Museum architect Sir John Soane is in the house in which he lived and worked in this outstanding master of neoclassicism. He is worthy of a personal museum, if only because it has built a unique building of the Bank of England.

The son of a bricklayer Soun, who was born in 1753, made a brilliant career: he became a professor of architecture at the Royal Academy, the architect of the Bank of England. From 1792, he gradually bought and rebuilt the house standing next to Lincoln's Inn Fields. Here he lived and worked, kept his ever-growing collection of antiquities. Architectural practice master flourished, and in his collection were curiosities worthy of the British Museum - such as alabaster sarcophagus of Pharaoh Seti I. appearance in meeting such a valuable exhibit was devoted to a special three-day admission to the house Soane (more precisely, in the basement, where it was placed the sarcophagus , illuminated by hundreds of lamps and chandeliers). The reception was visited by 890 people, among them - Prime Minister Robert Jenkinson, Interior Minister Robert Peel, Prince August Frederick, Duke of Sussex (president of the Society of Arts).

Soane's Museum was created with the sad circumstances. In 1815, the architect's son got into debt and tried to extort money from his father. Duty paid Soane's wife Eliza. Soon, the son of a newspaper published in the Sunday anonymous article about low level of architecture in England from attacks against his own father. For Eliza, it was a fatal blow, she died. Soun, who loved his wife dearly, was furious. Between father and son took a break, head of the family decided to bequeath his legacy of the nation. Parliament passed a special act that made it possible. Soun Jr. tried to challenge the act in court, but lost.

John Soane died in 1837, his house and the collection became public domain. It exhibited a completely unique items: architectural fragments of the old Palace of Westminster, burned down in 1834, the Chinese and Peruvian pottery, Indian furniture, decorated with ivory. Art gallery includes paintings by Canaletto, Hogarth, Turner, Watteau, Reynolds, fifteen drawings of Piranesi. Extremely valuable part of the collection are thirty thousand architectural drawings collected Soun, as well as more than two hundred and fifty models of various buildings.

Considerable interest are the buildings of the museum, in the interior of which has left an indelible imprint of a person Soane. Library and dining room done in the style of Etruscan tombs - Soane in his youth he studied in Rome ancient architecture. In the picturesque gallery he used ingenious principle of lighting applied to them in the building of the Bank of England. The breakfast room is a convex mirror, the familiar modern public buildings.