From encyclopaedia to magazine: the Loudons, the public, and the architect in 1830s Britain. Issue 7 (2nd October 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Hultzsch, Anne
• Is Part Of: Journal of architecture. Volume 25:Issue 7(2020)
• Page Start: 844
• Page End: 872
• Publication Date: 2020-10-02
• Subjects: Architecture -- Periodicals; City planning -- Periodicals; 720
• DOI: 10.1080/13602365.2020.1833962
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1360-2365

Abstract

Abstract : John C. Loudon and Jane Webb Loudon formed one of the most productive publishing alliances in the fields of gardening, botany, and architecture in early nineteenth-century Britain. They employed a range of genres with particular skill, such as the encyclopaedia, the magazine, and the manual. Between 1834 and 1838, they produced the first British architectural magazine — then still a young genre. They strove to improve architectural taste among anyone involved with architecture: from the builder, student, and architect to the client and occupier, including women. This article examines the shortlived Architectural Magazine and the claim that its inclusive approach documented a brief period of architectural democratisation during the 1830s, before the exclusionary tendencies of professionalisation and institutionalisation took hold. Who made up the early architectural magazine's 'public', and in which ways can Loudon's approach indeed be called 'democratic'? To address such questions, this article considers the Architectural Magazine as a successor to Loudon's Encyclopaedia of Cottage, Farm, and Villa Architecture . It explores the networks of readers and authors established by the Loudons, and the relationship between the public and the emerging architectural profession, in light of contemporary aesthetic and political theory.