George, Sir Ernest. (1839-1922).

“Wych Street” / Old London.

Original Etching. London, The Fine Art Society, 1884. 26 cm x 37 cm. Original, vintage etching by Sir Ernest George. Signed in the plate, not in pencil ! Only very faint signs of some foxing. Mounted, ready to be framed. With descriptive Letterpress by Ernest George (included is a wonderful historic explanation regarding this old location in London by Ernest George).

Wych Street was a street in London, roughly where Australia House now stands on Aldwych. It ran west from the church of St Clement Danes on the Strand to a point towards the southern end of Drury Lane. The street was demolished by the London County Council in around 1901, as part of the redevelopment that created the Kingsway and Aldwych.
The area around Drury Lane was not affected by the Great Fire of London, and contained decrepit Elizabethan houses, with projecting wooden jetties. The Angel Inn public house was at the bottom of Wych Street, by the Strand. To the west, about halfway along on the north side, was the New Inn, an Inn of Chancery where Sir Thomas More received his early legal education, and, to the south, Lyon’s Inn, another Inn of Chancery where Sir Edward Coke was a reader in 1578, which was replaced by a Globe Theatre and the Opera Comique in c.1863.

At the western end was Drury House, the house of Sir Robert Drury, from which Drury Lane took its name, later rebuilt as Craven House by Lord Craven, and finally turned into a public house, the “Queen of Bohemia”, named after Lord Craven’s mistress, Elizabeth of Bohemia, the daughter of James I. This building was later demolished, and replaced by the first Olympic Theatre. Jack Sheppard, the infamous thief, was apprenticed to a carpenter, Mr. Wood, on Wych Street; one of Sheppard’s haunts, the White Lion tavern, was also on Wych Street. The music hall performer Arthur Lloyd lived at 39 Wych Street in 1892.

Around 1780, the brothers George and John Jacob Astor, who later became America’s first multimillionaire, ran an instrument store in 26 Wych Street. (Wikipedia)

__________________________________________

Sir Ernest George RA (13 Jun 1839–1922) was an English architect, landscape and architectural watercolour painter, and etcher.
His London office was once called “The Eton of architects’ offices”. His pupils included Herbert Baker, Guy Dawber, John Bradshaw Gass, Edwin Lutyens and Ethel Charles.
In the 1870s in partnership with Harold Peto, George designed houses in London for the Cadogan Estate in Chelsea and Kensington, and a number of country houses. In 1881 they designed Stoodleigh Court at Tiverton for Thomas Carew. In 1891 they designed an extension to West Dean House for William James, creating the Oak Room, now Oak Hall in West Dean College. Between 1870 and 1911 George designed several houses with his former pupil, Alfred B. Yeates. In New Zealand, which he never visited, he designed the Theomin family house Olveston in Dunedin which was built 1904-07. He was also responsible for the current Southwark Bridge (1921), and the Memorial to Heroic Self Sacrifice in London’s Postman’s Park. He served as president of the Royal Institute of British Architects from 1908 to 1910. In the late 19th century, George trained Ethel Charles, the first woman to be elected a member of the Royal Institute of British Architects. George’s residence at 17 Bartholomew St, London Borough of Southwark is commemorated with a Southwark Council blue plaque. (Wikipedia)

• Keywords: Decorative Original Graphic · History of London · Inanna Modern – Decorative Art · London · Old London · Original Art · Original Decorative Art Rare · Original Etching
• Language: English
• Inventory Number: 501AG

EUR 195,--