames

River Thames

The Thames is a major river flowing through southern England. While best known because its lower reaches flow through central London, the river flows through several other towns and cities, including Oxford, Reading, Berkshire and Windsor, Berkshire....
. An early client was Thomas Vernon

Thomas Vernon

Thomas Vernon was a landowner and Member of Parliament in eighteenth century England. He was the only son of Bowater Vernon , who inherited Hanbury Hall, Worcestershire and large estates in Hanbury, Worcestershire and elsewhere, from his second cousin Thomas Vernon who had died childless....
of Twickenham Park.

For the Palladian

Palladian architecture

Palladian architecture is a European style of architecture derived from the designs of the Republic of Venice architect Andrea Palladio . The term "Palladian" normally refers to buildings in a style inspired by Palladio's own work; that which is recognised as Palladian architecture today is an evolution of Palladio's original concepts....
house built at Twickenham by James Johnston

James Johnston

James Johnston may refer to:*James Johnston , Scottish Secretary of State*James Johnston , Bytown businessman and politician*James Johnston ...
in 1710 (later "Orleans House", demolished 1926), Langley, probably on his own endeavor, prepared and published a garden plan, which offered an encyclopedia of the garden features that were swiftly becoming obsolete by the time the plan (illustration, right) was published in Langley's A Sure Method of Improving Estates (1728): here are several maze

Maze

A maze is a complex tour puzzle in the form of a complex branching passage through which the solver must find a route. In everyday speech, both maze and labyrinth denote a complex and confusing series of pathways, but technically the maze is distinguished from the labyrinth....
s, a "wilderness" with many tortuous path-turnings, cabinets de verdure cut into dense woodland, formal stretches of canal and formally-shaped basins of water, some with central fountains, a central allée

Avenue

Avenue may refer to:* Avenue , a straight road with a line of trees or large shrubs running along each side* Avenue , a specialist term in archaeology referring to lines of stones...
of trees leading to an exedra

Exedra

In architecture, an exedra is a semicircular recess, often crowned by a half-dome, which is usually set into a building's facade. The original Greek sense was applied to a room that opened onto a stoa, ringed with curved high-backed stone benches, a suitable place for a philosophical conversation....
. His New Principles of Gardening, 1728 included designs for mazes, a feature he could never quite leave behind.

Batty Langley is best known for one of his confident self-promotions, Ancient Architecture Restored published in 1742 and reissued in 1747 as Gothic Architecture, improved by Rules and Proportions, a bit of cockscombry that thoroughly irritated Horace Walpole

Horace Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford

Horace Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford , more commonly known as Horace Walpole, was an art historian, writer, antiquarian and politician. He is now largely remembered for Strawberry Hill, London, the home he built in Twickenham, south-west London where he revived the Gothic style some decades before his Victorian successors, and for his Got...
, whose Gothick villa at Twickenham, Strawberry Hill

Strawberry Hill, London

Strawberry Hill is an affluent area of the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames near Twickenham. It is a suburban development situated 10.4 miles west south-west of Charing Cross....
, gave impetus to the stirrings of the Gothic Revival:

"All that his books achieved, has been to teach carpenters to massacre that venerable species, and to give occasion to those who know nothing of the matter, and who mistake his clumsy efforts for real imitations, to censure the productions of our ancestors, whose bold and beautiful fabrics Sir Christopher Wren

Christopher Wren

Sir Christopher Wren was a 17th century England designer, astronomer, geometer, and one of the greatest English architects in history. Wren designed 53 London churches, including St Paul's Cathedral, as well as many secular buildings of note....
viewed and reviewed with astonishment, and never mentioned without esteem." (Walpole, Anecdotes of Painting, 1798, p 484)