Georgian Group Symposium, September 2015

Robert Adam and His Brothers: New light on Britain’s leading architectural family

The Adam style revolution transformed British architecture in the latter half of the eighteenth century. The brothers’ unique and inventive approach to design, based on a modern reinterpretation of the art of antiquity, found widespread popularity and was to have a lasting impact on European and American architecture. The movement and surface variety inherent in their buildings, combined with the lightness and informality of their interiors, set new standards of elegance and were widely imitated.

This two-day symposium aims to highlight important new research and findings on Robert Adam and his brothers across all aspects of their life and work, including architecture, interior decoration, the use of colour, the influence of classical sources, drawing office procedure, the art market, town-planning and building speculation.

The conference will present papers from established scholars as well as new research by a younger generation of historians and doctoral students, and is intended to stimulate further study into this most important of British architectural families.

Registration:

We welcome proposals for 20-minute presentations on any aspect of the Adams’ oeuvre. Please email abstracts of no more than 250 words and a copy of your CV by 25 December 2014 to c.thomucl.ac.uk or geoffrey.tyackkellogg.ox.ac.uk

Important dates:

- Submissions by 25/12/2014
- Notification of acceptance 12/01/2015
- Confirmation of programme, symposium days and venue 02/02/2015
- Symposium date: September 2015

Organizing Committee:

Dr Geoffrey Tyack (Director, Stanford University Programme, Oxford, and Editor, Georgian Group Journal)
Robert Bargery (Secretary, Georgian Group)
Colin Thom (Senior Historian, Survey of London, UCL Bartlett School of Architecture)

Important information

The symposium is being hosted by the Georgian Group with the support of the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London, and will be held in London in September 2015. Further details of the symposium dates, venue and programme will follow by 2 February 2015.

It is intended that selected papers from the Symposium will be published in an edited volume in 2016.