October 28, 2025 • 26 mins
In this special bonus episode of Home in Progress, Dan Hansen explores one of the most dramatic and transformative moments in architectural history—the 1834 fire that destroyed London’s Palace of Westminster.What began as the simple burning of outdated tally sticks—wooden accounting tools used by the British Treasury—ended with a blaze that consumed centuries of political history. But from the ashes rose a new vision for British architecture.Dan unpacks the story of how two remarkable architects—Charles Barry, the classical designer, and Augustus Pugin, the passionate Gothic revivalist—came together to rebuild Parliament and, in doing so, shaped the architectural identity of an entire age. Their work didn’t just redefine the skyline of London; it established the moral and aesthetic principles that would define the Victorian era.The episode also examines Pugin’s belief that beauty and morality are intertwined—that good design could uplift hearts, civilize minds, and make daily life richer. It’s a story about craftsmanship, faith, vision—and how even tragedy can lay the foundation for beauty.Episode Timeline00:00 — Introduction and Recap01:39 — The Fire at the Palace of Westminster02:02 — The History and Significance of Tally Sticks04:55 — The Aftermath of the Fire10:51 — The Architectural Partnership of Barry and Pugin21:23 — The Legacy of Victorian Architecture25:54 — Conclusion and Final Thoughts
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hey, everyone, welcome to this bonus episode of Home in Progress,
sponsored by Repcolite Paints and Benjamin Moore. And on the
last episode, the last official episode, we dug into the
rise and the decline of Victorian era architecture.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
And it's a huge story with.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
A ton of interesting things to cover, and I did
my best to focus on what I thought were the
key aspects of the story. But one big part of
it that I was forced to skim over, and it
really bummed me out, was the story of the fire
at the Palace of Westminster and the working relationship of
Augustus Pugin and Charles Barry. Now this fire and the
(00:42):
resulting collaboration between those two, the architect and the idealist,
all of that kind of set the template for how
Victorian architects would think about style, about ornament, and the
relationship between the past and the present. You know, it's
kind of where the philosophy foundation for all of the
Victorian abundance that we think about when we think about
(01:05):
Victorian era architecture. This is where all of that really
crystallized into something, you know, tangible. So today we're going
to look at all of that in detail in this
bonus episode. And since I don't really have time constraints
here normally Home and Progress. You're hearing it as a podcast,
but it airs as a radio show on a local
(01:26):
station out in Holland, Michigan. And I've got time constraints,
so a lot of the times I have to cram
things into certain spaces and I've got.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
To cut stuff.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Today I don't have to do that. I can kind
of ramble and just take my time to get there.
So I want to focus on this fire. It started
on October sixteen of eighteen thirty four, and it destroyed
the Palace of Westminster in London, you know, the seat
of Parliament there. And interestingly enough, I think we can
make the argument that the blaze, this big fire actually
(01:57):
started in a way at least seven hundred years earlier. Okay,
all those years back in eleven hundreds or so. England
is using something called tally sticks to keep its accounting records.
And I don't know if you've ever heard of tally
sticks before, but there's simply pieces of wood, usually hazel
(02:17):
or ash or something like that, and each stick had
notches carved into it to show how much money someone
owed the crown. All right, So here's the deal. When
a debt was issued, the stick was notched accordingly, and
then it was split into two pieces. One half went
to the royal treasury, the other half went to the
person who owed the money. Later, when the debt was paid,
the two pieces were matched back together to make sure
(02:39):
that everything was paid back in full. Now, because the
grain and the notches had to line up perfectly, it
was nearly impossible to fake these things. So here are
a couple interesting facts with tally sticks before we even
get to the fire. When the stick was split into
the longer piece was called the stock, and that one
went to the creditor, the person who was oh the money.
(03:00):
The shorter piece was called the foil, and that went
to the debtor, to the person who owed the money.
So if you held the stock, you literally held proof
that somebody owed you money. You were a stockholder, all right.
Over time, those stocks started to take on a life
of their own. People began buying, selling, and trading them,
and they kind of became their own source, you know,
(03:23):
their own kind of currency. The British government even issued
tally sticks and people would trade them at a discount.
Basically creating the first bond market. And when the Bank
of England opened its doors in sixteen ninety seven, a
big chunk of its startup capital came from tally stick stocks.
So our entire modern financial system, stocks, bonds, shareholders, all
(03:45):
of that all traces back to these simple notched pieces
of wood tally sticks, all right. Really interesting. And here's
another fun fact, that old saying getting the short end
of the stick. You know, I've spent my whole life
getting the short end of the stick that I That
phrase actually comes from tally sticks because the debtor, the
person who owed the money, literally got the shorter piece,
(04:07):
the shorter end of the stick, all right. So that's
what tally sticks were. And while it sounds really simplistic
and primitive, the system worked, and it worked so well
that it lasted, you know, seven hundred or so years,
you know, into the early eighteen hundreds, and that's when
people finally started using paper based record keeping.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
And written ledgers and stuff like that.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
Now, the move away from sticks of wood with notches
carved on them to paper was generally agreed upon by
most people as a solid, solid advancement, but there was
still a little problem, just a little inkling of a problem,
and they needed to do something with all these piles
and piles and piles of obsolete, old wooden sticks that
(04:51):
were cluttering up the Palace of Westminster. Well, that gets
us to our fire. The current clerk of works at
the Palace eighteen thirty four, a man named Richard Whibley
wibbly weebley.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
I don't know how to pronounce it.
Speaker 1 (05:06):
Richard Whibley, that's what we're gonna call it. He was
a thinker, he was a problem solver, and he went
to work and came up with an absolutely brilliant plan.
You know, after all, he's looking at these sticks in
the basement and he's thinking, all right, what are we
gonna do with all these guys? There's a lot of them.
