The Crystal Palace
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The Crystal Palace The Crystal Palace was a cast-iron and plate-glass structure originally The Crystal Palace built in Hyde Park, London, to house the Great Exhibition of 1851. More than 14,000 exhibitors from around the world gathered in its 990,000-square-foot (92,000 m2) exhibition space to display examples of technology developed in the Industrial Revolution. Designed by Joseph Paxton, the Great Exhibition building was 1,851 feet (564 m) long, with an interior height of 128 feet (39 m).[1] The invention of the cast plate glass method in 1848 made possible the production of large sheets of cheap but strong glass, and its use in the Crystal Palace created a structure with the greatest area of glass ever seen in a building and astonished visitors with its clear walls and ceilings that did not require interior lights. It has been suggested that the name of the building resulted from a The Crystal Palace at Sydenham (1854) piece penned by the playwright Douglas Jerrold, who in July 1850 General information wrote in the satirical magazine Punch about the forthcoming Great Status Destroyed Exhibition, referring to a "palace of very crystal".[2] Type Exhibition palace After the exhibition, it was decided to relocate the Palace to an area of Architectural style Victorian South London known as Penge Common. It was rebuilt at the top of Town or city London Penge Peak next to Sydenham Hill, an affluent suburb of large villas. It stood there from 1854 until its destruction by fire in 1936. The nearby Country United Kingdom residential area was renamed Crystal Palace after the famous landmark Coordinates 51.4226°N 0.0756°W including the park that surrounds the site, home of the Crystal Palace Destroyed 30 November 1936 National Sports Centre, which had previously been a football stadium Cost £2 million that hosted the FA Cup Final between 1895 and 1914. Crystal Palace Design and construction F.C. were founded at the site in 1905 and played at the Cup Final venue in their early years. The park still contains Benjamin Architect Joseph Paxton Waterhouse Hawkins's Crystal Palace Dinosaurs which date back to 1854. In 2013 a Chinese developer proposed to re-build the Crystal Palace [3] but the developer's sixteen-month exclusivity agreement with Bromley council to develop its plans was cancelled when it expired in February 2015.[4] Contents 1 Original Hyde Park building 1.1 Conception 1.2 Design 1.3 Construction 2 The Great Exhibition of 1851 3 Crystal Palace at Sydenham Hill 3.1 Relocation and redesign 3.2 Exhibitions and notable events 3.3 Crystal Palace Park 3.4 Decline 4 Destruction by fire 5 Since the fire 5.1 Crystal Palace Bowl 5.2 Future 6 See also 7 References 7.1 Sources 7.2 Notes 8 External links Original Hyde Park building Conception The huge, modular, wood,[5] glass and iron structure was originally erected in Hyde Park in London to house the Great Exhibition of 1851, which showcased the products of many countries throughout the world.[6] The Commission in charge of mounting the Great Exhibition was established in January 1850, and it was decided at the outset that the entire project would be funded by public subscription. An executive Building Committee was quickly formed to oversee the design and construction of the exhibition building, comprising Isambard Kingdom Brunel, Robert Stephenson, renowned architects Charles Barry and Thomas Leverton Donaldson, the Duke of Buccleuch and The transept façade of the original Crystal Palace the Earl of Ellesmere, and chaired by William Cubitt. By 15 March 1850 they were ready to invite submissions, which had to conform to several key specifications: the building had to be temporary, simple, as cheap as possible, and economical to build within the short time remaining before the Exhibition opening, which had already been scheduled for 1 May 1851.[7] Within three weeks, the committee had received some 245 entries, including 38 international submissions from Australia, the Netherlands, Belgium, Hanover, Switzerland, Brunswick, Hamburg and France. Two designs, both in iron and glass, were singled out for praise - one by Richard Turner, co-designer of the Palm House at Kew, and the other by French architect Hector Horeau [8] but despite The Crystal Palace in Hyde Park for Grand the great number of submissions, the Committee rejected them all. International Exhibition of 1851 Turner was furious at the rejection, and reportedly badgered the commissioners for months afterwards, seeking compensation, but at an estimated £300,000, his design (like Horeau's) was too expensive.[9] As a last resort the committee came up with a standby design of its own, for a brick building in the rundbogenstil by Donaldson, featuring a sheet-iron dome designed by Brunel[10] but it was widely criticized and ridiculed when it was published in the newspapers.