
Gibbs' Book of Architecture: An 18th Century Classic
One of England's most respected and influential architects, James Gibbs was born in Scotland, studied in Rome, and left a legacy of design the world will treasure forever. His legendary 1728 folio, a sprawling gallery of Gibbs's magnificent drawings, perspectives, and blueprints, is a brilliant testimony to his remarkable talent. Profusely illustrated, the volume features such notable commissions as London's St. Martin in the Fields — the inspiration for many steeple churches of the colonial period in America; St. Mary le Strand, his first public building; Marybone Chapel; The Church of Allhallows in Derby; plus Gibbs's first commission, an addition for King's College at Cambridge. His most outstanding accomplishment may be the circular Radcliffe Library at Oxford, for which he received a Master of Arts. Also included here are detailed floor plans, plus fine drawings of decorative marble cisterns, ornamental iron gates, stately funeral monuments, and much more. Essential for an unders