You know, they're made of wood, and you know, after
(05:27):
all these years, he's thinking, this is incredibly dry wood.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
And one thing we all know.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
About drywood is that it burns. It burns like there's
no tomorrow. So Richard Whibley, our clerk of Works at
the Palace, thinks, hmmm, why not burn all these tally
sticks to ash? Right, Ash is a lot easier to
deal with than all these tally sticks. That's the surefire
way to get them out of here and to free
(05:53):
up some space. Yeah, you could toss them out. He
thought about that, but that's not as much fun as
burning things. You know, just throwing it in the garbage
isn't as much fun. And we know that's true, right,
you know, raking and bagging leaves for example. You know
we can do that. We can break them all up
and put them in big bags and put them on
the roads, and that's doable.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
We can make do with that. It works, but it's
not fun, right, not like when.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
We used to be able to make a big pile
of leaves and then burn it, you know, like lighting
the beacons of Gondor or something like that. I loved
burning leaves. It was a lot more fun. Fall was
more fun. Life was more fun when we could burn
things to get rid of them. Probably wasn't as healthy,
I get that, but it was more fun. So anyway,
Richard Webbly Webley Webbly wibly, he wants to.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Burn these sticks.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
So he's going to do that, but not outside in
some big, uncontrollable bonfire.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
That's what the commoners might do. You know.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
He's a man of breeding and he decided that these
tally sticks royal as they were, should be burned royally
right here in the palace's furnaces. And so, without a
second thought, the Clerk of Works tasks a couple of
workmen with the job of burning two large, enormous cartloads
of sticks in the stoves beneath the floor of the
House of Lords. And let me tell you the guys
(07:11):
that he got, they were devoted. You know, they may
not have been all that bright. You know, history doesn't
tell us for sure, but there are clues. They may
not have been all that bright, but they were committed
to their work. You know, nothing was going to deter
them from finishing this task, and I mean literally nothing. See,
they went to work early in the morning of October sixteen,
(07:31):
and they started dumping loads of these sticks into the fires,
watching that dry wood ignite almost instantly. So they've worked
in work throughout the day, constantly tossing armfuls of sticks
into the furnaces. Now, unfortunately, part way through the day,
a chimney fire begins to smolder beneath the floor of
the House of Lords, you know.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Out of sight for the workers. They don't see it. Happening.
Speaker 1 (07:52):
They don't know what's going on, but it's happening.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
You know.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
It starts to smolder, and it continues to smolder for
a good part of the day and on a If
you'd think that something like that would be noticed by somebody,
well you'd be right. It would be noticed. And in fact,
a party of visitors to the House of Lords conducted,
you know, brought through by this deputy housekeeper named missus. Right,
(08:15):
she's bringing them through, and this party of visitors become
strangely puzzled by the heat just emanating out of the
floor as they're walking over it. That was definitely strange, right,
that's not the normal experience here in October, that the
floor is.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Hot to the touch. Hmm, that's odd.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
But if that wasn't confusing enough, they were absolutely flummixed.
I mean, they had no idea what to do with
this when they saw the smoke pouring out of the floor.
You know, the floor is hot and it's smoking. What's
going on here?
Speaker 2 (08:47):
This is not usual.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Now, we would all know what was going on at
that point if we were there and we saw that.
But that was happening way before the phrase where there's
smoke there's fire had been invented, so they had no idea.
The heat and the smoke and its connection to fire
completely lost on them. So they puzzled about it for
a while, and then good old missus Right checked with
(09:10):
the workmen. But I told you these people were diligent,
you know, I said that right at the beginning. They
were committed to the work. They maybe weren't the brightest bulbs,
but they were committed. They told their boss they're going
to burn these sticks, and they weren't going to quit
till they burned.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
Them, all of them.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
So they dismissed missus Right in her concerns. You know,
hot floors with smoke rising from them was clearly clearly
not connected to the inferno in the furnaces. There's no
causal relationship there at all, nothing to worry about. So
they kept working. Missus Right figured, well, you know, they
seemed good with it. I guess we might as well
just move on with our day. And everything proceeded.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
As it had been going.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
And then around five o'clock or so, the workmen called
it a day, put the fires out in the furnaces,
and they went home. Missus Right also decided to call
it a day, locked things up up and headed out.
Soon after that, screams arise from a doorkeeper's wife that
the House of Lords is on fire, and then, in
what seemed like no time at all, the flames spread
(10:10):
through the rest of the palace. Huge fireball erupted. You know,
it's visible for miles and miles around as more of
the building goes up in flames, and thousands of Londoners
are crowding around the bridges around the bank of the Thames,
and they're watching as the blaze consumed centuries of history.
There's paintings about this. Google it and you can check
(10:30):
them out now. In the end, both Houses of Parliament
were completely destroyed, along with most of the surrounding buildings.
The only major structure that survived was Westminster Hall, and
that was saved by heroic firefighters and a lucky shift
and wind that night. Now, by the following morning, October seventeen,
much of the Palace of Westminster it's in ashes. But
(10:51):
out of these ashes came one of the most famous
architectural partnerships of the nineteenth century and one of the
most tragic, the story of Charles Bears and Augustus Pugin
and their design for the new Palace of Westminster didn't
just give us the iconic Houses of Parliament. It ended
up launching the Gothic Revival and helped define what we
now call Victorian architecture. Here's the scoop on this part
(11:14):
of the story. Now, after Parliament burned down, the government
held a design competition for the new building, and the
rules were specific. The design had to be either Gothic
or Elizabethan, nothing classical, nothing modern, because Westminster Hall had
survived and the new construction needed to be able to
blend with that, so it needed to be Gothic or Elizabethan.
(11:36):
That was basically the requirement.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
Now.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
The winner of this contest was Charles Barry. He's a
Westminster born architect in his forties at the time, and
he's already one of London's rising stars. He'd been born
just across the street from where Big Ben now stands,
and he was orphaned as a young kid, and he
left school I think it was around fifteen. The age
of fifteen, he apprenticed with a surveyor and before long
(12:03):
he'd earned this reputation for diligence and quiet genius, you know,
not saying anything. But I earned a similar reputation amongst people.
