The Royal Pavilion Brighton [FIRST EDITION]

Dinkel, John

Published by The Vendome Press, New York, 1983

About this Item

Fine condition dark blue linen boards with gold spine lettering contained in a fine condition non price-clipped color photographic dust jacket. The jacket is contained in a clear plastic Brodart type protective jacket cover. Includes Introduction; Brief Chronology; Acknowledgments and Index. Profusely illustrated with both color photographs and black-and-white photographs. A previous owners' vintage bookplate is neatly affixed to the center of the inner front board and name neatly scripted to the upper left corner of the blank first free front endpaper. All other pages are in fine unmarked condition and the spine/binding is in exceedingly tight and square condition (see photographs). "The Royal Pavilion at Brighton is an extraordinary building whose exotic outline is recognizable throughout the world and whose air of festivity, brilliance and pleasurable distraction has made it the symbol of the Regency period. With a mature confederation of styles - picturesque, romantic, Chinese, Indian - it is the last and most thorough-going expression of the aristocratic fascination with an idealized Eastern world that first blossomed with the rococo and that withered when exposed to the disillusionment of the 19th century. The Pavilion was the brainchild of the pleasure-loving King George IV, perhaps England's greatest palace builder. His was a rare combination if impeccable taste, passion for France's rococo and love of display linked with an unfailing belief in the Divine Right of Kings. And, after the death of his father - the more severe George III - colossal wealth permitted the fulfilment of his dream, the creation of a pleasure palace not only befitting the monarch of Europe's leading power after the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo, but surpassing the wildest dreams of an Oriental satrap. When the Prince Regent first came to Brighton, then a rather modest fishing village suffused in the continuously changing magic of the Channel light, it was a rather informal place. Pleasure seekers took the waters, were dipped in the sea, went to the races, hunted, gossiped and flirted in relatively unconstrained circumstances. In 1786, the Prince settled on a modest cottage, Brighton House, that was rich in possibilities and must have held the thrill of fashionable, romantic poverty. Three months later, thanks to the work of architect Henry Holland, the small farm house was but a single element in a villa of Palladian dignity linked to a duplicate of itself by a striking domed rotunda, half encircled by Ionic columns. And in 1801, Holland produced sketches which contained the first intimations of an exotic taste which was soon to fold its wings around the Pavilion and dominate the interior decoration of the next quarter century." - from the inner front jacket flap. Seller Inventory # 008628

Bibliographic Details

Title: The Royal Pavilion Brighton [FIRST EDITION]

Publisher: The Vendome Press, New York

Publication Date: 1983

Binding: Hardcover

Illustrator: Johnson, Richard (book design); ELgin, Kathy (series editor)

Condition: Fine

Dust Jacket Condition: Fine

Edition: 1st Edition