East India House

East India House in Leadenhall Street in the City of London in England was the headquarters of the British East India Company.SirWilliam Foster, The East India house: its history and associations‎, 1924. It was built on the foundations of the Elizabethan mansion Craven House, the London residence of Sir William Craven, Lord Mayor of London,Edward Wedlake Brayley, Londiniana, or, Reminiscences of the British metropolis vol. 4 1829 :299. to designs by the merchant and amateur architect Theodore JacobsenThe professional on the site was John James, and completed in 1729. Much of British India was governed from here until the British government took control of the Company's possessions in India on November 1, 1858.

The exterior as Jacobsen originally designed it is known from a detailed wash drawing by Samuel Wale, ca 1760.Mildred Archer, "The East India Company and British art", Apollo (November 1965:401-09) fig. 1, p. 401 (India Office Library). Its five-bays were three storeys high, with an attic storey disguised behind the cornice balustrade. A giant order of Doric pilasters under an academically correct frieze of triglyphs demonstrated the East India Company's soundnessIn 1726-29 the South Sea Bubble was a vivid recent memory. and seriousness of purpose: the Directors' "aim was resolutely down to earth— to inspire confidence and impress the...
Read More