But he was rather more than an architect: a merchant who travelled to India; a soldier and spy who spent some time in the Bastille; a successful playwright and theatrical impresario; an official in the Office of Works; a herald in the College of Arms (the official recorder of aristocratic lineage in Britain); a prominent figure in society (he worked for more dukes than any other individual architect); and member of the influential Kit-Cat Club.

Portrait of Sir John Vanbrugh by Sir Godfrey Kneller, c. 1705, oil on canvas. Courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery

Of all these achievements, it is perhaps his architecture that resonates most with us now. To celebrate it, the Georgian Group is compering Vanbrugh 300 with events across the year at six of his most important architectural creations, Castle Howard, Blenheim, Seaton Delaval Hall, Grimsthorpe Castle, Kimbolton Castle, and Stowe. There is also a new biography, John Vanbrugh: The Drama of Architecture (Lund Humphries), by Charles Saumarez Smith, architectural historian, former director of London’s National Gallery and chief executive of the Royal Academy of Arts.

The sites range from the rugged north, which Vanbrugh preferred to the softer south; from the monumental Blenheim to Seaton Delaval, described to me by a guide as a ‘five-bedroom bachelor pad’ (though definitely monumental by that measure!); from projects where he generally saw eye to eye with clients, such as Castle Howard’s Earl of Carlisle, to those with whom he most certainly did not. Sarah Churchill of Blenheim was a veritable client from hell.

Castle Howard as depicted in Vitruvius Britannicus (The British Architect), by Colen Campbell, 1725, part of the Castle Howard collection

We should note that Vanbrugh lived (1664-1726) through an extraordinarily creative period in English history which saw, after the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660, a revival not just in cultural life, especially in science, architecture and theatre, but also the transformation of the state from near absolute monarchy to one where Parliament was sovereign.

It was an era of scientific discovery, especially after the foundation of the Royal Society in 1662, which allowed the work of Newton, Hooke, Boyle and other fellows to progress alongside political thought, such as that of John Locke. William Petty was pioneering ‘political arithmetic’, essentially the origin of scientific economics. Tying many of the threads together, from optics, mathematics and medicine was Christopher Wren (1632-1723). And since he had been designing buildings since before Vanbrugh was born, he also brought architecture to the table.

Wren’s career as an architect took off with the reconstruction of the City of London following the Great Fire of 1666, with commissions for 51 new churches as well as St Paul’s Cathedral. He supervised this work (and other commissions such as a major expansion of Hampton Court Palace and the Royal Naval Hospital at Greenwich) from the Office of Works, where he was surveyor-general for almost 50 years from 1669. It was an extraordinary institution where his colleagues at various times included Nicholas Hawksmoor, Robert Hooke and a host of lesser but not necessarily untalented architects and craftsmen, and Vanbrugh from 1702, the date he was appointed comptroller. Some of the other appointments had a whiff of nepotism, even corruption, about them, but the coincidence of three of Britain’s greatest architects is itself remarkable. (for a discussion of this trio see Anthony Geraghty’s Howard Colvin Memorial Lecture here.)

Even more remarkable is the contribution they were to make to the evolving concept of national identity, with the constitutional upheavals of the second half of the 17th century and the emergence of the single nation of Great Britain through the Act of Union between Scotland and England in 1707. Alongside that lofty endeavour, they were also applying their combined talents to wrestle with the duller but equally important one of what would come, over the following 150 years, to be the profession of architecture, including, rights and responsibilities of the client, the division of labour between designer and maker, and appropriate remuneration for all parties concerned. Collectively they resolved little of this, but Saumarez Smith makes clear how fraught and visceral these issues could be.

As his numerous interests suggest, Vanbrugh came to architecture relatively late. It is not clear entirely what prompted this new direction, but it seems that his acquaintanceship with the 3rd Earl of Carlisle, a cadet branch of the Howard family headed by the Duke of Norfolk for whom Carlisle was deputising as Earl Marshal (in charge of all ceremonial state events) during the then duke’s minority, was the catalyst. Carlisle, who had inherited huge estates, wanted to build a new house, large and grand enough to support his political and social ambitions, on one of them, Henderskelfe, not far from York. Just before 1700, he turned to the most fashionable country house architect of the day, William Talman, then engaged on the vast Chatsworth for the Duke of Devonshire, for ideas. But Talman outraged the earl with his excessive demand for fees, and it seems, fortified by a glass or two of port at the Kit-Cat Club, Vanbrugh either offered or was invited to see what he could do. With political influence at the Office of Works and positions of heralds at the College of Arms more or less in his gift, Carlisle had patronage alongside or in lieu of ready cash for fees.

Carlisle encouraged or benefitted from Vanbrugh’s free-wheeling imagination. The site was an enviable one in the Howardian Hills, not quite the rugged moors that inspired Wuthering Heights more than a century later, but within sight of them. There was a ruined mediaeval castle, the sort of cue Vanbrugh liked (he had fierce and ultimately losing arguments with Duchess Sarah over whether to keep ‘fair Rosamunde’s tower’ at Blenheim), and a large landscape pregnant with possibilities for manipulation into an enchanted landscape. Vanbrugh clearly had a strong visual imagination which, until Castle Howard, had been formed in the theatre, though inspired by his myriad experiences. These included seeing as a young man the cemetery at Surat in India, which he was able to recall vividly in a sketch in 1711, many years after he saw it, and by the fortifications he encountered as a soldier and during his sojourn in the Bastille.

