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Dromo's Den
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[Up] [Dromo's Den] Christopher Wren Biography WREN, Sir Christopher (1632–1723) One of the greatest of English architects, born at Knowle, Wiltshire. He was a graduate of Wadham College, Oxford, fellow of All Souls' in 1653, and Savilian professor of astronomy in 1660. He was one of the founders of the Royal Society and its president in 1681. As a scientist and mathematician of wide reputation he was in 1663 appointed one of the commissioners for the repair of old St. Paul's Cathedral (q.v.), London. There were at this time few trained architects in England, and Wren, finding himself gradually drawn, by frequent consultations on building matters, into a profession which he had not originally intended to follow, devoted himself to its study with increasing enthusiasm. In 1665 he began the Sheldonian Theatre at Oxford and the Library of Trinity College, Cambridge. The great fire of London in 1666 gave the real opportunity for the manifestation of his genius; from that time on for forty years there was hardly an important building in or near London planned without his aid. Winchester Palace, an extensive addition to Hampton Court, Chelsea Hospital, Marlborough and Buckingham Houses, the old Royal Exchange, Greenwich Hospital (in part), and a series of fifty-three parish churches in London, are among the works. He employed assistants and deputies to carry out his plans, but impressed the stamp of his individual style on everything that was in his charge. He showed extraordinary ability in producing monumental effects with slender financial resources; and was the originator of the modern Renaissance type of steeple. For his great masterpiece, see St. Paul's Cathedral. Working in an age when his art had declined in England, he raised the standard of taste by his refinement and propriety of design. His work exerted strong influence on the nascent architecture of the American colonies, especially that of churches, though it is doubtful whether he designed any American buildings. He is buried in St. Paul's, his tablet bearing the well-known epitaph, "Si monumentum requiris circumspice" The New International Encyclopaedia, Vol. XXIII (New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1920) 743. |