John Thorpe - Cromwell Gardens, London, UK
N 51° 29.782 W 000° 10.253
30U E 696374 N 5708820
This statue of John Thorpe is one of many adorning the Cromwell Gardens facade of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.
Waymark Code: WMW0J4
Location: London, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 06/22/2017
Views: 1
The statue, that is probably 150% life-size, is set into an alcove that incorporates a pedestal. The statue is carved from a similar stone to that forming the alcove - probably Portland stone.
The statue shows John Thorpe in a standing position. He is wearing a waistcoat buttoned up to the neck with pantaloon type trousers and a cloak. His left hand is by his side holding a mainly rolled-up set of documents. His right hand is holding his cloak collar. His head is covered with a flat cap and he has longish hair covering his ears.
The name of the sculptor, Wenlock Rollins, is carved into the alcove behind the pedestal with the name "John Thorpe" carved at the base of the pedestal.
Wikipedia has an article about John Thorpe that tells us:
John Thorpe or Thorp (c.1565–1655?; fl.1570–1618) was an English architect.
Little is known of his life, and his work is dubiously inferred, rather than accurately known, from a folio of drawings in the Sir John Soane's Museum, to which Horace Walpole called attention, in 1780, in his Anecdotes of Painting; but how far these were his own is uncertain.
He was engaged on a number of important English houses of his time, and several, such as Longleat, have been attributed to him on grounds which cannot be sustained, because they were built before he was born. In 1570 when he was five years old, he laid the foundation stone of Kirby Hall, Northamptonshire his father being the Master mason of the project. He was probably the designer of Charlton House, in Charlton, London; the original Longford Castle, Wiltshire; Condover Hall and the original Holland House, Kensington; and he is said to have been engaged on Rushton Hall, Northamptonshire, and Audley End, Essex (with Bernard Janssens).
Thorpe joined the Office of Works as a clerk, then practised independently as a land surveyor. From 1611 he was assistant to Robert Tresswell, Surveyor-General of Woods South of the Trent. He retired in the 1630s but seems to have lived to an advanced age, dying around 1655.