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Petworth House
The North Front
The view from the North Front of the House.
The building to the right of the photo is the main House and the Square
Bay can be seen with its round headed windows. The white box shapes over the
bay windows are the skylights which allow natural light into the Gallery.
The original gallery was formed by using the tall round-headed arches of
the earlier cloister (by turning them into windows), which served the Chapel
at the north-east corner of the house. The cloister ran the full width
of the of the north front, and above it the 6th Duke of Somerset refaced the
façade of the main building with distinctive rustication reminiscent of engravings
in Rubens's 'Palazzi di Genova'.
The Duke had the 1652 edition of this famous book in his library.
The arcade or cloister beneath was presumably also refaced in the same style
by the same 6th Duke, and was probably similar to the rusticated arches and
pillars of the north front of Boughton, Northamptonshire, rebuilt in the 1690s
and early 1700s for Ralph Montagu, later 1st Duke of Montagu, probably to
the design of Daniel Marot.
In 1749/50 the 'North Cloisters' were furnished with '4 Marble Tables
on Walnuttree frames' and '6 broken cane chairs'. In the Proud Duke's
day, the cloister faced an enclosed orange garden the width of the house,
with an orangery at the far end. The lawn here is still called the Orange Green.
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