Lucknow was once described as 'the last example of the old pomp and refinement of Hindustan'. Both culturally and architecturally it still remains one of the most interesting cities of North India. Besides touching on the political aspects of Nawabi rule in the province of Audh, the author discusses the ethos and architecture of Lucknow in its heyday: between the period of the first Nawab in the early eighteenth century, and the last Nawab who was deposed by the British in 1856.