An Overview of English Architecture

You can determine the period in which a building was constructed (or reconstructed) by its architectural and decorative details. In a country like England, where the age of buildings can span a thousand-year period (a few Anglo-Saxon churches are even older than that), many different styles evolved. The architectural periods are often named for the monarch or royal family reigning at the time. You can enhance your enjoyment of England’s abundance of historic buildings if you know a few key features of the different styles. The following list is a brief primer in English architectural history, from Norman to Victorian times:

• Norman (1066–1189): Round arches, barrel vaults, and highly decorated archways characterize this period’s Romanesque style.
• Early English Gothic (1189–1272): The squat, bulky buildings of the Norman period gave way to the taller, lighter buildings constructed in this style.
• Decorated Gothic (1272–1377): Buildings in this style have large windows, tracery (ornamental work with branching lines), and heavily decorated gables and arches.
• Perpendicular Gothic (1377–1483): Large buttresses (exterior side supports) allowed churches to have larger windows than ever before. Tracery was more elaborate than in previous Gothic buildings; the four-centered arch appeared; and architects perfected fan vaulting (a decorative form of vaulting in which the structural ribs spread upward and outward along the ceiling like the rays of a fan).
• Tudor (1485–1553): During this period, buildings evolved from Gothic to Renaissance styles. Large houses and palaces were built with a new material: brick. England has many half-timbered Tudor and Elizabethan domestic and commercial buildings. This method of construction used brick and plaster between visible wooden timbers.
• Elizabethan (1553–1603): The Renaissance brought a revival of classical features, such as columns, cornices (prominent rooflines with brackets and other details), and pediments (a decorative triangular feature over doorways and windows). The many large houses and palaces of this period were built in an E or H shape and contained long galleries, grand staircases, and carved chimneys.
• Jacobean (1603–1625): In England, Inigo Jones adopted the symmetrical, classically inspired Palladian style that arrived from Italy, but he used it in a freer and more fanciful way. Buildings in this style incorporate elements from ancient Greek and Roman architecture. Columns and pilasters, round-arch arcades, and flat roofs with openwork parapets became common.
• Stuart (1625–1688): Elegant classical features, such as columns, cornices, and pediments, are typical of this period, in which Sir Christopher Wren was the preeminent architect.
• Queen Anne (1689–1714): Buildings from the English baroque period mix heavy ornamentation with classical simplicity.
• Georgian and Regency (1714–1830): During these periods, elegant terraced houses were built; many examples survive in Brighton and Bath. Form and proportion were important elements; interior decoration inspired by Chinese motifs became fashionable. _ Victorian (1830–1901): A whole range of antique styles emerged —everything from Gothic and Greek Revival to pseudo-Egyptian and Elizabethan. Hundreds of English churches were renovated during the Victorian era.
• Modern, Postmodern, and Contemporary Architecture (1946–present): Massive destruction in World War II bombing raids meant rebuilding whole sections of London and other cities throughout England. International Modernism, adapted from European models, resulted in sleeker and simpler facades. The most iconic building from the modernist era is Royal Festival Hall, built on London’s South Bank for the Festival of Britain in 1951. Gargantuan and ungainly Postmodern office buildings went up in The City (London’s financial center) during the 1980s, borrowing architectural styles and elements from earlier and more gracefully coherent epochs. In the past decade, designer buildings by designer architects have popped up on the London skyline, most notably “the Gherkin,” a pickle-shaped City office tower, and the new London City Hall, a rounded glass building on the South Bank near Tower Bridge, both by Lord Norman Foster.