Baroque Revival architecture
also: Neo-Baroque
Baroque Revival (Neo-Baroque) is the late 19th- and early 20th-century architectural style that restages the forms of the seventeenth-century Baroque. Baroque elements were part of the curriculum of the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, the pre-eminent school of architecture of the age, so the revival is woven into Beaux-Arts classicism both in France and abroad. Governments and institutions of the great empires reached for its sculpted grandeur to express power and confidence - opera houses, city halls, palaces, museums, and parliaments from Paris to Vienna, Belfast to Tokyo. In France the style overlaps with Second Empire architecture, in Germany with Wilhelminism, and in Britain with Edwardian Baroque. Typical buildings pair ordered classical structure with Baroque exuberance: domes, mansard roofs, colossal orders, statuary, and lavish sculpted ornament.
Defining characteristics
- Baroque domes, cupolas, and curved gables crowning classically ordered facades
- Colossal column orders and paired pilasters rising through two or more storeys
- Lavish sculptural ornament: statuary, cartouches, garlands, and figural groups
- Mansard roofs and emphatic mansarded pavilions in the French Second Empire variant
- Grand staircases and richly decorated ceremonial interiors
- Eclectic Baroque detail fused with Beaux-Arts planning and symmetry
Key figures
- Charles Garnier (1825-1898) — Architect of the Palais Garnier (Paris Opera), the revival's flagship building
- Ferdinand Fellner (1847-1916) — With Hermann Helmer, built Baroque Revival theatres across Central Europe
- Hermann Helmer (1849-1919) — Partner of Fellner in the prolific Vienna theatre-building firm
- Edwin Lutyens (1869-1944) — British architect who worked in an Edwardian Baroque mode
Example works
- Palais Garnier — Charles Garnier (1861-1875)
- Dolmabahce Palace — Balyan family (1843-1856)
- Belfast City Hall — Brumwell Thomas (1898-1906)
Sources
- Baroque Revival architecture - Wikipedia encyclopedia