Designs for The Pavillon of Brighton.: Humbly inscirbed to His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales.

REPTON, Humphrey (1752-1818) - John Adey (1775-1860) and George Stanley (d.1858).

Designs for the Pavilion at Brighton.

London: T. Bensley for J.C.Stadler, to be sold by Boydell and Co. and others, 1808 [watermarked Whatman 1807].

Folio. 41 pp. (Prefatory Observcations), Letterpress title-page and dedication leaf. Illustrated with 20 engraved and or aquatint plates of views of the Pavillion and grounds, including plans, mostly hand-coloured or sepia washed, elaborate double-page and full-page designs with overlays, beautifully rendered by Stadler after Repton.

Modern half dark blue morocco, marbled boards, spine extra-gilt.

First edition, and early issue with watermarks dated 1807.

An extraordinary work illustrating Repton's unused plans for one of Britain's most iconic buildings. "Repton's shift in scaling dramatizes the visual consequences of his plans. In the before flap on tip, the Brighton pavilion appears hidden, isolated, distant--impressions intensified by the tiny person and by the over-writing on the shadowy building. When the flap is raised to reveal the proposed redesign, the space between us and the pavilion has now become intimate and comfortable, filled with well dressed visitors. Repton overreached in several other before/after comparisons, exaggerating the impact of his proposed improvements. In the plan at left, the design of the flap, the pole-people, and the integrated text are all ingenious and delightful--but the integrity of the work is compromised by persistent visual cheating" (Tufte, Visual Explanations, p.17). Repton was deeply flattered by "his most promising commission of all, to refashion the Royal Pavilion at Brighton for the prince of Wales. From the outset of his career Repton had sought royal patronage. When Thomas Sandby died in 1798 he tried unsuccessfully to secure, through his aristocratic contacts, the position of deputy rangership of Windsor Great Park, which Sandby had used to pursue landscaping and architecture. Repton worked on the commission for Brighton Pavilion with three of his sons, John Adey, George Stanley, and Humphry the younger. They chose an Indian style, explicitly modelled on the illustrations in volume 1 of William Daniell's Oriental Scenery (1805), and prepared a sumptuous red book. Repton was again disappointed. His design was not implemented, nor was he paid for his work; moreover, John Nash prepared another design loosely based on Repton's which was eventually built. Repton tried to salvage something from the commission by publishing Designs for the Pavillon [as here] at Brighton (1808)" (Stephen Daniels for DNB). Brighton Pavilion was a departure from Repton's usual restraint, in many ways, and he expected criticism for it, pre-empting the charges in his own "Prefatory Observations" Repton quotes himself from his "An Enquiry into the Changes of Taste in landscape Gardening and Architecture", 1806: ".we are on the eve of some great change in Landscape Gardening and Architecture, in consequence of our having lately become better acquainted with Scenery and Buildings in the interior provinces of India" (page 41)… [Arader Galleries]