1840.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



201 



the ground will admit of it, public buildings can hardly be too grand 

 and magnificent ; but where they cannot be seen when finished, use 

 and convenience only should be consulted, and a pile of rough stones 

 from the quarry, w-ould answer the end, as well as the marble of Egypt 

 with the decorations of Greece or Rome. 



Newgate, considered as a prison, is a structure of more cost and 

 beauty than was necessary, because the sumptuousness of the out-side 

 but aggravates the misery of the wretches within : but as a gate to 

 such a city as London, it might have received considerable additions 

 both of design and execution, and abundantly answered the cost in the 

 reputation of building. 



The Physicians College, in Warwick-lane, Newgate-street, (now 

 occupied as a market on the ground floor,) a structure little known and 

 seldom talked of, is a. building of wonderful delicacy, and eminently 

 deserves to be considered among the noblest ornaments of this city ; 

 and yet so unlucky is its situation, that it can never be seen to advan- 

 tage, nay seldom seen at all, and wdiat ought to be conspicuous to 

 every body, is known only to a few, and those too people of curiosity, 

 who search out their own entertainments, and do not wait for the im- 

 pressions of vulgar reports or common fame, to cs.cite their attention 

 or influence their judgments. 



The hall of justice at the Old Bailey, and indeed all the courts I 

 have ever yet seen in England are justly to be excepted to, as wanting 

 that grandeur, that augustness, that decency, and solemnity which 

 ought to be inseparable irom them, in order to give men in general a 

 suitable awe for the place, and strike offenders with a terror, even 

 more forcible than the sentence they were to undergo. The form of a 

 theatre agrees best with a place of "this nature : that part of the build- 

 ing wdiich is the stage, would answer exactly for the bench, the pit for 

 the council, prisoners, &c., and the circle round it, for the spectators: 

 but the present form of these assemblies is utterly ojiposite to this 

 regularity, and instead of representing the wdiole' in cue grand and 

 comprehensive view, divides it into me'amiess and confusion. 



(To be continued.) 



PAPIER MACHE. 



Extracts from an Historical Account of the Application of Papier Mache 

 for Architectural Ornaments. By Charles Frederick Bielefeld. 



WITH AN ENGRAVING, PLATE XI. 



Of the Interior of the Pantlieon, Oxford Street. 



[The following account we have selected from the preface to Mr. 

 Bielefeld's work on Papier Machi- ornaments ; the subjoined plate 

 shows how far Papier Mache may be introduced with consitlerable 

 taste, and a richness of effect produced, which is not so easily ob- 

 tained by any other kind of ornament at the same ex]ience, besides 

 the facility it affords in being fixed immediately the carpenters' work 

 is finished, and painted directly afterwards.] 



" Though paper be one of fhe commonest bodies that we use, there are 

 very few that imagine it is lit to be employed other ways than ia writing, or 

 printing, or wrapping up of other things, or about some such obvious piece 

 of service, without dreaming that frames of pictures and divers fine pieces of 

 embossed work, with other carious moveables, may, as trial has informed us, 

 be made of it." — (Of man's great ignorance of the uses of natural things ; 

 Boyle, vol. ni. page 485, ed. m.dcc.lxxii. 



Notwithstanding the name that has been given to the material, which 

 would seem to imply that it is of French extraction, there is yet very good 

 reason to believe that to England is to he attributed the merit of first apply- 

 ing this manufacture to important uses. Light and trivial articles, snch as 

 snuff-boxes, cups, &c. had, on the Continent, been made of Papier-Mache for 

 a long course of time ; but, from the following passage from an article " sur 

 I'Art de Moulage," in the " EncyclopucUe Mcthodiqne," we may safely con- 

 jecture that here first it was apphed to the builder's purposes : " Les Anglois 

 font en carton les ornamens des plafonds que nous faisons en platre : ils sont 

 plus durables ; sc dctachent difficUement, on s'ils se detachent, le danger est 

 md et la reparation est peu (hspendieuse." (Vol. v. Paris, 1788.) We may 

 here take occasion to remark, that the writer of the above passage appears to 

 have perfectly understood the pecuUar merits of Papier-lluche ; and it woidd 

 be impossible to explain more concisely or more accurately than in that short 

 paragraph, the more valuable qualities of this material. The particular cir- 

 cumstances that gave rise to the adoption of Papier-Mache by the architec- 

 tural decorator in England, deserves the especial notice of all who are inte- 

 rested ia the welfare of our manufactures. 



It should be premised, that with the Ehzahcthan style, or the " renaissance," 

 of England, enriched plaster cedings were very generally brought into use, 

 and in the more classic or ItaUan styles that followed, the same material was 

 still more extensively and more boldly employed. As the art advanced, 

 plaster became partially substituted for carved or panelled wood wainscoting 

 ou walls ! botli in that situation and upon ceilings, foliage of the highest re- 



lief and of the richest character, may at the present day he found in the more 

 important edifices remaining of the 17th and beginning of the 18th cen- 

 turies : these enrichments were generally worked or rather modelled by the 

 hand upon the stucco in its place, whilst still in a soft and plastic state. 



