No doubt the Prince of Wales dusted off his flak jacket for his visit to the Royal Institute of British Architects last night. After all, there can't be an architect alive who isn't sick of the C word.

Only a few days ago the new pavilion at New Road cricket ground, Worcester, was described in this paper as “a modern carbuncle on this lovely old ground”. The Prince appeared to be creating a cliché when, in a speech 25 years ago, he described a proposed extension to the National Gallery as “a monstrous carbuncle on the face of a much loved and elegant friend”.

But he may be guilty only of recycling an old insult. It turns out that the carbuncle had appeared before, and the offending party was almost certainly one of his ancestors. In 1825 work started on refurbishing, at public expense, Queen Charlotte's private home, Buckingham House, to provide a refuge for her son, George IV, away from the formality of St James's Palace. The King had recently finished building Brighton Pavilion with John Nash as architect, and Nash was hired again.

But George soon changed his mind about having a modest retreat and persuaded Parliament to stump up for a complete makeover to turn the building into Buckingham Palace, a magnificent new official residence, fit to be “the intended abode of royalty”.

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Costs soared. The Times speculated that nearly all of the original grant of £150,000 went on raising a small hill to prevent the hobbledehoy of Pimlico being able to see in through the windows. No plans seem to have been approved, other than by the King himself, and a strong suspicion arose that things were being made up as they went along.

The public was all agog to see what was going on, but when two enormous wings on either side of the original house started to emerge, our correspondent was underwhelmed: “Naked gables - unadorned cubes - one elliptical elevation, somewhat like an half egg-shell rising above the cup - and a general air of crowding and confusion, without one particle of majesty or magnificence, are all that can at present be descried of that edifice which will have cost almost its weight in gold.”

By the summer of 1827 The Times had seen enough. A leading article declared: “The people of England have paid before now for frivolous and useless undertakings - for mean jobs - for thriftless and foolish quackeries of various descriptions - political, military, naval, architectural; but surely such a job as this new erection, or fabrication, or whatever it may be; under the name of a rebuilding of Buckingham-house, was never before inflicted on a community which had eyes to see with.”

The writer had no axe to grind with Nash, who, it said, had washed his hands of the design: “This heap (for it is nothing better) presents what has not been often equalled in works which pretend to be works of art, a mixture of magnitude and meanness, of laboriousness and insignificance, of intricacy and poverty, of frivolous caprice with heavy and lumbering vulgarity.”

And in case anyone hadn't got the message: “Three or four lumps or knobs protrude themselves, not unlike so many carbuncles on the proboscis of a bloated visage, with no link of relationship between them, or of connexion with the edifice of which they are said to be members.”

So, who got his hands on Nash's design, and hanky-pankied with it?

The leading article ends with this rather cryptic insult: “No professional or educated mind could ever have produced such a piece of monstrous meagreness... If intermeddling or dictation has been suffered from an irresponsible quarter, there is no language strong enough to express our contempt for the unmanly servility which has endured it.”

In other words, was that architectural vandal the King himself? Presumably.

Poor Nash's reputation was ruined amid accusations of unaccountable wastefulness. The infamous wings were demolished and, with costs running at nearly half a million pounds, he was fired and the project handed over to Edward Blore.

By this time George IV had died, so it didn't matter what anyone said. On receiving his notice, Nash wrote an indignant letter to the Lords of the Treasury. He was, of course, only obeying orders: “In the course of the work, many alterations and many additions were made; and it appeared to me that I could have no choice but to obey the commands of His Majesty, relating to the details of finishing a palace which was destined for his own personal residence.”

And yes, the King had been extemporising, hence the horrifying incidental costs of £28,793. “I was referred for all details of the execution to the personal commands of the King; my instructions, given verbally, being only that the general outline of the plan should be adhered to.”

The story then takes on a strangely contemporary tone. Calling for strict controls over the Civil List, The Times discussed at length what the public should be expected to pay for fixtures and fittings and decorating costs to preserve the dignity of its monarchy.

To those who had argued that the King was “the worst lodged Sovereign in Europe” it replied that absolute monarchs, “Louis XIV, or Philip II, or Frederick of Prussia, or the virago Catherine”, could do what they liked with their country's money “having no institutions nor audible opinions - no responsibility of Ministers - nor Parliament - nor press, to restrain them”.

In a democracy, however, anyone spending public money should be accountable to the public, and not a penny should be spent without authorisation from a responsible public officer. In particular, it concluded, “gewgaws and monstrosities ought not to be paid for by the people”.

Or moats and helipads, presumably.

Rose Wild is the Times Archive editor

You can read the 1827 leader in full here

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