Some people, handful of people, mom, dad, kind of mom.
Mom saw the genius and the diligence. But anyway, Charles Berry,
(12:24):
you know, people are seeing that he's got, you know,
a bright future in front of him. He's got big dreams,
and they're feeling like he's going to be able to
achieve these things. Well, Charles Berry's got a small inheritance,
you know, like I said, it was orphan young, but
there's a little bit of money there. And he takes
that money and he sets off on a three year
grand tour through France, Italy, Greece, Egypt, Palestine, you know,
(12:47):
all over the place. And those travels really end up
changing him. He falls in love with the balance and
the grandeur of the Italian Renaissance. And when he came
home in eighteen twenty, he brought that, you know, and
all the things that he picked up on the road,
he brought that with him. His Travelers Club on Paul Mall,
built in eighteen thirty two, that was hailed as the
(13:09):
first true Italian Renaissance building in London. Now, by the
mid eighteen thirties, Barry was famous for elegant classical designs.
Palaces in miniature kind of is the idea, you know,
So he's really well known when this contest comes about.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
But there's a problem.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Remember, the rules require a Gothic ear Elizabethan style to
match the surviving medieval Westminster Hall. Gothic wasn't really Barry's language.
So he needed help, and he turned to somebody who
spoke Gothic fluently. And that's a brilliant twenty three year
old draftsman named Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin, Pugi n Pugin.
(13:48):
He was already a phenomenon at this point. He's talented, fiery,
absolutely consumed by his love for the Gothic, and just
that same year, eighteen thirty four, he had converted to Catholicism.
Now it wasn't a sudden spiritual experience for him, it
was something that had been building for years. Through all
of his work. Pugin had been studying the great cathedrals
(14:10):
of France and when.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
He was doing that.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
While doing that, he became just absolutely convinced that the
medieval Gothic wasn't just more beautiful, it was more truthful. Okay,
it's not just more beautiful, it's more truthful. The forms
of those old churches. He argued that those forms expressed
the faith that had created them. Every point at arch
lifted the soul towards Heaven. That's his idea. Every carved
(14:35):
detail was an act of devotion. To pugen architecture wasn't decoration.
It was theology and that conviction that really really strong belief,
which is.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
Literally what conviction is.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
Didn't need to clarify that conviction shaped every single thing
he touched. And the irony was really profound here, all right.
So here's a young, devout Catholic helping design the seat
of Britain's product government, just five years after Catholics had
even been allowed to serve in Parliament. He couldn't even
submit designs under his own name, really, because his open
(15:10):
passionate Catholicism would have guaranteed rejection. But Barry understood the
genius of Pugin, and so while Barry handled the structure,
Pugin kind of quietly supplied the soul of the building,
and he worked feverishly designing not only the huge, soaring interiors,
but also the carved woodwork, the metal fittings, the tiles,
(15:31):
the fabrics, the patterns of the tiles underfoot, the tracery
and the windows, even the shape of the inkstands, all
of them came from Pugin's imagination. Now, later letters to
his friends show how much he poured into this work
and how much it drained him. He called it the
hardest labor of his life. But it was also his
ministry because for Pugen this wasn't remember, this wasn't just architecture.
(15:55):
You know, there's way more going on with the construction
of these buildings. To him, it was kind of like evangelism.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
In a way.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
He believed that beauty was moral. We talked about that
in the episode that aired previously. We got a little
more into that. But he believed that beauty was moral,
that good buildings could shape good people. And so through
Barry's official plans, Pugen set out to kind of preach
through design, to restore, inform and symbol what he saw
(16:24):
as the spiritual heart of England. That's his goal, that's
what he's doing, and that's the deep irony of the
Palace of Westminster. It's really really intriguing. It's one of
the most enduring symbols of British Protestant democracy, and yet
inside in its details and on the outside it's profoundly Catholic. Now, however,
I mentioned that this collaboration had elements of the tragic
(16:46):
in it, right, So let's get to those. Despite all
of Pugin's work, we talked about all the things that
he did, despite all of that, Charles Barry actually gave
him very little public credit. And it's a little muddy
as to why. You know, what his reasoning was. Was
he being selfish, was he just protecting the project and
protecting both of them. It's really hard to say.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
You know.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
On the one hand, he gave pugin In, you know,
a way to contribute to the cause in a safe manner.
Remember we talked about if it was clear to everybody
that this new Catholic convert was involved, he probably would
have been, you know, potentially kicked off the project. So
in one regard, Charles Barry's giving Pugin a way to
contribute safely. You know, he's kind of giving him some
(17:30):
architectural cover so that he can collaborate with Barry.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
But on the other hand, the only.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Official title Pugin ever was given was Superintendent of Wood carving,
you know, a description that came nowhere close to covering.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
What he actually did. Well.
Speaker 1 (17:45):
Despite this, despite the fact that Barry wasn't dishing out
the credit, by the mid eighteen forties, people were beginning
to whisper that Pugin really was the real architect of Parliament.
And the rumors grew loud enough and rampant, ton and
fervent enough that Pugin himself came out and issued a
public statement saying, hey, no, no, no, I'm only assisting
(18:08):
mister Barry. All of my work is just based on
his designs, so he's trying to calm things down and
move things forward, you know, keep things moving forward. Well,
all of this drama added a huge amount of pressure
to the work. And then on top of that, all
Parliament themselves get involved and micromanages every single design decision
(18:28):
that needs to be made. So they're there micromanaging everything.
They're blaming Charles Barry for every single delay that crops up,
even though most of those delays were caused by their
own demands. And then when the House of Commons Chamber
was finally finished in eighteen fifty, the members of Parliament
they walk in, they look it over and they say, nah,
we hate it. They complained about the layout, they had
(18:50):
complained about the acoustics, and they forced Barry to redesign
the whole thing. He had to love working with these people.
We know that he did, because all of this pressure
took a terrible toll on both of the men. You know, Pugin,
let's look at him first. He was juggling dozens of projects.
