A Popular Account of the Styles of Architecture: Their Rise, Progress, and Present Conditions.

Blue blind stamped cloth with bright gilt titling on upper boards. Rubbed and worn edges. Slightly soiled cover. Previous owners faded name and date of 1855 on ffep. A very few spots. 80 pages clean and tight. The book is the Prize essay for the "Institute Medal" of the Royal Institute of British Architects a sound copy. "PREFACE. THE object of this Essay, which has been honoured with the highest mark of approval the Institute of Architects can bestow, is to convey to the general public, within a small compass and in a popular manner, free from technical ambiguities, a comprehensive historical account of the various Styles of Architecture, with the view of promoting comparisons between the past and present conditions of the Art. The respective merits of the different systems, and the impropriety of reproducing the ancient edifices in modern times, are fully considered; and the concluding portion is devoted to a brief disquisition on the singular isolation of Architecture, as a Fine Art, from that law of progress, which in this, the nineteenth century, so forcibly applies to every other branch of human knowledge. For the views he has ventured to express, the Author claims that amount of originality, which consists in his endeavours to initiate in his articles in " THE BUILDER," and on the present occasion, a philosophical inquiry, and to expatiate on what has been heretofore but casually treated; namely, the absolute necessity for a total revision of the anomalous system of practice adopted by the architects of the present day. E. L. T. 54, King William Street, London Bridge, 22nd March, 1855." Size: 8vo.…