From the Tudors to Wren
The Renaissance came late to England, first as decoration on Tudor houses and then through Inigo Jones. After the fire of London in 1666 Christopher Wren rebuilt the city.
Elizabethan houses such as Hardwick Hall have more glass than wall. Inigo Jones had seen Palladio’s buildings in Italy and designed the Queen’s House in Greenwich and the Banqueting House in Whitehall, England’s first fully classical buildings.
After the fire Wren built some fifty City churches and St Paul’s Cathedral, and John Vanbrugh and Nicholas Hawksmoor designed Blenheim Palace, a gift from the nation to the Duke of Marlborough.