The Gothic Revival (1999) by Chris Brooks is another of those beautiful books in the Phaidon Arts & Ideas series, my Ideal Art Book. It is hardly the most mellifluously written book in the series, I believe because it is burdened by necessary but tedious lists of architects and buildings. I don't have a better suggestion - maybe tables, not lists? Hardly more elegant.
Regardless, the book did just what I wanted it to do, filling in a lot of the intellectual and artistic context of the Gothic Revival in England and elsewhere. Reading and teaching Ruskin led me here. If I ever go on a driving tour of England, I am going to return to this book an make my own list, of places to visit. The illustrations and building photography are superb, as in every book in the series.
Forget the buildings, though, and the ideas, and the political meaning of Belgian Gothic Revival ecclesiastical architecture. I want to look at bookshelves. To the left (from p. 340), we see The Great Bookcase (it has a name!), built 1859-62 by "William Burges and others." Take a trip to Knighthayes Court in Devon to see it for yourself. It's about ten and a half feet high. You might want to contact your local cabinet-maker and commission one of these. It's your duty, really, to help fight the recession.
The book owner who is understandably worried about the inadequate size of The Great Bookcase will want to consider the oak specimen pictured below (p. 356), built by the Austrians Bernardis and Kranner in 1850. This beauty was dispatched to the 1851 Geat Exhibition as an example of Austrian craftsmanship, and now resides in the Victoria and Albert Museum. The dimensions are 463 x 579 cm, or 15 ft 2 1/2 in x 19 ft. You could omit the little statues and towers if that's too tall for your library. Or you could raise the ceiling of your library.
Bookshelf lust! This adds a whole new dimension to the "When we win PowerBall..." fantasy discussion. Not only will we have a library in the house; we will have The Great Bookcase!
ReplyDeleteWow! Gorgeous!
ReplyDeleteWow, I wish I had seen these before I went and bought a plain but functional bookcase at IKEA the other weekend... oh well! Next time!
ReplyDeleteForget having these bookshelves installed in the house. I'd be happy just to live in bookcase itself!
ReplyDeleteWow, puts my plain bookshelves to shame. I live in a house built in 1950 and the ceilings are only 8 ft. I had better start working on raising the roof!
ReplyDeleteI'd be happy just to live in bookcase - yeah, that Austrian one looks like it has space for a kitchenette, at least.
ReplyDeleteThey're beauties, aren't they. I wonder how they would look with books in them, if my Penguin Classics would look a little inadequate.
Actually, despite that Gothic bookcase's huge size, it doesn't hold many books. The two outermost sections have 4 shelves but the other two sections only have 2. So unless you have enormous books, they won't take up much of the space. Unless you put books in the drawers, which is no place for books!
ReplyDeleteI suppose you're right; that's not the ideal bookcase for a bunch of old Penguin Classics.
ReplyDelete