He was juggling over one hundred churches, country houses, furniture designs, metalwork, wallpaper, tiles.
(19:14):
He was doing a ton of different things while working
on Westminster, and by eighteen fifty two his health completely collapsed.
He suffered a complete mental and physical breakdown after years
of relentless overwork, and he was committed to Bedlam, right,
the infamous Bedlam Asylum, and after five and a half
weeks there he was released. But he never really recovered,
(19:35):
and he ended up dying on September fourteen, eighteen fifty two,
at just forty years old, never seeing the palace completed. Now, Barry,
he didn't really fare all that much better. While he's
managing Westminster's construction, you know, he's dealing with Parliament's constant
interference they're micromanaging, they're constant nagging. While he's doing that,
he's also designing the Reform Club. He's working on projects
(19:59):
from Istanbuldest, Scotland. He reportedly slept only four or five
hours a night, you know, rising between four and six
in the morning to get to work again. Well, doing
that day after day on top of all the stress
that each one of those projects brought him, all of
that aged him terribly. And on May twelve, eighteen sixty,
after spending an afternoon at the Crystal Palace with his wife,
(20:21):
he was seized with difficulty breathing and chest pain, and
then later he died of a heart attack that night
at his home. He was sixty four years old, and
the palace still wasn't finished. His son Edward, completed the
work in eighteen seventy, thirty four years after construction began.
Now neither of the brilliant minds who created it lived
to see their masterpiece completed. So that was tragic, right,
(20:43):
But it gets worse. Remember when I mentioned that Barry
said Pugin was the superintendent of woodworking, and how that
really didn't explain the depth of his role in the
least well, nobody ever corrected that story, at least not
while both men were alive. After their deaths, their sons
end up fighting bitterly over who deserved the greater share
of the glory, and that feud dragged on for decades,
(21:05):
And it wasn't until after World War Two, nearly one
hundred years later, that Pugin's name finally appears in the
official guidebook to the Houses of Parliament. Today, historians generally
agree Barry provided the grand plan and oversaw construction. Pugin
filled it with soul. So why does all of this matter?
You know, why spend time on a fire, two architects
(21:26):
and one building. Well, it matters because what Barry and
Pugin created at Westminster didn't just rebuild, you know, Parliament,
It reshaped an entire era. Before the Palace of Westminster,
Gothic revival was just a niche curiosity, you know, it
was something Romantics used for country chapels or the odd
you know, odd of state house or something like that.
But after Westminster, pretty much everything changed. Gothic became the
(21:49):
architectural language of the Victorian Age. You know, if the
seat of the British Empire, the very symbol of its
power and identity and coolness if that could be gothic.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
And pretty much anything could be gothic.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Town halls, train stations, universities, libraries, and then from there,
homes across Britain and America eventually followed the lead. Very
and Pugin proved that you could take a medieval style,
something old, and.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
Make it work for the modern world.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
You know, you could blend history and progress, you could
honor the past while looking ahead to the future. And
that balance, you know, nostalgia and innovation, reverence, reform, however
you want to look at it. That balance became the
heartbeat of Victorian design and it's still something that we
see in design today. But there's something deeper to Pugin
(22:35):
brought a philosophy to Westminster that would echo through the century.
You know, the belief that beauty and morality were connected,
that good design could help make good people. Now, to him,
ornament wasn't frivolous.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
It was meaningful.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
You know, every carved detail, every painted pattern, every curve
and flourish was meant to lift the spirit, to remind
people that beauty pointed towards something higher than themselves. And
that conviction spread and it became the soul of the
Victorian home. It's why they filled their homes with pattern
and color, why they covered every wall and every ceiling.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Why more.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
You know, it wasn't just excess, it was virtue. They
truly believed that living among beautiful, well crafted things could
make you a better person. And I love, love, love
love that idea. I love digging into it because here's
the thing. It's so easy to dismiss design and decoration
and all of that.
Speaker 2 (23:27):
It's kind of shallow, you.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
Know, sup superfluous, super oh, good grief, super what is
that word? Superficial? Man, I'm sorry, complete brain melt.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
Superficial.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
It's easy to dismiss, you know, design and decoration as
shallow and superficial, you know, something that's not important, something
that just makes our homes look nice and feel comfortable,
but at the end of the day, it's not actually.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Important, right. It's easy to say that, you know.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
I catch myself thinking that way sometimes, and I've spent
most of my working life in the paint industry, but
still sometimes it's easy to think that paint's just you know,
an afterthought, it's a finishing touch, you know, not something
that really matters.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
At the end of the day.
Speaker 1 (24:12):
But I think the Victorians were onto something. And it's
not just them.
Speaker 2 (24:16):
I know that it's not just them.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
Who had this thought, but they really brought it to
the forefront, and I think they're onto something. And I'm
not saying that paint in your living room is going
to make you morally superior. You know, that's not the
argument at all. But what I am saying is that
when we take the time to paint our homes perhaps,
or to choose colors that we love, to add touches
that reflect who we are and who we want to be,
(24:40):
we're making our homes better places to be in, better
places to live in.
Speaker 2 (24:44):
And that is a moral good.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
Isn't it.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
Isn't that a moral good?
Speaker 1 (24:48):
I think that's a moral good because the world out
there is nuts. Sometimes not all the time, but sometimes
it's nuts. Often it's nuts. And home is our retreat,
you know, it's our hate. And making it feel welcoming
and comfortable and peaceful, that's not just frivolous, it's necessary.
It's good for us. It's good for the people we love.
(25:09):
It's good for the kids that were raising in that space.
A beautifully painted and designed home doesn't raise your kids
for you, of course not, but it helps you know,
maybe a little bit, maybe a lot. Either way, it matters,
you know, when the world feels chaotic, Every bit of
piece that we can create at home is definitely worth something.
Every small choice to make our space better, even something
(25:31):
as simple as a fresh goat to paint.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
All of that adds up.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
The Victorians understood that they built it into their philosophy.
