Indigo Jones was one of England's first architects. He studied Renaissance and Palladian buildings in Europe. After designing settings for court masques, he became in 1615 the king's suveyor of works and began in 1616 the Queen's House in Greenwich, the first English design to embody the principles of Palladio. He then built the royal banquet hall, Whitehall (1619-22). In many houses in London and in the country he broke from the prevailing Jacobean style, marking a starting point for the Renaissance and Georgian period in England.