London's Pevsners: Capital gains

Sir Nikolaus Pevsner, pictured on the cover with a salvaged bust of Robert Stevenson, was Chairman of the Victorian Society for almost twenty years from our foundation in 1958 until 1976. His work on the Buildings of England guides, with county visits crammed into Easter and summer vacations, shows his prodigious energy. Had he not started the series, it is hard to imagine that anyone else would have taken on such a mammoth task. Forty-six volumes appeared between 1971 and 1974, thirty-two of them by Pevsner alone.

This issue of the Victorian celebrates the completion of the London 'Pevsners' as we now call them. Originally dealt with in two slim volumes, or three if you count Middlesex, London now fills six solid hardbacks, brick-sized and only just portable.