Beauty isn't a luxury. It's part of what makes life livable.
And I think they were right. And a good chunk
of that philosophy that we're talking about came into being
because of the work of Pugin and Barry and the
legacy of their partnership. And remember all of that started
with a pile of burning sticks. All right, that's going
(25:55):
to do it for this bonus episode of Home and Progress.
If you enjoyed the show and you want to hear
more content like this, be sure to subscribe to the podcast,
and please, if you feel so inclined, share the show
with a friend or two, or you just leave us
a review. All of those things will help other people
find the show, and I really appreciate that. Thanks for
listening for home and progress. I'm Dan Hansen. I'll see
(26:16):
you next time.
Hey, everyone, welcome to this bonus episode of Home in Progress,
sponsored by Repcolite Paints and Benjamin Moore. And on the
last episode, the last official episode, we dug into the
rise and the decline of Victorian era architecture.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
And it's a huge story with.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
A ton of interesting things to cover, and I did
my best to focus on what I thought were the
key aspects of the story. But one big part of
it that I was forced to skim over, and it
really bummed me out, was the story of the fire
at the Palace of Westminster and the working relationship of
Augustus Pugin and Charles Barry. Now this fire and the
(00:42):
resulting collaboration between those two, the architect and the idealist,
all of that kind of set the template for how
Victorian architects would think about style, about ornament, and the
relationship between the past and the present. You know, it's
kind of where the philosophy foundation for all of the
Victorian abundance that we think about when we think about
(01:05):
Victorian era architecture. This is where all of that really
crystallized into something, you know, tangible. So today we're going
to look at all of that in detail in this
bonus episode. And since I don't really have time constraints
here normally Home and Progress. You're hearing it as a podcast,
but it airs as a radio show on a local
(01:26):
station out in Holland, Michigan. And I've got time constraints,
so a lot of the times I have to cram
things into certain spaces and I've got.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
To cut stuff.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Today I don't have to do that. I can kind
of ramble and just take my time to get there.
So I want to focus on this fire. It started
on October sixteen of eighteen thirty four, and it destroyed
the Palace of Westminster in London, you know, the seat
of Parliament there. And interestingly enough, I think we can
make the argument that the blaze, this big fire actually
(01:57):
started in a way at least seven hundred years earlier. Okay,
all those years back in eleven hundreds or so. England
is using something called tally sticks to keep its accounting records.
And I don't know if you've ever heard of tally
sticks before, but there's simply pieces of wood, usually hazel
(02:17):
or ash or something like that, and each stick had
notches carved into it to show how much money someone
owed the crown. All right, So here's the deal. When
a debt was issued, the stick was notched accordingly, and
then it was split into two pieces. One half went
to the royal treasury, the other half went to the
person who owed the money. Later, when the debt was paid,
the two pieces were matched back together to make sure
(02:39):
that everything was paid back in full. Now, because the
grain and the notches had to line up perfectly, it
was nearly impossible to fake these things. So here are
a couple interesting facts with tally sticks before we even
get to the fire. When the stick was split into
the longer piece was called the stock, and that one
went to the creditor, the person who was oh the money.
(03:00):
The shorter piece was called the foil, and that went
to the debtor, to the person who owed the money.
So if you held the stock, you literally held proof
that somebody owed you money. You were a stockholder, all right.
Over time, those stocks started to take on a life
of their own. People began buying, selling, and trading them,
and they kind of became their own source, you know,
(03:23):
their own kind of currency. The British government even issued
tally sticks and people would trade them at a discount.
Basically creating the first bond market. And when the Bank
of England opened its doors in sixteen ninety seven, a
big chunk of its startup capital came from tally stick stocks.
So our entire modern financial system, stocks, bonds, shareholders, all
(03:45):
of that all traces back to these simple notched pieces
of wood tally sticks, all right. Really interesting. And here's
another fun fact, that old saying getting the short end
of the stick. You know, I've spent my whole life
getting the short end of the stick that I That
phrase actually comes from tally sticks because the debtor, the
person who owed the money, literally got the shorter piece,
(04:07):
the shorter end of the stick, all right. So that's
what tally sticks were. And while it sounds really simplistic
and primitive, the system worked, and it worked so well
that it lasted, you know, seven hundred or so years,
you know, into the early eighteen hundreds, and that's when
people finally started using paper based record keeping.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
And written ledgers and stuff like that.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
Now, the move away from sticks of wood with notches
carved on them to paper was generally agreed upon by
most people as a solid, solid advancement, but there was
still a little problem, just a little inkling of a problem,
and they needed to do something with all these piles
and piles and piles of obsolete, old wooden sticks that
(04:51):
were cluttering up the Palace of Westminster. Well, that gets
us to our fire. The current clerk of works at
the Palace eighteen thirty four, a man named Richard Whibley
wibbly weebley.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
I don't know how to pronounce it.
Speaker 1 (05:06):
Richard Whibley, that's what we're gonna call it. He was
a thinker, he was a problem solver, and he went
to work and came up with an absolutely brilliant plan.
You know, after all, he's looking at these sticks in
the basement and he's thinking, all right, what are we
gonna do with all these guys? There's a lot of them.
