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William Kent

Royal artist, architect and designer to Georgian kings

William Kent (1685-1748) rose from humble origins as sign painter. Commissioned by George I and George II, he became one of the most successful and fashionable designers of the Georgian period. His work can still be seen at Kensington Palace and Hampton Court Palace.

Kent was the first British designer to tackle the interior as a whole; extending an architect’s control to every detail of interior decoration, fireplaces and furnishings. 

The King's Grand Staircase, showing detail of the wall painting by William Kent (1684-1748)

Image: William Kent (third from left) depicted in his own painting on the King's Staircase at Kensington Palace. Pictured alongside him are his mistress, Elizabeth Butler, and two of his assistants. © Historic Royal Palaces

William Kent, Georgian designer

Yorkshire-born William Kent began his working life as a sign and coach painter. His employer recognised his greater talent, and Kent was sent to study art in Italy, thanks to several wealthy patrons.

A charming and skilful social climber, he made several influential friends on his travels, including the wealthy and sophisticated Earl of Burlington.

A skilful social climber

In 1719, Kent returned to London from his Italian travels, looking for work.  His friend Lord Burlington used his high-ranking contacts to introduce the young artist to the royal household.

George I was searching for a ‘dazzling’ painter to decorate his new state apartments at Kensington; Kent saw his chance. He undercut the official royal painter, Sir James Thornhill’s quote by several hundred pounds, and won the job.

Did you know?

Kent’s first royal commission stirred up jealousy: a highly-critical rival suggested that he had cheated on his materials to save money!

A room with three chandeliers and a structure in the centre of the room placed on some steps. A fireplace and two small gold statues are pictured in the background.

Image: At the centre of the Cupola Room is an 18th-century musical clock, known as the 'Temple of the Four Great Monarchies of the World'. © Historic Royal Palaces

The room that launched a career

With his rivals brushed aside, and with George I’s blessing, Kent set to work on the largest of the state apartments, the Cupola Room.

He was closely monitored by a nit-picking committee from the Office of Works, but his new fashionable Italianate style (and Kent’s powerful friends) tipped the balance of opinion in his favour. And George I loved the clever décor, full of eye-tricking illusions.

Kent made the whole room resemble a four-sided Roman cupola (a rounded dome). The illusion is enhanced by the steeply curved ceiling, with the Garter Star at its apex.

Photo of a well-lit room with a monument in the middle placed on some steps. Chandeliers surround this with raised entryways on either side.

Image: A general view of the Cupola Room.

The Cupola Room

When the room was finished, with its painted pilasters, marble chimney piece and gilded lead statues it must have dazzled in the flickering candlelight, but others called it a ‘terrible glaring show’. However, George I loved it.

Kent went on to decorate several other rooms at the palace, including the extraordinary King’s Staircase.

He also remodelled and redecorated the King’s Gallery, originally built for William III, between 1725 and 1727.

Photo of a railing at the top of a grand staircase. Paintings of people on the walls in the background looking over balconies can be seen.

Image: The King's Staircase © Historic Royal Palaces

A painter, architect and father of modern gardening. In the first... he was below mediocrity; in the second he was a restorer of the science, in the last an original...

Horace Walpole, who thought Kent’s real talent was for landscape design

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The King's Grand Staircase, showing detail of the wall painting by William Kent (1684-1748)

The puzzle of the King's Staircase

William Kent created the King's Staircase in the 1720s for George I. We believe that Kent used people from the royal household as his sitters. But who are they?

There are 45 people in the painting (including Kent himself), but so far only 12 have been identified with evidence from other portraits and court records. The painting presents historians with an enormous puzzle.

Included in this scene is Peter 'the Wild Boy' (in the green coat), a boy in his early teens who was found in German woods 'wild, naked… and knowing nobody' and brought to London. The man standing beside him is Dr John Arbuthnot, a medical doctor and satirist, who tried to teach Peter how to speak.

Image: © Historic Royal Palaces

William Kent at Hampton Court Palace

An apartment for a spoilt second son

By 1732, William Kent’s work at Kensington Palace had won him a huge number of admirers, among them George II and Queen Caroline.

The King commissioned Kent to improve the royal accommodation at Hampton Court Palace, in particular to transform the dilapidated Tudor royal apartments in Clock Court into a sumptuous apartment for their favoured second son, William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland.

Did you know?

The doted-on William Augustus grew up to be a vicious military commander, nicknamed 'The Butcher of Culloden'.

A large portrait of a man and woman displayed in-between two large bollard structures with an arch over the top. The painting is lit up with railings beneath it.

Image: The former Cumberland Suite newly re-presented as a flexible royal art gallery with a rotating display of masterpieces from the Royal Collection. © Historic Royal Palaces

Fit for a prince

Little expense was spared for the favoured son’s new suite of rooms at Hampton Court. 

Kent designed the new range in Gothic style, with other architectural elements, in an attempt to match the Tudor buildings around it.

This image shows one of the four final rooms of the Duke’s grand apartments, which today have become the Cumberland Art Gallery, housing a fabulous rotating collection of Royal Collection artworks.

Queens Stairs

Image: The Queen's Staircase. © Historic Royal Palaces

The Queen's Staircase

In 1734, Queen Caroline invited her favourite architect and designer, William Kent to redecorate the stairs to the Queen’s State apartments at Hampton Court Palace. Kent’s Roman-inspired setting includes an homage to the Queen, whom he compares to the ancient goddess Britannia. 

On the west wall of the Queen's Staircase, now part of the Georgian Story, is the painting Mercury Presenting the Liberal Arts to Apollo and Diana by Gerrit van Honthorst, 1628.

The wrought-iron balustrade was designed by the Huguenot ironworker Jean Tijou, who also created the Tijou Screen in the Privy Garden.

Kent painted the walls with a series of trompe l’oeil (trick of the eye) niches and half-domed spaces with classical sculptures, and the Garter star and royal ciphers within the ceiling. 

The Cupola Room (SF045) looking south-east, 23 January 2019. 

Showing part of the 1722 trompe l'oeil ceiling painting by William Kent (1684-1748) and the musical clock, known as the 'Temple of the Four Great Monarchies of the World', acquired by Augusta Princess of Wales in c1743. Made by Charles Clay, the clock was unfinished at his death in 1740 and completed by John Pyke (active 1710–77). 

The Cupola Room was the principal state room of the palace, and it was here that Princess Victoria, later Queen, was christened in 1819.

Image: The Cupola Room at Kensington Palace. © Historic Royal Palaces

William Kent's death and legacy

William Kent went on to be a highly successful and much-sought after designer.  Apart from the palaces of Kensington and Hampton Court, his other houses, gardens and interiors can be seen all over England. However, his work divided opinion both during his life and after his death. To some he was a multi-talented genius; to others, ‘opportunistic’ and ‘over-rated’.

Everyone agrees that the man himself was fond of the good life, with his love of ‘high feeding and inaction’ clearly demonstrated in his ample proportions, and probably leading to his relatively early death in 1748.

Kent never married, and left his mistress Elizabeth Butler part of his £10,000 estate.

Browse more history and stories

Kings and queens of the Georgian period

Who were the Georgians – the kings and their queens who gave their name to an era?

The story of Kensington Palace

An elegant retreat for Britain's royal family

William III and Mary II

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