Queen Square, Bath

Instead he approached Robert Gay, a barber surgeon from London, and the owner of the Barton Farm estate in the Manor of Walcot, outside the city walls.

Named in honour of Queen Caroline, wife of George II,[5] it was intended to appear like a palace with wings and a forecourt to be viewed from the south side: Wood wrote that: The intention of a square in a city is for people to assemble together.

[3]He understood that polite society enjoyed parading, and in order to do that Wood provided wide streets, with raised pavements, and a thoughtfully designed central garden.

With the Palladian buildings at Queen Square, Wood "set fresh standards for urban development in scale, boldness and social consequence.

"[1] The elegant and palatial north façade of seven individual townhouses, with emphasis only on the central house to suggest a grand entrance, is heralded as Wood’s greatest triumph, but the other three wings purposefully act as foils to this ostentatious palace front.

Wood undoubtedly took his inspiration from Inigo Jones’s Covent Garden piazza (1631–37) in London and perhaps Dean Aldrick’s Peckwater Quadrangle at Christ Church, Oxford (1706–10).

Ultimately this meant less work and risk for Wood; in addition he received £305 per annum in rents, leaving him a healthy profit of £168 – the equivalent today (in terms of average earnings) of £306,000.

[4] The obelisk in the centre of the square, of which Wood was "inordinately proud", was erected by Beau Nash in 1738 in honour of Frederick, Prince of Wales.

It was here that he had the best view imaginable: It was in keeping with Wood’s robust sense of self-satisfaction that he should have made his home in...the central house of the...south side.

[17] The protestors held a variety of debates, talks and musical events related to financial inequality and were runners up in the 2011 Bath Chronicle Campaign of the Year.