You know, they're made of wood, and you know, after
(05:27):
all these years, he's thinking, this is incredibly dry wood.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
And one thing we all know.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
About drywood is that it burns. It burns like there's
no tomorrow. So Richard Whibley, our clerk of Works at
the Palace, thinks, hmmm, why not burn all these tally
sticks to ash? Right, Ash is a lot easier to
deal with than all these tally sticks. That's the surefire
way to get them out of here and to free
(05:53):
up some space. Yeah, you could toss them out. He
thought about that, but that's not as much fun as
burning things. You know, just throwing it in the garbage
isn't as much fun. And we know that's true, right,
you know, raking and bagging leaves for example. You know
we can do that. We can break them all up
and put them in big bags and put them on
the roads, and that's doable.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
We can make do with that. It works, but it's
not fun, right, not like when.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
We used to be able to make a big pile
of leaves and then burn it, you know, like lighting
the beacons of Gondor or something like that. I loved
burning leaves. It was a lot more fun. Fall was
more fun. Life was more fun when we could burn
things to get rid of them. Probably wasn't as healthy,
I get that, but it was more fun. So anyway,
Richard Webbly Webley Webbly wibly, he wants to.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Burn these sticks.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
So he's going to do that, but not outside in
some big, uncontrollable bonfire.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
That's what the commoners might do. You know.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
He's a man of breeding and he decided that these
tally sticks royal as they were, should be burned royally
right here in the palace's furnaces. And so, without a
second thought, the Clerk of Works tasks a couple of
workmen with the job of burning two large, enormous cartloads
of sticks in the stoves beneath the floor of the
House of Lords. And let me tell you the guys
(07:11):
that he got, they were devoted. You know, they may
not have been all that bright. You know, history doesn't
tell us for sure, but there are clues. They may
not have been all that bright, but they were committed
to their work. You know, nothing was going to deter
them from finishing this task, and I mean literally nothing. See,
they went to work early in the morning of October sixteen,
(07:31):
and they started dumping loads of these sticks into the fires,
watching that dry wood ignite almost instantly. So they've worked
in work throughout the day, constantly tossing armfuls of sticks
into the furnaces. Now, unfortunately, part way through the day,
a chimney fire begins to smolder beneath the floor of
the House of Lords, you know.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Out of sight for the workers. They don't see it. Happening.
Speaker 1 (07:52):
They don't know what's going on, but it's happening.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
You know.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
It starts to smolder, and it continues to smolder for
a good part of the day and on a If
you'd think that something like that would be noticed by somebody,
well you'd be right. It would be noticed. And in fact,
a party of visitors to the House of Lords conducted,
you know, brought through by this deputy housekeeper named missus. Right,
(08:15):
she's bringing them through, and this party of visitors become
strangely puzzled by the heat just emanating out of the
floor as they're walking over it. That was definitely strange, right,
that's not the normal experience here in October, that the
floor is.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Hot to the touch. Hmm, that's odd.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
But if that wasn't confusing enough, they were absolutely flummixed.
I mean, they had no idea what to do with
this when they saw the smoke pouring out of the floor.
You know, the floor is hot and it's smoking. What's
going on here?
Speaker 2 (08:47):
This is not usual.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Now, we would all know what was going on at
that point if we were there and we saw that.
But that was happening way before the phrase where there's
smoke there's fire had been invented, so they had no idea.
The heat and the smoke and its connection to fire
completely lost on them. So they puzzled about it for
a while, and then good old missus Right checked with
(09:10):
the workmen. But I told you these people were diligent,
you know, I said that right at the beginning. They
were committed to the work. They maybe weren't the brightest bulbs,
but they were committed. They told their boss they're going
to burn these sticks, and they weren't going to quit
till they burned.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
Them, all of them.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
So they dismissed missus Right in her concerns. You know,
hot floors with smoke rising from them was clearly clearly
not connected to the inferno in the furnaces. There's no
causal relationship there at all, nothing to worry about. So
they kept working. Missus Right figured, well, you know, they
seemed good with it. I guess we might as well
just move on with our day. And everything proceeded.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
As it had been going.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
And then around five o'clock or so, the workmen called
it a day, put the fires out in the furnaces,
and they went home. Missus Right also decided to call
it a day, locked things up up and headed out.
Soon after that, screams arise from a doorkeeper's wife that
the House of Lords is on fire, and then, in
what seemed like no time at all, the flames spread
(10:10):
through the rest of the palace. Huge fireball erupted. You know,
it's visible for miles and miles around as more of
the building goes up in flames, and thousands of Londoners
are crowding around the bridges around the bank of the Thames,
and they're watching as the blaze consumed centuries of history.
There's paintings about this. Google it and you can check
(10:30):
them out now. In the end, both Houses of Parliament
were completely destroyed, along with most of the surrounding buildings.
The only major structure that survived was Westminster Hall, and
that was saved by heroic firefighters and a lucky shift
and wind that night. Now, by the following morning, October seventeen,
much of the Palace of Westminster it's in ashes. But
(10:51):
out of these ashes came one of the most famous
architectural partnerships of the nineteenth century and one of the
most tragic, the story of Charles Bears and Augustus Pugin
and their design for the new Palace of Westminster didn't
just give us the iconic Houses of Parliament. It ended
up launching the Gothic Revival and helped define what we
now call Victorian architecture. Here's the scoop on this part
(11:14):
of the story. Now, after Parliament burned down, the government
held a design competition for the new building, and the
rules were specific. The design had to be either Gothic
or Elizabethan, nothing classical, nothing modern, because Westminster Hall had
survived and the new construction needed to be able to
blend with that, so it needed to be Gothic or Elizabethan.
(11:36):
That was basically the requirement.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
Now.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
The winner of this contest was Charles Barry. He's a
Westminster born architect in his forties at the time, and
he's already one of London's rising stars. He'd been born
just across the street from where Big Ben now stands,
and he was orphaned as a young kid, and he
left school I think it was around fifteen. The age
of fifteen, he apprenticed with a surveyor and before long
(12:03):
he'd earned this reputation for diligence and quiet genius, you know,
not saying anything. But I earned a similar reputation amongst people.
Some people, handful of people, mom, dad, kind of mom.
Mom saw the genius and the diligence. But anyway, Charles Berry,
(12:24):
you know, people are seeing that he's got, you know,
a bright future in front of him. He's got big dreams,
and they're feeling like he's going to be able to
achieve these things. Well, Charles Berry's got a small inheritance,
you know, like I said, it was orphan young, but
there's a little bit of money there. And he takes
that money and he sets off on a three year
grand tour through France, Italy, Greece, Egypt, Palestine, you know,
(12:47):
all over the place. And those travels really end up
changing him. He falls in love with the balance and
the grandeur of the Italian Renaissance. And when he came
home in eighteen twenty, he brought that, you know, and
all the things that he picked up on the road,
he brought that with him. His Travelers Club on Paul Mall,
built in eighteen thirty two, that was hailed as the
(13:09):
first true Italian Renaissance building in London. Now, by the
mid eighteen thirties, Barry was famous for elegant classical designs.
