How the Ludlow 1768 map was created

The reconstruction image of Ludlow in 1768 is the product of a partnership between Ludlow Museum Resource Centre, Ludlow Historical Research Group and artist Phil Kenning.

The artist

We knew that in Phil Kenning we had an artist with a good knowledge of architecture and with experience in reconstructing past townscapes. He had worked on reconstructing buildings in Spon Street for Coventry City Council and has long experience of using architectural drawings. Crucially he had also worked before with Museum Project Officer Phil Scoggins in recreating the lost townscapes of 1630s Shrewsbury, and 1470s Much Wenlock. Interactive versions of both these maps can be found on the Discovering Shropshire’s History web site.

Why 1768?

Although many would see Ludlow as still “Georgian” in character today, there are major differences between the town now and what it looked like in 1768. There were no extensive suburbs and most of the back plots in the centre of the town would have been gardens. It was only later in the 18th century that pressure from population growth led to many of those burgage plots being built upon. In 1768 the town walls and gates were largely intact and far more medieval, Tudor and Jacobean buildings lined the streets. In 1768 the Guildhall was being rebuilt and Galdeford Gate had just been replaced by the new gaol. If this map had been set noticeably earlier too much of it would have been conjectural; much later and it would have looked too similar to the town of today. 1768 was also a good year to choose because a superb painting of Broad Street had been painted by Samuel Scott the previous year and a series of drawings had been made of the Castle grounds by Thomas Pritchard at around the same time.

The choice of base map

The starting point was the 2nd edition Ordnance Survey map. This was digitally copied and a CAD (Computer Aided Design) version produced. This enabled the map to be skewed to the desired viewing angle for the town. It was decided that this would be from the south-east to contrast with most early views of Ludlow which are from Whitcliffe in the south-west.

The sources of information

The source of the great bulk of the historical information came from the research of Ludlow historian Dr. David Lloyd, without whom this whole project would not have been feasible. David worked alongside Phil Scoggins to ensure that the buildings depicted by the artist were, as far as possible, the ones that were there in 1768. To achieve this, museum volunteer Terry Anley undertook the mammoth task of photographing every building in the town and historic suburbs. These were then digitally numbered by Phil to allow comparison with a numbered Ordnance Survey map. This allowed the artist to draw the correct building on the right site. Where the existing building was not the one standing in 1768, information gleaned from old photographs and paintings was also provided. Where there was no pictorial information available, (and Ludlow is far less well served by artists and antiquarians in this respect than Shrewsbury), documentary sources were consulted, which often gave clues as to house type, whether the site was gardens or building yard etc, so that an educated guess could be made as to appearance.

Painting

After Phil Kenning had been provided with as much information as possible he drew every building individually on tracing paper over the skewed Ordnance Survey map. When this was done the image was transferred to art paper and, after checking with Phil and David, was coloured in using first a series of watercolour washes followed by the laborious filling in of each building individually as brick, stone or timber. (In 1768 many timber houses were covered in plaster as exposed timbers were not as fashionable as today, and this had to be deduced on a case by case basis from old images.) The image was then shown to other local historians and the, mercifully few, corrections were made by digitally “dropping” replacement buildings onto the original digitised image.

The future

The aim of the project has been to make the research of the Ludlow Historic Research Group more widely available by linking it to an interactive map of the town on the Discovering Shropshire’s History website. The public will now be able to look at the detailed histories of over 70 buildings in the town, often illustrated by old paintings or photographs. These will be complemented by a range of themes about the town’s history particularly focusing on the mid 18th century when Ludlow was at the height of its Georgian prosperity.