Exhibition: Architects' Houses

This exhibition celebrates five London houses all of which (like the Soane Museum) have been designed by the architects who lived and, in some cases, still live in them.

Soane’s home is considered a showcase for his architectural philosophy. This is also the case for each of the five exhibited houses, incorporating the most innovative, freethinking designs of five major figures of British architecture.

The houses featured in this new exhibition include William Morris’s Red House, Ernö Goldfinger’s 2 Willow Road, Charles Jencks’ The Cosmic House, Patty and Michael Hopkins’ Hopkins House, and Sarah Wigglesworth’s 9/10 Stock Orchard Street. Each of the houses will be explored through drawings, photographs, models and objects from the houses, reflecting a broad range of modern and contemporary architectural practice.

Sir John Soane built his house at 13 Lincoln’s Inn Fields to reflect his own architectural ideals and interests. Soane was renowned for his experimentation with the forms of Classical architecture and inventive use of light. His house was home to his extensive collection of artefacts, models and paintings, arranged to create unexpected juxtapositions which inspired his own designs. Similarly, the coloured glass panels installed throughout the house stemmed from his fascination with light and the effects that it could create as part of an architectural setting.