TOWNLEY HALL – Francis Johnston's Neo-Classical Masterpiece

Francis Johnston was from Co Armagh and is recognised – along with James Gandon and Edward Lovett Pearce – as one of the leading architects of his time. The book features an illustrated biography of Johnston and a complete catalogue of his works by Michael Kavanagh. The book is sumptuously and comprehensively illustrated with 760 photographs and drawings.

EXTRACTS

"Set within a landscape layered with a history so long its beginnings are lost in mythology, Townley Hall sits on the northern slope of the Boyne river valley, gazing across the enfolding ‘bend in the Boyne’ towards the ancient megalithic monuments of Newgrange, Dowth and Knowth. The genesis of a neo-classical house such as Townley Hall, complete with extensive stables and outbuildings in a landscaped demesne surrounded by high walls, can be traced to the Italian Renaissance and the villas and palaces of the Veneto and Florence. The design of the house itself reaches back further, referring to the architecture of ancient Greece and Rome. At its height, the demesne was the centre of a vast estate of some 8,000 acres in counties Louth and Fermanagh. The story of how this iconic piece of architecture, built between 1794 and 1798, came into being is told in the essays that follow. It is the story of the Townley (Balfour) family and their long association with the land from the 16th century to the 20th century. It was they who commissioned one of Ireland’s greatest architects, Francis Johnston, to design what is widely regarded as his neo-classical masterpiece, and who collaborated closely with him in the process. It is a celebration of the craftsmanship involved in realising the purist architectural intention of both architect and patron. 
          A stately neo-classical home, Townley Hall is an architecture of the ideal, conceived in the imagination of a family embedded in the spirit of their times. The plan is a square with a domed central rotunda at its core, around which lucidly flow well-lit and beautifully proportioned spaces. The effect is austere, typical of the sophisticated restraint that characterised the Greek Revival style of which Townley Hall is an early example in Ireland. The design of the house cannot be separated from its setting in a landscape carefully contrived in the English garden style, so that house and nature appear to reside in perfect harmony. Typical of such demesnes in Ireland, the distinction between utility and beauty is blurred, and the entire property contains elements of both."