The Lord Mayor's 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 in the prints.

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 on the right and looks towards Cornhill on the left and Lombard Street. The tower of the Royal Exchange can be seen on the left. This print was produced by successful engraver Paul Fourdrinier, to capitalise upon the current interest in the new building. It was produced in 1751. There is also a coloured engraving of this view in the collection (59.34/24).

The collection has a copper engraving (53.52/13) and etching (59.34/5) of Mansion House from the same viewpoint, but without the Lord Mayor's procession, also produced in 1751 by Thomas Bowles, before completion of the building.

All the prints have 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 the Thomas Bowles print without the mayoral procession 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).

This print appeared in the publication Stow's Survey.