Talk:John Nash (architect)

Picturesque in architecture

This article would really benefit if at just one point it were to describe what is meant by Nash's use of the picturesque in architecture. It makes this point multiple times, but does nothing to inform readers what design choices Nash made that distinguish him from his contemporaries, who presumably used the picturesque less. Bangabandhu (talk) 21:27, 13 April 2016 (UTC)

"...found us all brick..."

I suspect this belongs in here; any objections? Anmccaff (talk) 16:10, 15 November 2016 (UTC)

Welsh

This citation clearly states that he considered himself Welsh. "John Nash considered himself Welsh". Can't be clearer than that.Titus Gold (talk) 20:08, 10 October 2022 (UTC) https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Oe2VDwAAQBAJ&newbks=0&printsec=frontcover&pg=PA138&dq=john+nash+welsh&hl=en&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=john%20nash%20welsh&f=false Both parents Welsh also. Titus Gold (talk) 20:14, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

References

You cite two books. One says he was born in London, the other says "probably" Neath. One says his father was Welsh, the other not. He certainly had a Welsh connection but then other sources call him English. It really could be a lot clearer, you know. He was certainly British, but a suggestion he was Welsh is not lead worthy as it needs too much unpacking. Also there should not be novel information in the lead. It is extremely common that editors start work on the lead, but nothing should be going in the lead that is not a summary of text in the main, and then there should be no need to add lead citations. I know I have said this to you before. What belongs in the lead here is that he was British. That is indubitably true. I note that you have removed text saying architects are British from a lot of pages today. Why? If someone is Welsh then they are British, and that also has the advantage of being the state too. These edits appear to violate WP:NPOV because they are a series of edits that prima facie speak to a nationalist agenda. Why are we trying to expunge this information? Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 21:11, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

Titus Gold, "Can't be clearer than that" - actually, as Sirfurboy points out, it can be a lot less clear than that. Hilling says Nash considered himself Welsh, though acknowledging his father's family came from Shropshire. The ODNB calls him "British", as does the Royal Academy, [1]. While James Stevens Curl calls him "English", (Oxford Dictionary of Architecture, p.511). And different sources place his birth in Carmarthenshire or London. What this shows is the foolishness of your POV-driven, Welsh Nat. approach. Where all the sources do agree is that he was British, which encompasses Wales and England, then and now. Can you also try to remember that we are writing for an international, not a national, audience. Removing a nationality, as you have done elsewhere, merely because you can't demonstrate an architect is Welsh and resent the use of the term British, is not helping to build the encyclopaedia. KJP1 (talk) 09:20, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

Stop accusing me of a political motive. British is an umbrella term that was previously applied to everyone living on the island. You can't assume someone is British, just in the same way that you can't assume any nationality unless you have a valid citation. Whatever someone considers themselves to be, trumps whatever other sources say about them. Titus Gold (talk) 16:04, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

What matters is what reliable sources say. Britannica calls him both British and English. "Nash, John". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/19786. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.) calls him "one of the most creative and influential of all British architects" and also says "Few English architects have had a greater influence on their surroundings than John Nash". DuncanHill (talk) 16:17, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

You can be "British" and "Welsh". So I would find it accurate and acceptable to describe him as "British" in the lede and, or course, expain in the body of the article that his work matured in Wales (and he reportedly considered himself to be Welsh at some point). He has strong connections to the UK capital city and seems to be recognised for this too. Sionk (talk) 17:10, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

Reference style

The edsum for this edit: [2] says we need a consistent reference style. sfn is being added but did not exist before. Inline citation edits did exist, but the original style appears to me to be paranthetical referencing (e.g. <ref>Suggett 1995, p. 82</ref>) which is deprecated and rightly replaced with sfn. As the page first use was parenthetical referencing, sfn is the correct style. I won't attempt to do any of that now as the page is in use. I expect I could convert all inline citation based ref templates to sfn in one session (if someone else does not do it first). It appears editors are already improving the parenthetical referencing, thanks. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 09:59, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

Sirfurboy - If you've an automated way of doing this, I'm very happy to stop my, very tedious, manual efforts! Let me know. KJP1 (talk) 10:14, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

DuncanHill - Morning Duncan - we're likely to end up edit-conflicting if we try to do this simultaneously. Not remotely possessive about it! If you want to plough on, let me know and I'll take the "In use" tag off. KJP1 (talk) 10:18, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

@KJP1: You carry on - I mainly wanted to get the misattributed Catalogue fixed, and will have to go out soon anyway. Didn't mean to tread on your toes! The 1978 Colvin is available on Archive.org, the page numbers differ significantly from the later edition used for some references. DuncanHill (talk) 10:24, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

DuncanHill - No worries at all! I’ll plough on. I’ll likely get bored at some point and take that tag off. Pleased to have any help. KJP1 (talk) 10:26, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

DuncanHill - Duncan, apropos Colvin, you don’t know whether the follow-up dictionary by Brodie is available on line, [3]? I’ve wanted it for a long while but it’s £300 on eBay! KJP1 (talk) 10:37, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

@KJP1: It's not on Archive.org (the Felstead, Franklin, and Pinfield Directory of British architects, 1834-1900 is). There are other possible places one could find it, but we're not meant to know about them! I might have a dig about later to see what I can find. Some books are priced at "the most a well-funded research library will pay" rather then "let's sell lots of copies so people can actually appreciate and learn from them". DuncanHill (talk) 10:46, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

User:KJP1 I can semi-automate the process for all inline citation templates (pull the source out of wikipedia and playing with regular expressions), but I have no way to automate the old paranthetical updates. Happy to help with those too but it would be manual for me as well. My suggestion is you get it as far as you want, but don't pay much attention to inline citation templates. Then later I can take over and do the inline citation templates and anything else outstanding. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 10:38, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

Fine, I’ll plough on until I get bored, and then take the tag off. Collectively, we’ll have it sorted shortly. While I’m on, what do you both think about the images? I love images and galleries for architecture articles, but I think this just has too many. KJP1 (talk) 10:41, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

Thanks. Yes, it is a bit too image heavy. We could certainly lose the second gallery (or merge with the first and prune). The left aligned image in the text is also not a great idea (I think there is a policy about these but I can't remember where). Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 10:44, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

On second thoughts, maybe prune all 4 of the end galleries so they don't look like galleries. Selecting at most 4 or 5 pictures for each sub heading. That would be my view at least. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 10:51, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

Think we're mostly there on the sfn'ing, although I may well have missed some. And I think all the repeated stuff from the Wales section is now smoothed out. Duncan, any thoughts on the images before I begin trimming? KJP1 (talk) 13:21, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

Works

Another thing I’m not sure about is the, very long, list of Works. This could be moved into a separate article, List of works by John Nash, and we could move many/most of the images there too. It would all need citing, of course. Thoughts? KJP1 (talk) 13:42, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

All remaining inline citation template refs now converted to sfn. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 20:16, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

Regarding the list of works - I don't think it needs to go into a list article. It is ok to have lists in an article and the page is not overlong. It is useful information to have here. A reader interested in the architect would certainly be interested in a list of his works. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 20:18, 12 October 2022 (UTC)