A View of the Mansion House

This etching was one of a series of prints produced in the early 1750s of the popular view of the Mansion House. Many of the views are very similar with slight differences in the positioning of the figures.

Completed in 1753 after a design by George Dance the elder (1741-1825) the Mansion House was positioned in the heart of the City to provide a permanent residence for the Lord Mayor of London. This view shows the Palladian Mansion House on the right and looks towards Cornhill on the left and Lombard Street. The tower of the Royal Exchange can also be seen on the left. This print was produced by successful engraver and print publisher Thomas Bowles, to capitalise upon the current interest in the new building. It was produced in 1751 (and the collection has a complementary copper engraving of the same view also produced in 1751 by Bowles ( 53.52/13)) before completion of the building. It has a deliberately enhanced perspective which lent itself to future reproduction as a ‘perspective view’ to be viewed through a specially made optical diagonal machine. This gave the appearance of three-dimensionality in a print.

A coloured version of this print appeared in the publisher Robert Sayer’s Catalogue entitled ‘Two Hundred and Six Perspective Views adapted to the Diagonal Mirror, or Optical Pillar Machine’ in 1753. It was also reproduced in 1794 by the publishers Laurie & Whittle who had taken over the Sayer business. Two versions of this print production are in the collection (A13535 and Z1434).