Amateur architects.(Report from Europe)(Brief article)

The grand tour so beloved by British aristocrats in the eighteenth century had a number of effects. The best known is the accumulation of works of art that found their way from Italy to the United Kingdom, as many wealthy tourists assembled large collections which they then shipped home. The second effect was the building of houses in which to keep these collections, many of which were designed by the returning gentlemen themselves, who had been inspired by what they saw on the Continent. The Swiss painter and writer Jean Andre Rouquet remarked in 1755 that "in England more than in any other country, every man would fain to be his own architect."

These houses varied greatly in quality and style. Some designers slavishly copied the Palladian ideal, while others went their own individual ways. Thomas Worsley, for ...