The Italian Opera House was built as the Queen’s Theatre by the architect and dramatist John Vanburgh in 1704-1705, on a site on the west side of the Haymarket occupied by the Phoenix Inn, coach houses and a number of small houses. London’s principal theatres at the time were Drury Lane, Dorset Gardens, and Lincoln’s Inn Filds Theatre. The foundation stone was laid on 18th April 1704, and the theatre opened on 19th April 1705 with a performance of the Italian opera The Loves of Ergasto. The first season was a failure however and Italian opera didn't succeed at the theatre until Handel’s Rinaldo in 1711. Alterations to the interior were made in 1707-8 when boxes were constructed by Robert Adam in 1778, and in 1782 by Michael Novosielski, but on the night of 17th June 1789 the theatre was destroyed by fire.

The artist of the original from which this print was made was William Capon (1757-1827), a Norwich-born scene-painter, architectural draughtsman and architect who lived in Westminster for thirty years. He produced many topographical drawings of views in Westminster and had a strong interest in theatre, assisting in the building and decoration of the Italian Opera House from 1790 to 1791, and working as a scene painter at Drury Lane Theatre in 1794. His drawings of Astley's Riding School in 1777 were also reproduced in engravings by Charles John Smith (1803-1838)