| Frederick Hervey’s connection with Ireland was through his eldest brother, the 2nd Earl of Bristol. Briefly Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (1766-7) the Earl appointed Hervey to the bishopric of Cloyne and a year later to the much richer see of Derry. Dying in 1775, the Earl was succeeded by his younger brother, and he in turn (on 22 December 1779) by the Bishop who thus became the 4th Earl of Bristol and was thereafter known as the Earl-Bishop. The construction of Downhill Castle was begun by the Bishop in 1776. Built on the edge of steep cliffs overlooking the Atlantic five miles west of Coleraine, it was intended as no more than a villa. The construction in a rough, dark local basalt was supervised by Michael Shanahan (c.1731-1811) an architect and mason from Cork who was resident agent on the Downhill estate for eleven years from 1772. His task seems to have been ‘to give concrete form to his employer’s volatile notions and his role that of an executant rather than an initiator’ (Irish Architectural Archive Database of Irish Architects 1720-1940). The Bishop spent a great deal of time in Italy, taking Shanahan with him to make sketches and measured drawings in 1770-2. On a later visit to Rome in 1778, the Bishop let it be known that he would welcome designs for a new dining room. Among others, Soane submitted a design and this was to give rise to a quarrel with George Henderson, another young English architect abroad (see note to No. 11). Of the designs made in Italy, the rectangular plans (Nos 1-3) kept more or less to the 36 x 24 feet dimensions found also on Henderson’s design and presumably specified by Hervey. Another plan form arose from a shared tour from Rome to Naples that saw Soane and the Bishop (on Christmas Day 1778) discovering the so-called ‘triclinium’ of Lucullus (see SM volume 164/pp.5-10). Soane drew out its half-elliptical plan, later using it as the source for a dining room on a similar plan for Downhill (Nos 4i, iv) and at the same time making a rough design for remodelling and enlarging the principal front (No. 4ii). A plan of Downhill (No.5) includes a design for a semi-elliptical room. The same plan gives some idea of what Soane found at the Earl-Bishop’s residence after he had been persuaded to cut short his stay in Rome and come to Downhill. As does the note/sketchbook kept by Soane (SM volume 80) that, as well as design proposals, details the bad planning, smoky chimneys, lack of conveniences and of a proper water supply, poor soundproofing, ill-fitting doors, windows and shutters and other evidence of poor practice and bad workmanship that he found at Downhill soon after his arrival on 27 July 1780. See Sketchbook data base for 'Downhill' note/sketchbook, 1780-1 (SM volume 80/ff.1-18v, 24). The rough plans from which are also given here - drawing 6i-iv. Except for the east wing, Downhill was gutted by fire in 1851, rebuilt in 1876 and dismantled after 1918. It is now a gaunt ruin in a landscape park with a Mausoleum (q.v.) and other buildings administered by the National Trust Literature. E.E.R.Green, ‘Downhill Castle, County Derry, Northern Ireland’, Country Life, CVII, 1950 , pp.34-8; Brinsley Ford, ‘The Earl-Bishop’: an eccentric and capricious patron of the arts’, Apollo, VOLUME ? {June} 1974, pp.426-434; P. Rankin, ‘Downhill, Co. Derry 1-II, Country Life, CL, 1971, pp.94-7, 154-7; P.du Prey, John Soane's architectural education 1753-80, 1977, pp.139-44; P. du Prey, ' Je n'oublieray jamais: John Soane and Downhill,' Quarterly Bulletin of the Irish Georgian Society, XXI, Nos 3 & 4, 1978, pp.17-40; P.du Prey, John Soane: the making of an architect, 1982, pp.110-11, 114-118 |
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| Purpose: | Presentation design, 1778 |
| Aspect: | 1 Floor plan and laid-out wall elevations/sections of a room with a coffered barrel vault ceiling with half-domes at each end. Ten detached Ionic columns outline a rectangular plan with a windowed apsidal end at the east end |
| Hand: | Soane |
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| Purpose: | Design with a reduced plan of John Henderson's rival scheme, 1778 |
| Aspect: | 2 Floor plan and laid-out wall elevations/sections of a room with a shallow domed ceiling on an oval plan, supported by two detached and six attached Corinthian columns. The apsidal end with three windows is at the west end. With reduced plan labelled (pencil) Mr Henderson, Rome showing an oval plan with four segmental apses within a rectangle; and an oval ceiling plan. Verso of right-hand side of drawing (volume 59/7), a rough (pencil) plan of a large, nine-part building with differently shaped rooms - apparently unrelated to Downhill. |
| Hand: | Soane |
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| Purpose: | 'Last' presentation design, 1778 or 1779 |
| Aspect: | 3 Floor plan and laid-out wall elevations/sections of a room with shallow domed ceiling on an oval plan, supported by eight detached Corinthian columns. The apsidal end with three windows is at the west end opposite a wall with a niche between two doors , and a long north wall with chimney-piece and two alcoves opposite another with three tall sash windows. The design of the stone floor echoes that of the coffered (elliptical) domical ceiling. |
| Hand: | Soane |
