Benjamin Bastard was a British architect during the first half of the 18th century working in the

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset. Covering an area of , ...

area of England. A member of a notable family of west country architect-surveyors and masons, he was related to the

Bastard brothers John (ca 1688–1770) and William Bastard (ca 1689–1766) were British surveyor-architects, and civic dignitaries of the town of Blandford Forum in Dorset. John and William generally worked together and are known as the "Bastard brothers". The ...

who rebuilt

Blandford Forum Blandford Forum ( ), commonly Blandford, is a market town in Dorset, England, sited by the River Stour about northwest of Poole. It was the administrative headquarters of North Dorset District until April 2019, when this was abolished and it ...

following its great fire of 1731. Bastard was responsible for the

Palladian Palladian architecture is a European architectural style derived from the work of the Venetian architect Andrea Palladio (1508–1580). What is today recognised as Palladian architecture evolved from his concepts of symmetry, perspective and ...

Sherborne House, at

Sherborne Sherborne is a market town and civil parish in north west Dorset, in South West England. It is sited on the River Yeo, on the edge of the Blackmore Vale, east of Yeovil. The parish includes the hamlets of Nether Coombe and Lower Clatcombe. ...

in Dorset built in the 1720s. The accomplished design of this mansion like the works of the Bastard brothers shows late Baroque influences such as those found in the works of Wren and

Hawksmoor Nicholas Hawksmoor (probably 1661 – 25 March 1736) was an English architect. He was a leading figure of the English Baroque style of architecture in the late-seventeenth and early-eighteenth centuries. Hawksmoor worked alongside the principa ...

. In style and design it could be compared to

Winslow Hall Winslow Hall is a country house, now in the centre of the small town of Winslow, Buckinghamshire, England. Built in 1700, it was sited in the centre of the town, with a public front facing the highway and a garden front that still commanded in ...

attributed to Sir

Christopher Wren Sir Christopher Wren PRS FRS (; – ) was one of the most highly acclaimed English architects in history, as well as an anatomist, astronomer, geometer, and mathematician-physicist. He was accorded responsibility for rebuilding 52 church ...

or Chicheley Hall like Winslow Hall also in

Buckinghamshire Buckinghamshire (), abbreviated Bucks, is a ceremonial county in South East England that borders Greater London to the south-east, Berkshire to the south, Oxfordshire to the west, Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-e ...

. Sherborne House has a three bayed centre projecting from two symmetrical flanking wings each of two bays. The tall slim windows are typical of the English Baroque period which immediately predated the Palladian period. The Baroque style is further emphasised by the broken segmental pediment and

architrave In classical architecture, an architrave (; from it, architrave "chief beam", also called an epistyle; from Greek ἐπίστυλον ''epistylon'' "door frame") is the lintel or beam that rests on the capitals of columns. The term can a ...

of the main entrance. However, the facade, with its central pediment and the balustrade concealing the roof line are devoid of ornament in the Palladian tradition. The only relief from the severity of the facade coming from the

quoining Quoins ( or ) are masonry blocks at the corner of a wall. Some are structural, providing strength for a wall made with inferior stone or rubble, while others merely add aesthetic detail to a corner. According to one 19th century encyclopedia, t ...

at each corner. In 1743 Bastard was commissioned to design a hospital for the reception of the poor, later known as the Dorchester parish workhouse. This building has been much altered but the original block can still be discerned as Palladian, albeit in a very severe and chaste form as would have been thought fitting for such an institution at the time. There is a wall monument with a pediment to Benjamin and Thomas Bastard, dated 1772, on the external face of the north wall of the parish church of St Mary Magdalene, Castleton,

in Dorset. The inscription has weathered away. Inside the nave, on the north wall of the north aisle is a monument to Elizabeth Bastard (née Prankerd), wife of Benjamin Bastard, 1732–3, and their son Benjamin. This is a marble wall monument with side-scrolls, pediment, urn and cherub's head.RCHME 1952:211

Notes

References

* *Royal Commission on Historical Monuments England 1952 ''An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in Dorset Vol 1 - West'' London, HMSO
Dorchester
retrieved 7 March 2007

External links

Image of Dorchester Workhouse originally by Benjamin Bastard
retrieved 7 March 2007 {{DEFAULTSORT:Bastard, Benjamin People from Dorset English Baroque architects Palladian architecture Year of death unknown Year of birth unknown