BONOMI, Joseph the Elder

Until the mid-eighteenth century, British architecture was wholly dominated by Palladianism. However, the supremacy of the Palladianism was on the wane in the second half of the century. The roughly simultaneous “discoveries” of both Greek Antiquity and the Middle Ages (the Gothic architecture) around the mid-eighteenth century brought with them a a basic, revolutionary change in historical perceptions of the time. When British architects and patrons now looked for a model for the design of their buildings, there was no longer a universally valid standard such as there had been in Palladianism up to the beginning of the eighteenth century. Now there were different styles of equal status from which one could choose.

The new ideas were first tried out on small scale in landscape gardens. However, soon were carried over into large-scale works in both Neoclassical and Gothic versions. In both cases, it was country houses that led the way after garden buildings. Clients and architects from the 1760s were dissatisfied with the classical grammar transmitted through the filter of the Renaissance. Instead, the aim was to turn directly to Antiquity for models, and an increasing number of archeological publications provided accurate plans for these. The new direct approach to Antiquity first became apparent in the interiors of the great country houses.

In Great Packington, the Roman-born architect Bonomi began work in 1782 on a Pompeian Gallery based on the wall designs discovered in Pompei. The choice of colour - black and red - was derived from paintings on Greek vases.

The church which Bonomi constructed in Great Packington reflected an endeavour to create a radically new architecture on the basis of antiquity. From outside, it consists of a pure cube with blank walls bare of all decoration, articulated only by semi-circular thermal windows and pepper-pot towers. The same purist severity reigns within. The four short symmetrical cruciform arms, derived from Roman ‘thermae’ buildings, are roofed by coffered barrel vaulting. The groin vaulting of the square crossing rests on Doric columns in the corners with entablatures based on those in the Greek temples in Paestum.

The church which Bonomi constructed in Great Packington reflected an endeavour to create a radically new architecture on the basis of antiquity. From outside, it consists of a pure cube with blank walls bare of all decoration, articulated only by semi-circular thermal windows and pepper-pot towers. The same purist severity reigns within. The four short symmetrical cruciform arms, derived from Roman ‘thermae’ buildings, are roofed by coffered barrel vaulting. The groin vaulting of the square crossing rests on Doric columns in the corners with entablatures based on those in the Greek temples in Paestum.