STOCKHOLM.- In the richly illustrated Royalty and Architecture, well-known scholars provide examples and perspectives on the importance of monarchs for architecture and architectural policy. From palaces and gardens to ornamental interiors and other artworks, this volume presents historical examples in which leaders of European nobility or aristocracy served as surprisingly active patrons of the projects that they commissioned.

Royalty has always built castles, fortresses, and entire cities. Less attention, however, has been given to individual monarchs pursuing an interest in architecture and, in some cases acting as architects. Recent research on Gustav III of Sweden (1746–1792) shows that he was, in fact, the architect of a number of important building projects. George III (1760–1820) also had a great interest in architecture, as did Louis XIV (1638–1715), who was greatly involved in shaping the palace and garden at Versailles. Stanisław II August’s (1732–1798) interest in architectural work had a major impact on the neoclassical style in Poland.

Royalty and Architecture delves into historical examples in which leaders of European nobility or aristocracy served as surprisingly active patrons of the projects that they commissioned.

In his essay on the Swedish King Gustav III, Magnus Olausson highlights an example of the great involvement that a king could have in architecture. Gustav III’s surviving collection of architectural drawings, kept in the Engelsberg archive of the Ax:son Johnson Foundation and published by Bokförlaget Stolpe, testifies not only to his great interest in architecture but also to the fact that he was his own architect. He was skilled with the pen, devoting much of his time since childhood not only to politics, warfare, theatre, and opera but also – and not least – to architecture.

Although the essays in the book attest to the importance of royalty in architecture in earlier times, we also have examples from our own time of how royalty has been important in the field. Clive Aslet describes in his essay how in modern times HRH Prince Charles, the Prince of Wales, now HM King Charles III, has had a great and positive influence on architecture by raising the significance of place and the importance of beauty to man. King Charles’s aesthetic ideals are shared by at least the general public in Sweden and today, most people realize that attractive houses and places built to last over time are better both socially and environmentally.

This volume of essays constitutes the first major international study of an intriguing subject: the extent to which European royal architectural commissions from the seventeenth century to the present day were designed by the monarchs who ordered them.