Georgian

The term Georgian is applied to the styles that prevailed in Britain during the reigns of the four kings named George, from 1714 to 1830 (the period is sometimes extended to 1837). It is an age defined above all by the dominance of classicism and Palladianism in architecture and the decorative arts. The Georgian style is marked by symmetry, clear proportion, restrained elegance and reliance on ancient Roman and Renaissance models, disseminated by the Italian architect Andrea Palladio. Exemplars of Georgian architecture include the refined terraced town houses, squares and set-pieces of Bath and Edinburgh, as well as country houses. In furniture the age is celebrated for the names of Thomas Chippendale, George Hepplewhite and Thomas Sheraton, and in ceramics for the porcelain and earthenware of Josiah Wedgwood. In the fine arts it was a time of flourishing English portraiture and landscape: Joshua Reynolds and Thomas Gainsborough worked then, followed by John Constable and J. M. W. Turner. The end of the period also saw the elegant decorative Regency style. Overall the Georgian era is regarded as a classical, harmonious phase of British culture that laid the foundations of national taste in architecture and applied art.