1800 George Dance Plan for the improvement of the Legal Quays, City of London

George Dance the Younger, (April 1, 1741 - January 14, 1825) was an English architect, surveyor and portraitist. Dance was born at his family home on Chiswell Street, London. He was the fifth son of a well-established architect and educated to follow in the family tradition. He studied at the St. Pauls School before departing on the Grand Tour and eventually spending six years studying architecture and draughtsmanship in Rome. He won several architecture awards in Italy and received his first commission there, to design two chimney pieces for Sir Robert Mainwaring. Dance returned to London and joined his father's architecture practice in 1765. In the same year his design was chosen to rebuild the All Hallows-on-the-Wall Church, Dance's first major project in London. He went on to complete numerous major constructions including the Royal College of Surgeons, Newgate Prison, St Luke's Hospital for Lunatics, and the Shakespeare Gallery in Pall Mall. Unfortunately most of these have been demolished. His most significant surviving work is the façade of London's Guildhall. In December of 1768 Dance was one of the Royal Academicians, founders of the Royal Academy. Dance largely retired in 1798 when he became a professor of architecture at the Royal Academy. Around this time he dedicated himself instead to portraiture to the extent that he did not deliver a single lecture at the academy. He was dismissed in 1805. Dance died at his home on 92 Grower Street, London, a site now marked with a plaque. His physical remains were interred at St. Paul's Cathedral. More by this mapmaker...