[11] Adding to the Committee's woes, the site for the Exhibition was still not confirmed; the preferred site was in Hyde Park, adjacent to Princes Gate near Kensington Rd, but other sites considered included Wormwood Scrubs, Battersea Park, the Isle of Dogs, Victoria Park and Regent's Park. Opponents of the scheme lobbied strenuously against the use of Hyde Park (and they were strongly supported by The Times). The most outspoken critic was arch-conservative Col. Charles de Laet Waldo Sibthorp; he denounced the Exhibition as "one of the greatest humbugs, frauds and absurdities ever known",[7] and his trenchant opposition to both the Exhibition and its building continued even after it had closed. At this point renowned gardener Joseph Paxton became interested in the project, and with the enthusiastic backing of Commission member Henry Cole, he decided to submit his own design. At this time, Paxton was chiefly known for his celebrated career as the head gardener for the 6th Duke of Devonshire at Chatsworth House; and by 1850 he had become a preeminent figure in British horticulture and had also earned great renown as a freelance garden designer - his works included the pioneering public gardens at Birkenhead Park which directly influenced the design of New York's Central Park. At Chatsworth, Paxton had experimented extensively with glasshouse construction, developing many novel techniques for modular construction, using combinations of standard-sized sheets of glass, laminated wood, and prefabricated cast iron. The "Great Stove" (or conservatory) at Chatsworth (built in 1836) was the first major application of Paxton's now-famous ridge-and-furrow roof design, and was at the time the largest glass building in the world,[12] covering around 28,000 square feet (2600 sq.m.).[13] A decade later, taking advantage of the Joseph Paxton's first sketch for the availability of the new cast plate glass, Paxton further developed his techniques with Great Exhibition Building, about the Chatsworth Lily House, which featured a flat-roof version of the ridge-and- 1850, pen and ink on blotting paper, furrow glazing, and a curtain wall system that allowed the hanging of vertical bays V&A Museum of glass from cantilevered beams.[14] The Lily House was built specifically to house the giant Victoria amazonica waterlily which had only recently been discovered by European botanists; the first specimen to reach England was originally kept at Kew Gardens, but it did not do well. Paxton's reputation as a gardener was so high by that time that he was invited to take the lily to Chatsworth; it thrived under his care and in 1849 he caused a sensation in the horticultural world when he succeeded in producing the first amazonica flowers to be grown in England (his daughter Alice was famously drawn for the newspapers, standing on one of leaves). The lily and its house led directly to Paxton's design for the Crystal Palace and he later cited the huge ribbed floating leaves as a key inspiration.[15] Paxton left his 9 June 1850 meeting with Henry Cole fired with enthusiasm. He immediately went to Hyde Park, where he 'walked' the site earmarked for the Exhibition. Two days later, on 11 June, while attending a board meeting of the Midland Railway, Paxton made his original concept drawing, which he famously doodled onto a sheet of pink blotting paper. This rough sketch (now in the Victoria & Albert Museum) incorporated all the basic features of the finished building, and it is a mark of Paxton's ingenuity and industriousness that detailed plans, calculations and costings were ready to submit in less than two weeks. The project was a major gamble for Paxton, but circumstances were in his favour - he enjoyed a stellar reputation as a garden designer and builder, he was confident that his design was perfectly suited to the brief, and the Commission was now under enormous pressure to choose a design and get it built - the Exhibition opening was now less than a year away. In the event, Paxton's design fulfilled and surpassed all the requirements, and it proved to be vastly faster and cheaper to build than any other form of building of a comparable size. Indeed, his submission was budgeted at a remarkably low £85,800 - by comparison, this was only about 2-1/2 times more than the Great Stove at Chatsworth[16] but it was only 28% of the estimated cost of Turner's design, and it promised a building which, with a footprint of over 770,000 sq.ft. (19 acres, or 7 hectares), would cover roughly twenty-five times the ground area of its progenitor. Impressed by the low bid for the construction contract submitted by the engineering firm Fox, Henderson and Co, the commission accepted the scheme and finally gave its public endorsement to Paxton's design in July 1850.