The Great Hall at Castle Howard. Photo by Chris Horwood

Arresting effects – one of Vanbrugh favourite phrases – drawn from drama, were his stock in trade. In this he differed from Wren, whose mind was, as historian Anthony Geraghty recently remarked to me, formed by geometry. He also differed from Hawksmoor, who was more rooted in architecture per se, its materiality and tectonics and the effects that could come from them. Those effects were overlaid on the site at Castle Howard, emanating from the large but not overwhelming central block, across the flanking wings (only one of which was completed by Vanbrugh), and out into the landscape with its woods, bogs, lakes, obelisks, pyramids, mausolea, temples and walls in the form of mock fortifications.

This is the subject of the exhibition ‘Staging the Baroque’ at Castle Howard, curated by Roz Barr (who also co-curated with Saumarez Smith, an exhibition about Vanbrugh at the Soane Museum). Its centre-piece is a large plaster model of the house in its landscape, something often drawn (though only in part) but never rendered in this way. Setting it in a room with views into the landscape makes it especially piquant. It also draws attention to the degree of thought embedded in the landscape which the house, itself a complete show-stopper, can easily overshadow.

Roz Barr, designer and curator of 'Staging the Baroque', Vanbrugh at Castle Howard. Photo by Carole Poirot

The house has recently had extensive work carried out, including recreating the tapestry drawing room which lies between what were the private and the state apartments, itself the latest phase in a longstanding restoration project after a near- catastrophic fire while it was housing a girls’ school during the World War II. The current owner’s father George (sometime BBC chairman) started a restoration when he opened the house to the public in 1952, and oversaw the recreation of the dome in the entrance hall, itself a complex layered space with multiple views in which several theatrical performances could take place at the same time. Barr’s exhibition includes more models and a series of drawings from a stash of Vanbrugh’s at the Victoria & Albert Museum which show consistently inventive designs, many for relatively small houses, as well as reproductions of letters. As intended, the exhibition gives just enough information to whet the appetite for exploring the house and grounds.

Installation view of 'Staging the Baroque', Vanbrugh at Castle Howard. Photo by Carole Poirot

Castle Howard is remarkable among great houses in that it can be both grand and intimate. Its grandeur came out in its most famous representation in the television dramatisation of Evelyn Waugh’s novel Brideshead Revisited, but far less of the intimacy was apparent, despite Waugh’s narrative (essentially about love, faith and death). I became aware of this on a recent visit when, having wandered through the exhibition and descended to the entrance hall, I found George’s son Nick, sitting casually in an armchair by a roaring fire. One had the sense that this is how the family still occupy the house.

Focusing on the architecture, Saumarez Smith provides a rich picture of Vanbrugh. A longstanding fan, he remarked to me some time ago that he was writing the book partly to put Vanbrugh back where he belonged – as at least the equal of Wren and Hawksmoor after a period, inspired in part by Peter Ackroyd and Ian Sinclair (perhaps with a nod to Reyner Banham’s comment that Hawksmoor was a real architect and Wren something else), when Vanbrugh’s star was eclipsed. In this he succeeds.

Vanbrugh had a complex family history. The grandson of a Flemish merchant who moved to England (hence Vanbrugh, derived from van Brugge) and son of a successful cloth trader, his mother was a daughter of Sir Dudley Carleton, a diplomat at James I and VI’s court, which connected her not just to one influential dynasty but a range of the English aristocracy including the Earls of Huntingdon and the Bertie family who became Dukes of Ancaster, Vanbrugh’s client at Grimsthorpe. His soldiering started with a commission in Huntingdon’s regiment; at various stages in his career he made use of his mother’s connections. But throughout he had the confidence to deal with potential clients and members of the Kit-Cat Club, if not as equals, at least on an equal footing. The influence of the club was significant, with Vanbrugh later describing it as ‘the best club that ever met’.

The great story is Blenheim. From the start, the terms of engagement were slightly unclear: would it be a national monument to the great victory of John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, or a family home? Who would pay for it – the Queen from the privy purse, the nation, or the Marlboroughs themselves, whose resources vastly accumulated with the duke’s victories? The question of payment became especially fraught as when Blenheim was commissioned, Sarah Churchill, John’s wife, was the favourite (and possibly intimate partner) of Queen Anne, though she lost this status when her younger, more nubile cousin Abigail Masham arrived on the scene. Sarah may have lost her status, but she retained her temper, as Vanbrugh was to find to his cost.

What emerged was a complex series of misunderstandings that veered into vengeful feuds, all against the intimate background of disappointed love and the grander one of national and European politics. Vanbrugh could not escape this – indeed he was sacked as comptroller of the Office of Works because he made comments suggesting that the duke, temporarily out of favour, had been badly treated. However, four years after losing his position, Vanburgh was the first person to be knighted by the new king George I, in 1714. Two years later, he finally ended all involvement with Blenheim. Some years later he and his wife, and the Earl of Carlisle and his daughters, went on a tour of country houses: the formidable duchess banned the Vanburghs from entering Blenheim, though she allowed entry to the Carlisles. None of this should distract from Vanbrugh’s extraordinary inventiveness. Not trained in architecture, he naturally saw it as scenography, the orchestration of effects and the background for people to exist, whether acting formally or casually. Clearly his architecture, with its bold ornamentation ,is suited to a large scale (Saumarez Smith correctly suggests his work prefigures the great French architects Ledoux and Boullée), but he could also design seductive but bold smaller houses, such as those he designed for family members in Greenwich (the name Vanbrugh Castle is still used) and his own Goose Pie House in Whitehall. The latter in particular, brought opprobrium from his contemporaries, especially Tories like Jonathan Swift who wrote of it, ‘He built up such a monstrous pile/ That no two Chairman could be found/ Able to lift it from the Ground…’

Even within his lifetime Lord Burlington was engineering a new regime of taste, based on strict classical precedent, which seems to have bored Vanbrugh, for whom the challenge was to startle, arrest, surprise and entertain.