Portrait of Inigo Jones 1573 -1652, After Sir Anthony Van Dyck

Size 30.00x27.00ins; oil on canvas

Inigo Jones (July 15, 1573 – June 21, 1652) is regarded as the first significant British architect of the modern period, and the first to bring Italianate Renaissance architecture to England. He also made valuable contributions to stage design.Beyond the fact that he was born in the vicinity of Smithfield in central London, the son of a Welsh Catholic cloth worker, and christened at the church of St Bartholomew the Less, little is known about Jones' early years. He certainly travelled abroad at the end of the century, probably at the expense of a patron, and was very influenced by the work of the Italian architect Andrea Palladio. In the early 1600s, Jones was employed by the wife of King James I, Queen Anne, to provide costumes and settings for a masque at court, something he continued to do even after he started receiving architectural commissions. His first-known building was the New Exchange in the Strand in London, designed in 1608 for the Earl of Salisbury. In 1611 Jones was appointed surveyor of works to Henry, Prince of Wales but the young prince died in 1612. In 1613, Jones left England to visit Italy again. A year after his return, he was appointed surveyor to the king, a position he held until 1643.

But towards the end of the 16th century, he became one of the first Englishmen to study architecture in Italy, making two visits to that country. The first (c.1598-1603) was possibly funded by Roger Manners, 5th Earl of Rutland. The second, from 1613 to 1614, found Inigo in the company of the Earl of Arundel. He may also have been in Italy in 1606 and was influenced by the ambassador Henry Wotton and owned a copy of Andrea Palladio's works with marginalia that refer to Wotton. See Wotton And His Worlds 2004 by Gerald Curzon. His work became particularly influenced by Palladio. To a lesser extent, he also held that the setting out of buildings should be guided by principles first described by ancient Roman writer Vitruvius.

The Queen's House at Greenwich Jones' best known buildings are the Queen's House at Greenwich, London (started in 1616, his earliest surviving work) and the Banqueting House at Whitehall (1619) – part of a major modernisation by him of the Palace of Whitehall – which also has a ceiling painted by Peter Paul Rubens. The Banqueting House was one of several projects where Jones worked with his personal assistant and nephew by marriage John Webb. It was begun in 1617 but work was suspended at her death in 1619 and only completed in 1635. In 1619 the old Banqueting House at Whitehall Palace burned down and Jones began work on a new one. It was completed in 1622 and in 1635, an allegorical painting for its ceiling was commissioned from Rubens. Jones also worked on the restoration of St Paul's Cathedral, adding a magnificent portico to the west end.