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| Purpose: | 4 Preliminary designs (from volume 39, Italian sketchbook) for a dining room on a semi-elliptical plan after the supposed 'triclinium' of Lucullus, together with a design for remodelling the south front, 1779 |
| Aspect: | i) 86v Rough plan for a new dining room on a half-ellipse, the room measuring 36 by 25 feet with two large alcoves to the north and six small ones and with a segmental 'portico' at the west end. Also shown is an existing adjacent room with a canted bay; three internal wall elevations/sections with a domical ceiling and a height to the cornice of 18.0 feet (ii) 87r Rough elevation of three storeys and 12 bays for the remodelling and enlargement of Downhill's principal front with a piano nobile over a low ground floor (with three Diocletian windows) and with pavilion ends that have a large tripartite window beneath a blind semicircular arch, an attic storey and hipped roof. A giant order marks the divisions of the bays and encloses the bowed terrace against each end wall; a door, approached by a double flight of steps, is shown in the centre bay (iii) 87v Rough perspective of the pavilion end shown on (ii); rough rectangular plan divided lengthwise by a ? drain, each half 13.9 feet wide and attached to a small building 12.6 x 12.2 (iv) 88r Rough variant plan for dining room on a half-ellipse: To preserve the Views – a Circular Portico at / each end in lieu of the Bows, with gilded / Ironwork between the Columns |
| Hand: | Soane |
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| Purpose: | Design for addition of of pavilion wings, 1779-80 |
| Aspect: | 5 Plan of existing house with proposed east and west additions; rough (pencil) elevation of north wall of proposed semi-elliptical room to the east |
| Hand: | Soane |
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| Purpose: | Rough plans for alterations and additions extracted from Downhill note/sketchbook, 27July-2 September 1780 |
| Aspect: | 6 (Sketches extracted from Downhill note/sketchbook) f.1recto Rough plan of room 63:0 feet long, 36.0 feet without the apse at each end and 22.0 feet wide; rough part-section with dimensions given, with notes: Windows from the floor / abt 2':10" / Windows 9 feet 3 high, floor to ceiling 18.4½, height of barrel vault ceiling 7.0 f.2 recto Rough plan of a 3-sided arrangement of external steps following the outline of a canted bay window f.2 verso Rough plan of a re-arranged bedroom labelled A, B, B and 8 [feet] 6 [inches] with note Partition & door at A. / B.B. make a dressing room here with an / angular Chy 8 [feet] 6 [inches] wide, with / a door with it from the Passage f.4 recto Plan and 2 elevations of a design for a casino with a circular domed 36 foot Drawg Room , Eatg Room with apsidal ends measuring 24 by 36, and 24 foot Libr[ary]. The North front has a pedimented portico in antis on a concave plan; the South front has a semicircular bow with 6 attached columns; pencil additions. Perhaps Soane's idea of what the original design for Downhill should have been. See also Alternative designs for a (hunting) casino, c.1780 CROSS REFERENCE NEEDED f.6 verso Rough plan of the existing stair (contained within a bow on the north front) with proposed WCs to be built on either side labelled K, B, A1, A, C, D, E f.11 recto (pencil) Rough part-plan with proposed entrance corridor 10.0 feet wide, twin bow-fronted west gallery, 60.0 feet long, and rough part-section. In the 1780s the west side was extended north for a new gallery with twin bows f.11 verso and f.12 recto Rough but neat part-plan showing the existing stair with Soane's proposed WCs and extending northwards a new west wing that includes a room, 36.0 by 24.0 feet with wide semicircular alcoves at each end (56 feet total length)and windows on one side only; with 2 sections showing the internal decoration, labelled door f.13 verso Rough plan of a set of rooms labelled A, B, C, D with key A. Anti Room / B. Lady Erne’s dress. Room / C. Lord E. do / D. Lord & Lady's Bed.C. f.14 verso rough plan (related to plan on f.2 verso) labelled a and 8'.6" / To take away the present partition shewn by the / dotted lines, build a small Chimney in the Angle / & take in 8/6 of the present Alcove & Closet / for a dressing room ... f.15 recto Rough thumbnail plan of proposed Room / of 36 by 24 [that Lord Bristol wishes changed] into a Gallery of 40 by 20
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| Hand: | Soane |
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| Purpose: | Record copies of drawings, 1791 or later (2) |
| Aspect: | 7-8 Floor plans and laid-out wall elevations/sections, reduced copies of Nos 1 and 3 respectively |
| Hand: | pupil |
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| Purpose: | Record copies of drawings, 1796 (2) |
| Aspect: | 9-10 Floor plans and laid-out wall elevations/sections, copies of drawings 3 and 1 respectively |
| Hand: | Robert Smirke (briefly a pupil 1796-7) |
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| Purpose: | Record drawing related to drawing 2 with reduced plans of Henderson' s scheme |
| Aspect: | 11 Floor/ceiling plan and laid-out wall elevations/sections; reduced floor and ceiling plans labelled Mr Henderson with reduced plan to same scale of Soane's design as shown on drawing 2 |
| Hand: | Soane |
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