Palaces in miniature kind of is the idea, you know,
So he's really well known when this contest comes about.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
But there's a problem.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Remember, the rules require a Gothic ear Elizabethan style to
match the surviving medieval Westminster Hall. Gothic wasn't really Barry's language.
So he needed help, and he turned to somebody who
spoke Gothic fluently. And that's a brilliant twenty three year
old draftsman named Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin, Pugi n Pugin.
(13:48):
He was already a phenomenon at this point. He's talented, fiery,
absolutely consumed by his love for the Gothic, and just
that same year, eighteen thirty four, he had converted to Catholicism.
Now it wasn't a sudden spiritual experience for him, it
was something that had been building for years. Through all
of his work. Pugin had been studying the great cathedrals
(14:10):
of France and when.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
He was doing that.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
While doing that, he became just absolutely convinced that the
medieval Gothic wasn't just more beautiful, it was more truthful. Okay,
it's not just more beautiful, it's more truthful. The forms
of those old churches. He argued that those forms expressed
the faith that had created them. Every point at arch
lifted the soul towards Heaven. That's his idea. Every carved
(14:35):
detail was an act of devotion. To pugen architecture wasn't decoration.
It was theology and that conviction that really really strong belief,
which is.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
Literally what conviction is.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
Didn't need to clarify that conviction shaped every single thing
he touched. And the irony was really profound here, all right.
So here's a young, devout Catholic helping design the seat
of Britain's product government, just five years after Catholics had
even been allowed to serve in Parliament. He couldn't even
submit designs under his own name, really, because his open
(15:10):
passionate Catholicism would have guaranteed rejection. But Barry understood the
genius of Pugin, and so while Barry handled the structure,
Pugin kind of quietly supplied the soul of the building,
and he worked feverishly designing not only the huge, soaring interiors,
but also the carved woodwork, the metal fittings, the tiles,
(15:31):
the fabrics, the patterns of the tiles underfoot, the tracery
and the windows, even the shape of the inkstands, all
of them came from Pugin's imagination. Now, later letters to
his friends show how much he poured into this work
and how much it drained him. He called it the
hardest labor of his life. But it was also his
ministry because for Pugen this wasn't remember, this wasn't just architecture.
(15:55):
You know, there's way more going on with the construction
of these buildings. To him, it was kind of like evangelism.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
In a way.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
He believed that beauty was moral. We talked about that
in the episode that aired previously. We got a little
more into that. But he believed that beauty was moral,
that good buildings could shape good people. And so through
Barry's official plans, Pugen set out to kind of preach
through design, to restore, inform and symbol what he saw
(16:24):
as the spiritual heart of England. That's his goal, that's
what he's doing, and that's the deep irony of the
Palace of Westminster. It's really really intriguing. It's one of
the most enduring symbols of British Protestant democracy, and yet
inside in its details and on the outside it's profoundly Catholic. Now, however,
I mentioned that this collaboration had elements of the tragic
(16:46):
in it, right, So let's get to those. Despite all
of Pugin's work, we talked about all the things that
he did, despite all of that, Charles Barry actually gave
him very little public credit. And it's a little muddy
as to why. You know, what his reasoning was. Was
he being selfish, was he just protecting the project and
protecting both of them. It's really hard to say.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
You know.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
On the one hand, he gave pugin In, you know,
a way to contribute to the cause in a safe manner.
Remember we talked about if it was clear to everybody
that this new Catholic convert was involved, he probably would
have been, you know, potentially kicked off the project. So
in one regard, Charles Barry's giving Pugin a way to
contribute safely. You know, he's kind of giving him some
(17:30):
architectural cover so that he can collaborate with Barry.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
But on the other hand, the only.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Official title Pugin ever was given was Superintendent of Wood carving,
you know, a description that came nowhere close to covering.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
What he actually did. Well.
Speaker 1 (17:45):
Despite this, despite the fact that Barry wasn't dishing out
the credit, by the mid eighteen forties, people were beginning
to whisper that Pugin really was the real architect of Parliament.
And the rumors grew loud enough and rampant, ton and
fervent enough that Pugin himself came out and issued a
public statement saying, hey, no, no, no, I'm only assisting
(18:08):
mister Barry. All of my work is just based on
his designs, so he's trying to calm things down and
move things forward, you know, keep things moving forward. Well,
all of this drama added a huge amount of pressure
to the work. And then on top of that, all
Parliament themselves get involved and micromanages every single design decision
(18:28):
that needs to be made. So they're there micromanaging everything.
They're blaming Charles Barry for every single delay that crops up,
even though most of those delays were caused by their
own demands. And then when the House of Commons Chamber
was finally finished in eighteen fifty, the members of Parliament
they walk in, they look it over and they say, nah,
we hate it. They complained about the layout, they had
(18:50):
complained about the acoustics, and they forced Barry to redesign
the whole thing. He had to love working with these people.
We know that he did, because all of this pressure
took a terrible toll on both of the men. You know, Pugin,
let's look at him first. He was juggling dozens of projects.
He was juggling over one hundred churches, country houses, furniture designs, metalwork, wallpaper, tiles.
(19:14):
He was doing a ton of different things while working
on Westminster, and by eighteen fifty two his health completely collapsed.
