The villa designed to be a Roman masterpiece, not a Renaissance copy
In short: Lord Burlington didn't just want a pretty house; he wanted to resurrect the lost grandeur of ancient Rome. By rejecting popular designs in favor of obscure reconstructions and specific geometric forms, he created a symbolic landscape that functioned as an architectural manifesto for Augustan England.
Completed in 1729 by Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington, Chiswick House was a deliberate attempt to recreate the atmosphere of a Roman villa. While many contemporary buildings were mere 'Renaissance pastiches,' Burlington sought to reinstate the canons of Roman architecture as described by Vitruvius. He achieved this by relying on his own collection of drawings—including those by Palladio and Scamozzi—which featured reconstructions of lost Roman buildings rather than just existing Italian structures.
The villa's geometry is a complex puzzle of influences. Its steep-pitched dome derives from the Pantheon in Rome, while its octagonal forms (found in the Upper Tribunal and cellar) may stem from Scamozzi’s Rocca Pisana or drawings by Sebastiano Serlio. Even the facade serves as a visual quote: the Corinthian capitals are modeled on the Temple of Castor and Pollux, while the rusticated 'v'-necked masonry mimics Trajan's Column. To emphasize these links, Burlington even placed full-length statues of Palladio and Inigo Jones in front of crenellated walls inspired by Venetian churches.
The surrounding landscape was equally ambitious, intended to evoke Emperor Hadrian’s Villa Adriana at Tivoli. Designed primarily by William Kent, the gardens incorporated a 'theatre of hedges' (an exedra) and a lawn featuring Cedar of Lebanon trees alternating with stone funerary urns. This wasn't just gardening; it was an attempt to build a symbolic Roman world in west London, creating what Horace Walpole famously dubbed "the beautiful model."
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- Summary by Intellect · source: Chiswick House
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