Touches of beauty

Wilton House, Wiltshire The seat of the Earl of Pembroke In the early 18th century, Wilton underwent improvement at the hands of the 9th Earl of Pembroke, an enthusiastic amateur architect. For a new book on this great house, John Martin Robinson assesses his remarkable legacy

- John Martin Robinson

THE splendours of Wilton today owe a great deal to the early 18th century and the figure of Henry, 9th Earl of Pembroke, (1689–1750), known as the ‘Architect’ Earl. His often-overlooked contribution to this magnificent house—in origin a great Benedictine convent that was suppressed at the Reformation and repeatedly remodelled thereafter—was described by Horace Walpole: ‘The towers, the chambers, the scenes which Holbein, Jones and Vandyke had decorated, and which Earl Thomas had enriched with the spoils of the best ages, received the last touches of beauty from Earl Henry’s hand… No one had a purer taste in building than Earl Henry, of which he gave a few specimens besides his work at Wilton.’

As a young man, Henry developed an intense interest in architecture. He was educated at Christ Church, Oxford, where he came under the influence of the Dean, Dr Henry Aldrich (1648–1710), an arbiter of architectural taste involved in many major projects in the university. These included the construction, from 1707, of Peckwater Quadrangle at Christ Church, to which, as an undergraduate, Henry subscribed £20.

The landscape gardens were described as “Nature converted into paradise”

After matriculating in 1705, Henry went on the Grand Tour. He visited Venice in 1712, observing the architecture of Palladio, and spent time in Rome, where he met the eminent English architect, decorator and painter William Kent (1685–1748). He also went to Naples with the philosopher Earl of Shaftesbury.