He suffered a complete mental and physical breakdown after years
of relentless overwork, and he was committed to Bedlam, right,
the infamous Bedlam Asylum, and after five and a half
weeks there he was released. But he never really recovered,
(19:35):
and he ended up dying on September fourteen, eighteen fifty two,
at just forty years old, never seeing the palace completed. Now, Barry,
he didn't really fare all that much better. While he's
managing Westminster's construction, you know, he's dealing with Parliament's constant
interference they're micromanaging, they're constant nagging. While he's doing that,
he's also designing the Reform Club. He's working on projects
(19:59):
from Istanbuldest, Scotland. He reportedly slept only four or five
hours a night, you know, rising between four and six
in the morning to get to work again. Well, doing
that day after day on top of all the stress
that each one of those projects brought him, all of
that aged him terribly. And on May twelve, eighteen sixty,
after spending an afternoon at the Crystal Palace with his wife,
(20:21):
he was seized with difficulty breathing and chest pain, and
then later he died of a heart attack that night
at his home. He was sixty four years old, and
the palace still wasn't finished. His son Edward, completed the
work in eighteen seventy, thirty four years after construction began.
Now neither of the brilliant minds who created it lived
to see their masterpiece completed. So that was tragic, right,
(20:43):
But it gets worse. Remember when I mentioned that Barry
said Pugin was the superintendent of woodworking, and how that
really didn't explain the depth of his role in the
least well, nobody ever corrected that story, at least not
while both men were alive. After their deaths, their sons
end up fighting bitterly over who deserved the greater share
of the glory, and that feud dragged on for decades,
(21:05):
And it wasn't until after World War Two, nearly one
hundred years later, that Pugin's name finally appears in the
official guidebook to the Houses of Parliament. Today, historians generally
agree Barry provided the grand plan and oversaw construction. Pugin
filled it with soul. So why does all of this matter?
You know, why spend time on a fire, two architects
(21:26):
and one building. Well, it matters because what Barry and
Pugin created at Westminster didn't just rebuild, you know, Parliament,
It reshaped an entire era. Before the Palace of Westminster,
Gothic revival was just a niche curiosity, you know, it
was something Romantics used for country chapels or the odd
you know, odd of state house or something like that.
But after Westminster, pretty much everything changed. Gothic became the
(21:49):
architectural language of the Victorian Age. You know, if the
seat of the British Empire, the very symbol of its
power and identity and coolness if that could be gothic.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
And pretty much anything could be gothic.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Town halls, train stations, universities, libraries, and then from there,
homes across Britain and America eventually followed the lead. Very
and Pugin proved that you could take a medieval style,
something old, and.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
Make it work for the modern world.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
You know, you could blend history and progress, you could
honor the past while looking ahead to the future. And
that balance, you know, nostalgia and innovation, reverence, reform, however
you want to look at it. That balance became the
heartbeat of Victorian design and it's still something that we
see in design today. But there's something deeper to Pugin
(22:35):
brought a philosophy to Westminster that would echo through the century.
You know, the belief that beauty and morality were connected,
that good design could help make good people. Now, to him,
ornament wasn't frivolous.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
It was meaningful.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
You know, every carved detail, every painted pattern, every curve
and flourish was meant to lift the spirit, to remind
people that beauty pointed towards something higher than themselves. And
that conviction spread and it became the soul of the
Victorian home. It's why they filled their homes with pattern
and color, why they covered every wall and every ceiling.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Why more.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
You know, it wasn't just excess, it was virtue. They
truly believed that living among beautiful, well crafted things could
make you a better person. And I love, love, love
love that idea. I love digging into it because here's
the thing. It's so easy to dismiss design and decoration
and all of that.
Speaker 2 (23:27):
It's kind of shallow, you.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
Know, sup superfluous, super oh, good grief, super what is
that word? Superficial? Man, I'm sorry, complete brain melt.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
Superficial.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
It's easy to dismiss, you know, design and decoration as
shallow and superficial, you know, something that's not important, something
that just makes our homes look nice and feel comfortable,
but at the end of the day, it's not actually.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Important, right. It's easy to say that, you know.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
I catch myself thinking that way sometimes, and I've spent
most of my working life in the paint industry, but
still sometimes it's easy to think that paint's just you know,
an afterthought, it's a finishing touch, you know, not something
that really matters.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
At the end of the day.
Speaker 1 (24:12):
But I think the Victorians were onto something. And it's
not just them.
Speaker 2 (24:16):
I know that it's not just them.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
Who had this thought, but they really brought it to
the forefront, and I think they're onto something. And I'm
not saying that paint in your living room is going
to make you morally superior. You know, that's not the
argument at all. But what I am saying is that
when we take the time to paint our homes perhaps,
or to choose colors that we love, to add touches
that reflect who we are and who we want to be,
(24:40):
we're making our homes better places to be in, better
places to live in.
Speaker 2 (24:44):
And that is a moral good.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
Isn't it.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
Isn't that a moral good?
Speaker 1 (24:48):
I think that's a moral good because the world out
there is nuts. Sometimes not all the time, but sometimes
it's nuts. Often it's nuts. And home is our retreat,
you know, it's our hate. And making it feel welcoming
and comfortable and peaceful, that's not just frivolous, it's necessary.
It's good for us. It's good for the people we love.
(25:09):
It's good for the kids that were raising in that space.
A beautifully painted and designed home doesn't raise your kids
for you, of course not, but it helps you know,
maybe a little bit, maybe a lot. Either way, it matters,
you know, when the world feels chaotic, Every bit of
piece that we can create at home is definitely worth something.
Every small choice to make our space better, even something
(25:31):
as simple as a fresh goat to paint.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
All of that adds up.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
The Victorians understood that they built it into their philosophy.
Beauty isn't a luxury. It's part of what makes life livable.
And I think they were right. And a good chunk
of that philosophy that we're talking about came into being
because of the work of Pugin and Barry and the
legacy of their partnership. And remember all of that started
with a pile of burning sticks. All right, that's going
(25:55):
to do it for this bonus episode of Home and Progress.
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a review. All of those things will help other people
find the show, and I really appreciate that. Thanks for
listening for home and progress. I'm Dan Hansen. I'll see
(26:16):
you next time.
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