Etchings of Ancient Ornamental Architecture (1800) e Designs for Cottages (1805)

Charles Heathcote Tatham and Joseph Gandy played important roles in early Nineteenth century British artistic world: Tatham for his contribution to the development of applied arts, Gandy for being John Soane’s projects graphic executor, as well as a truly eclectic artist, hard to classify in traditional canons. Apparently disconnected and distant from each other, the two architects shared the experience of the trip to Rome, which took place simultaneously in the years 1794-1796, but if they boarded the same ship, they also moved in two diametrically opposite directions once arrived in Rome. The letters sent home by the two young artists confirm this, telling two completely dissimilar experiences of the same Rome and the Ancient. After returning home, between 1800 and 1806, both architects published some illustrated publications strongly linked to the recent trip. In both cases they are architectural model albums: two series of ’didactic’ engravings by Tatham, and two pattern books for rural buildings by Gandy. They are two extremely different editorial cases, but both based on the ’re-use’ of the Italian experiences of the authors and their personal interpretation of their time’s cult of antiquity.