E-3: English Reception Room of the Jacobean Period, 1625-55

Narcissa Niblack Thorne, creator of the Thorne Rooms, combined a deep knowledge of design history with a vivid imaginative sensibility. In the 1930s, she assembled a team of skilled artisans in Chicago to construct a series of intricately detailed interiors at the scale of one inch to one foot (1:12).

Conceived as a visual history of interior design, the rooms are at once scholarly and inventive. Meticulously researched and carefully composed, they balance historical accuracy with artistic interpretation. Each atmospheric interior feels like a stage set awaiting its occupants—two parts fantasy, one part history, and entirely absorbing.

Entry from Fannia Weingartner, Miniature Rooms: The Thorne Rooms at the Art Institute of Chicago, 2nd ed. (The Art Institute of Chicago, 2004):

3. English Reception Room of the Jacobean Period, 1625–55
   “When I visited Wilton, I was deeply impressed by the magnificence of these royal apartments,” wrote Mrs. Thorne, describing portions of the magnificent house designed for Philip Herbert, fourth Earl of Pembroke, in the late 1630s by Isaac de Caus with advice from architect Inigo Jones. Jones and de Caus brought to the design of Wilton influences from Italian Renaissance architecture. The reception room, however, also bears evidence of the contemporary fashion for Baroque ornamentation.
   These influences are easily discerned in this interior. Here, Mrs. Thorne drew on two lavish rooms at Wilton—the so-called Single Cube Room (which measures 30 x 30 x 30 feet) and the so-called Double Cube Room (60 x 60 x 60 feet). Both rooms feature painted white paneling that is richly carved from floor (dado) to ceiling (cornice). In her interior, Mrs. Thorne substituted red damask for the paneling, confining the gilt carving to the ceiling, cornice, overmantel, and door and window frames. The elaborate painted ceiling, mirrors, and gilt furniture—distinctly Italianate in inspiration—convey the spirit of opulence that pervades the state reception rooms at Wilton.
   The overmantel and door are modeled after those of the Single Cube Room but are less elaborate. The floor is copied from another Inigo Jones commission, the Queen’s House in Greenwich. The tables resemble originals by William Kent, a follower of Inigo Jones, who had also studied in Italy and who favored solid side tables on thick, scrolled supports decorated with classical masks, swags, and leaf ornaments. The copies of portraits by Anthony van Dyck refer to the numerous family likenesses executed by that artist for the owners of Wilton in the 1630s. Provision for displaying the portraits was made in the design of the Double Cube and of other state rooms.
   The window looks out onto a narrow, walled walk fronting a garden with a lake.
   This room measures 16 1/4 x 24 1/2 x 19 1/4 inches.