As this work had to be done on the spot, and with much ra])idity of exe- 

 cution, in order to prevent the stucco from setting before it had acquired the 

 intended form, the art was somewhat difficult ; tlie workman had to design 

 almost as he worked : therefore, to do it well, it was necessary that he should 

 have some of the acquirements and qualities of an artist. This circumstance 

 of com'se tended very much to hmit the number of workmen, and theh pay 

 became proportionably large. 



It was no unnatural consequence that artisans thus circumstanced assumed 

 a consequence that belonged not to their humble rank in hfe j it ia said that 

 they might have been seen coming to their work girt with swords, and hav- 

 ing their wrists adorned with lace ruffles. Such a state of things was, as may 

 be conceived, attended with many inconveniences to their employers ; it was 

 scarcely possilile to preserve that subordination so essentially necessary in 

 carrying on the business of a builder, and ultimately the workers in stucco, 

 laying aside all restraint, combined together to extort from their employers 

 a most inordinate rate of wages. It would be supeiliuous here to detail all 

 the circumstances that followed ; it is sufficient to state that, as might have 

 been anticipated, the total ruin of their art was the final result of these de- 

 lusive efforts to promote their individual interests. 



Contrivances were resorted to by tl e masters, which soon supplanted the 

 old mode of working in stucco. The art of moulding and casting in plaster, 

 as previously practised in France, was generally introduced, and the art of 

 jireparing the pulp of paper became improved and extended, so as ultimately 

 to render practicable the adoption of Papier-Miiche in the formation of archi- 

 tectural decorations. Thus .at last was extinguished the original mode of 

 producing stucco ornaments, and there probably has not been for many years 

 a single inilividual in England accustomed to that business. 



The superior cheapness of the ])rocess of casting in plaster bro\ight it into 

 almost universal use ; for, although in the course of the last century an im- 

 mense trade was carried on in the manufacture* of architectural and other 

 ornaments in Papier-Mache, yet the poverty of taste they generally displayed, 

 .and the imperfection of machinery at that time, which i)revented this ma- 

 terial from coping with plaster in respect to price, ultimately caused its dis- 

 use. The mannfactiu'ers of Papier-Mache at that period do not seem to have 

 been .aware of the great improvements of which every process of their art 

 proves now to have been susceptible. 



A most mischievous effect, however, was produced in the art of decorative 

 designing by this change in the mode of execution. All the deep nudereut- 

 tings and hold shadows which marked the style of design in the age of Queen 

 Anne, became impracticable when ornaments were to be cast. A meagre, 

 tame, petite manner ensued almost of necessity, untd by the end of the last 

 century the art of designing architectural ornament had fallen into a deplor- 

 able state of imbecility. 



The subsequent introduction of Greek ornament formed a new era : the 

 limited cai)abihties of plaster-casting became then less inconvenient, for the 

 broad, flat character of the Greek style was favourable to the process of cast- 

 ing, and had that manner of designing continued to prevail goierally up to 

 the present day, it is probable that no material change would have taken 

 place in the manufacture of ornament. But great fluctuations have occurred 

 in the public taste : the pure and elegant simplicity of Greek ornament is iu 

 its nature appreciable only by the more highly cultivated tastes ; the gene- 

 rahty of persons do not understand its merits ; therefore, after the stimulus 

 of novelty had ceased to operate, fashion soon led the public favour into other 

 channels. The Ijold originality of the Gothic school, the gorgeous and mere- 

 tricious richness of the Flemish and French schools, the ]iicturesque and fan- 

 tantic forms of the Elizabethan style, soon found many adnjirers, and it ia 

 this great change in the manner of designing ornament that has given rise to 

 the important improvements in the manufacture of the highly plastic substance 

 called Papier-Mache. Plaster is totally inapplicable to the exact imitation of 

 the bold florid carvings in the above named styles, whilst to carve in wood 

 all these fanciful forms would occasian a cost far beyond the means of all 

 ordinary purses. As to the putty-composition, a material intru<luced at the 

 latter end of the last century as a substitute for wood carving in picture 

 frames, &c. its monstrous weight, its brittle, impracticable nature, and the 

 difliculties and heavy expenses necessarily incurred in its manufactm-e, as well 

 as in ILxing it up, render it properly apphcable to a veiy hmited range of pur. 

 poses. 



Having made these preliminary remarks upon the origin of Papier-Mache, 

 and the causes of its improvement and re-introduction, we will proceed to 

 the more important objects of the present brief ess.-iy, and describe, for the 

 information of practical men, the mode of applying the material to the various 

 uses for which it is so admirably adapted. We will only premise, that the 

 application of steam power, and the vast improvements that have of late been 

 made in all branches of mcclianics, have enabled the present manufacturer to 

 produce a material ahke only in name to the Papier-Mache of the last cen- 

 tiu-y : its hard compactness, its strength, its imperishable nature, its tracta- 

 bihty (if such an expression may be allowed), the facility with which it may 

 be put together and fixed up, its lightness, the rapidity with which it may be 

 prepared and fixed, and finally its cheapness, are qualities which eminently 

 distinguish it, but which cannot perhaps be fully appreciated but by those 

 wUo have had e.\ten5ive experience in its use, 



2fi 



