Trinity College Church

Category

Library Item

Item no

43377

Title

Trinity College Church

Description

This image from James Grant's sketchbook shows the church from the south-east, with the south transept projecting out on the left, the porch next to it leading into the south aisle, and the choir behind ending to the right with a curved apse with three tall windows.

Artist / maker

Grant, James

Date

1845

Size

23.0 x 40.0 cm

Type

Ink and colour; Pen work; Wash drawing

Location

Edinburgh and Scottish Collection

Grant wrote of Trinity College Church: 'With the exception of Holyrood, it was the finest example of decorated English Gothic architecture in the city, with many of the peculiarities of the age to which it belonged'. Grant's sketchbook includes detailed visual records of Trinity College Church, made in the knowledge that it was going to be demolished. In the sketchbook he drew: a floor plan 'drawn from measurement' in 1847; seven exterior views from different angles; and thirteen pages of details from the church, such as columns, capitals, grotesques and coats-of-arms.
He recorded that the choir was 90 feet long and the width across the transepts was 70 feet. The floor plan was used as the basis for engraving which was included in the first volume of his Old and New Edinburgh series from the 1880s, which traces the history of Edinburgh through its architecture. Interestingly, this sketchbook does not include any drawings of the hospital buildings, which obviously did not interest Grant as much as the church itself; he discusses the interiors of the hospital buildings in Old and New Edinburgh, but the book only includes partial views of it.

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Related subjects

Architecture > Architectural features > Doors and doorways

Architecture > Architectural features > Roofs

Architecture > Architectural features > Tracery windows

Places > Edinburgh areas > Old Town

Places > Scotland > Edinburgh

Religion > Religious facilities > Churches

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