Queen's House

About

Queen's House is a former royal residence in the London borough of Greenwich, which presently serves as a public art gallery. It was built between 1616 and 1635 on the grounds of the now demolished Greenwich Palace, a few miles downriver from the City of London. In its current setting, it forms a central focus of the Old Royal Naval College with a grand vista leading to the River Thames, a World Heritage Site called, Maritime Greenwich.

The Queen's House architect, Inigo Jones, was commissioned by Queen Anne of Denmark and her successor as queen consort, Queen Henrietta Maria. The House was a royal retreat and place to display and enjoy the artworks the queens had commissioned; this included the ceiling in the Great Hall that featured a work by Orazio Gentileschi titled Allegory of Peace and the Arts. Queen's House is one of the most important buildings in British architectural history, due to it being the first consciously classical building to have been constructed in the country.

It was Jones's first major commission after returning from his 1613–1615 grand tour of Roman, Renaissance, and Palladian architecture in Italy. Some earlier English buildings, such as Longleat and Burghley...