Blenheim Palace
The nation gave the Duke of Marlborough a palace in thanks for the victory over the French at Blenheim in 1704. Vanbrugh and Hawksmoor made it English Baroque on a monumental scale: a building meant to be seen from afar, with heavy masses and tower-like crowning features.
After the victory at the Battle of Blenheim in Bavaria in 1704, during the War of the Spanish Succession, Queen Anne gave John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, the royal manor of Woodstock and a promise of funds for a palace. John Vanbrugh, who was also a playwright, designed it with Nicholas Hawksmoor as his assistant. Work began in 1705. The state money dried up when the duke fell from favour, and the duchess, Sarah, who disliked Vanbrugh’s grand plans, dismissed him in 1716. Hawksmoor completed the work, and the palace was largely finished by 1722.
The palace is built around a large court, with the main block in the middle and lower wings for stables and kitchens on the sides. It is a symmetrical composition in which the masses rise towards the centre and are topped by heavy tower crowns with sculptures, trophies and balls. The portico has Corinthian columns. Inside are a great hall, a saloon with wall paintings and the long Library. Vanbrugh also built a huge bridge across the valley below. Later in the 18th century Lancelot Capability Brown dammed the river to form a lake, so that the bridge finally had water beneath it, and turned the gardens into an English landscape park.
Winston Churchill was born at Blenheim in 1874 and is buried at nearby Bladon. The palace is still owned by the Dukes of Marlborough and is open to visitors. It became a World Heritage Site in 1987. Blenheim is the grandest building of the English Baroque. At the same time it was criticised as heavy and impractical, and after Vanbrugh English architecture turned towards the calmer forms of Palladianism.