Inner empire is the first volume to consider the impact of imperial cultures on the landscapes and urban environments of the British Isles from the sixteenth century through to the twentieth century.
Bringing together leading scholars, this book asserts that Britain's four-hundred year entanglement with global empire left its mark upon the British Isles as much as it did on the wider world. Buildings stood literally as one of the most conspicuous manifestations of the myriad relationships that Britain maintained with the theory and practice of colonialism in its modern history. The volume considers both the 'internal' colonisation of the British Isles and its infrastructures of control, as well as that concerning wider relationships between architecture, the imperial economy, and cultural identity. It takes a holistic approach in examining the connective tissues that link country houses and canals, government buildings and slum dwellings, and reveals the role of buildings in the making of 'imperial Britain' not only from the perspective of those who commissioned and designed them, but also from those who used, occupied, and spent their lives in and around them.
At the foundation of each of the chapters comprising the volume is the central question of how and why empire affected the buildings and spaces of the British Isles. Studying these today is important in coming to terms with the full extent of Britain's imperial legacy in the twenty-first century.