Part of a set of six postcards featuring designs by members of the Faculty of Royal Designers for Industry

Part of a set of six postcards featuring designs by members of the Faculty of Royal Designers for Industry

The picture, reconstructed from contemporary prints, represents the meeting in June 1849, at which the suggestion was made to the Prince which led to the inauguration by the Society of Arts of the Great Exhibition of 1851. By Miss Anna Zinkeisen, RDI.

Viscount Folkestone was the first President of the Society of Arts, 1755-1761. 13,000 sold

Shows part of the Nave and West Dome of the International Exhibition of 1862, with the statue of Queen Victoria, by John Durham, in the right foreground. The Exhibition, which lasted from May to November, occupied the site in South Kensington where the Natural History and Science Museums now stand. The Society was the prime mover of this great display of the arts, sciences, manufactures and trade, perhaps the high water-mark of Victorian material prosperity and ebullience in design. It was responsible for the initial planning, for raising the necessary guarantee fund and for nominating the managing Commission. The Exhibition itself was on a larger and more ambitious scale than its famous predecessor of 1951, and attracted nearly six and a quarter million visitors. 24,000 copies sold

Founder and first Secretary of the Society. Minature presented to the Society in 1786, the inscription beneath is based on that of an original copper-plate engraving of the minature executed by Hincks himself. 11,800 copies sold.

On 18th December 1850, Charles Dickens, Vice President, in the Chair, Mr W Bridges Adams read his paper on Railway Influence and Extension. The Adelphi had been an area of mystery for Charles Dickens in his unhappy childhood and David Copperfield, in the same predicament, would wander about the district, finding excitement in the strange inhabitants of the riverside. In the foreground of the painting Dickens is surrounded by his characters and in the background he can be seen arriving at the Society. 31,000 copies sold.

Illustrations of inventions are reproduced from drawings based on engravings which originally appeared in the Society's Transactions. 33,500 copies sold.

The back of the House as originally completed faced on to the backs of other nearby, now non-existent, buildings and was hardly visible to the general public. The widening of the Strand in the 1920's brought it into a prominence never contemplated by the architects, Robert and James Adam, and revealed its untidy and ugly appearance. Sir George Sutton, then a Vice-President of the Society, undertook to pay the whole cost of re-designing and decorating it. The work was completed in 1927. It was carried out by Aston Webb, whose pilasters carrying a pediment were based on the design of the existing, original John Adam Street facade. The surmounting figure on the skyline was designed by Walter Gilbert. The reliefs in between the pilasters, symbolizing Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, were modelled by E J Bradford. 37,925 copies sold.

Second painting in a series entitled 'The Progress of Human Knowledge and Culture', displayed in the Great Room. This picture commemorates the votive rites 'established by the doctrinal songs of Orpheus. Barry describes the scene as follows 'In the foreground are young men and women dancing round a double terminal figure of Sylvanus and Pan, the former with his lap filled with the fruits of the earth...in the other corner is...a group of inferior rustics...less amiable, more disorderly, and mean...Inthe top of the picture, Ceres, Bacchus, Pan &c., are looking down with benignity and satisfaction, on the innocent festivity of their happy votaries, behind them is a limb of the zodiac, with the signs of Leo, Virgo and Libra, which mark this season of the year. In the distance is a farm house, binding corn, bees &c., male and female employments, courtships, marriage and a number of little children...' an unstated analogy between the birth of the ancient Greek religion and Christianity, in which we can see the child playing with a bird on a string as the infant Jesus, his mother as Mary and companion as the Baptist, makes this painting of especial significance at Christmas time. 25,123 copies sold.

This painting was bequeathed to the Society in 1861 by Lady Brown, widow of Captain Sir Samuel Brown, RN (1776-1852), the engineer of the bridge and for many years a member of the Society. Brown invented an improved method of manufacturing links for chain cables which greatly extended their use in the construction of suspension bridges and landing piers. Brown's bar link was first employed in the Union Bridge, completed in July 1820 and subsequently in the Chain Pier at Brighton. The bridge is 18ft wide, 368ft long and the distance between the points of suspension is 432ft. It was the earliest suspension bridge erected in Great Britain calculated for the passage of loaded carriages. The painting itself was executed before the bridge was built to show the effect it would have on the landscape. The large building discernible on the skyline in the centre of the picture, standing high on the northern bank of the Tweed is Paxton House, built to the designs of James and John Adam in the 1750's, with later additions by Robert Reid. Like the bridge, it still stands in fine condition.

The drawing was presented to the Society after Barry's death by the engraver Charles Warren, who called it 'a strong characteristic likeness of that....most singular man'.

Drawn from life in the year of the Prince's betrothal to Queen Victoria. Painting presented to the Society by Sir Hilary Blood, Chairman of Council, 1963-65

Part of a pack of ten, all with slightly different designs. Developed from an original Christmas card design sold by the RSA in 1991

Part of a pack of ten, all with slightly different designs. Developed from an original Christmas card design sold by the RSA in 1991

Part of a pack of ten, all with slightly different designs. Developed from an original Christmas card design sold by the RSA in 1991

Part of a set of six postcards featuring designs by members of the Faculty of Royal Designers for Industry

Plate from a book

Designed by Miss Anna Zinkeisen, incorporates the features of five members whose portraits can now be traced as: Dr Stephen Hales (at far end of table), Henry Baker and Viscount Folkestone (both standing), Lord Romney and William Shipley (centre of table, far side). The others present at the meeting were John Goodchild, Gustavus Brander, James Short, Nicholas Crisp, Charles Lawrence and Husband Messiter. 22,500 copies sold.