The Guildhall Art Gallery

 

The bust of Sir Christopher Wren

My day out in the City of London in June 2021 had started on Queen Victoria Street, where I saw the first of many churches built by Sir Christopher Wren after the Great Fire of London and, half an hour later, I arrived at the Guildhall Art Gallery.

 

The Guildhall Art Gallery

I had never seen this building before, which was built in 1999 to a design by Richard Gilbert Scott, but I took an immediate like to it, especially the Portland stone busts of Samuel Pepys, Christopher Wren, William Shakespeare and Oliver Cromwell and the use of various decorative stones in the arcade – including travertine, Baltic Brown granite, Rosso Verona marble and Sardinian Rosa Beta granite.

 

The bust of Oliver Cromwell

The facade is built in Portland limestone, which has been used ubiquitously in London since its use at the Banqueting House (1622) by Inigo Jones, on Whitehall. On this occasion, the appearance of the ashlar on the pilasters is broken up by the use of blocks of Portland Roach, which has had its fossils dissolved out to leave a very open texture.

 

Portland Roach and Rosa Beta granite

 

In the interior of the building, large areas of the floors are made of large squares of an attractive veined pink/beige marble that I am not familiar with, together with Baltic Brown and Rosso Verona used for inlays and travertine for the borders.

 

Various decorative stones

 

I then made my way down into the basement to see the foundations of the Roman amphitheatre, which I am assuming is built  with Kentish Ragstone from the area around Maidstone in Kent. This very hard and intractable siliceous limestone is found in the London Wall and many of the older mediaeval buildings of London, as well as Victorian churches, and was imported along the River Medway and River Thames from Maidstone in Kent.

 

A section of walling

 

The remains of the amphitheatre were discovered in 1988 and, although a very significant archaeological find, there isn't actually that much to see for a geologist, but there are plenty of information panels spread around and I think that it was well worth making the effort to visit.

 

Views of the remains of the Roman amphitheatre

With many places on my itinerary still to visit, I only had a very brief look around the various galleries on the upper levels and was mainly interested in the statues and sculptures, whose pedestals are made out of various veined and coloured marbles.

 

Prince Charles by David Wynne

 

With my experience of stone used in buildings being largely restricted to the exteriors, my knowledge of the marble industry isn’t extensive and there aren’t many that I could readily identify. The reference book that I use: Decorative Stone – The Complete Sourcebook by Monica Price, which is based on the small samples in the Corsi Collection, doesn’t help much in this instance.

 

The plinth to a statue by Edwin Roscoe Mullins

 

Using another reference book - Stones and Marbles of Wallonia - I think the pedestal to the statue by Edwin Roscoe Mullins could be Rouge Royal or a similar Belgian limestone; however, once a known example of a marble is seen in numerous large panels, where a full range of characteristic variations in colour and texture are seen, the identification becomes much easier.

 

The bust of "Clytie"

 

The green striped marble used for the plinth to the bust of "Clytie" reminds me very much of the stone used in the lobby of Sheffield Central Library, which I have seen described as Swedish Green marble, but I have not seen much of this marble and am happy to be corrected.

 

A detail of the plinth to the bust of "Clytie"