WEBLEYAN PALACE

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1144, 3 June 1911, Page 9

WEBLEYAN PALACE

WONDERFUL BUILDING IN LONDON. Every successive step in the building of the great AVesleyan Hall on the site of the old Aquarium, in Westminster, confirms tho growing conviction that when completed it will be one of tho most remarkable architectural monuments in England (says tho "Daily Mail"). Now that the building has been carried to the basis of tho lofty dome, it requires but little imagination to picture tho general effect of tho finished 1 ' edifice, which combines harmony of form and beauty and refinement of detail with tho most ingenious practical planning ami a quality which can only be described as romantic imagination. The whole conception is unusual, in so far as the building docs not consist of four straight elevations but of a series of receding pianos. Order and rhythm prevail everywhere, and yet there is a freedom of invention which renders the effect "picturesque" in the best sense of the' word. It is for this reason, and for the careful consideration given to the scale of the building, that the Methodist Hall, in spite of being based on Renaissance and Baroquo forms, does not look out of place in a neighbourhood dominated by Westminster Abbey, tho Houses of Parliament, Westminster Hospital, and other Gothic buildings. Tho purpose of the building is admirably expressed both by architectural form and by applied decoration. Apart from being the headquarters of Wcsleyan Methodism, it is to be a magnificent hall available for concerts and meetings. Indeed the whole upper floor, a little set back from the ground floor, is devoted to that large central hali with such necessary adjuncts as corridors, foyer, and cloakrooms, the ground floor being reserved for Methodist purposes and the "erypt"mainly-for a largo restaurant. The interior, although far from finished, is even more impressive than tho exterior. Indeed, in its present state, with its bare walls and masses of scaffolding, the largo concert hall has all the romance of one of Piranosi's fantastic architectural dreams. The great double staircase, designed in swelling curves, which oppose, and yet blend with, the wide span of a low arch, appears to the layman's eye at least, an astonishing architectural tour do force, suggested perhaps by the staircase in the palace at Nancy, which it rivals in beauty of design. Tho whole interior is constructed on tho most practical lines compatible with tho artistic effects that are aimed at from every point of view. There is no doubt that tho Wosloyan Hall, with its wide corridors, spacious foyer, and monumental stairrase, will bo tho finest concert hall in London.