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| Top Ten Essential Architecture | top ten London public buildings | |||||||||||||
| For a more complete list, see the main list | ||||||||||||||
| 1 | Crystal Palace | |||||||||||||
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The project took almost 2½ years to come to fruition and it’s leading light was Queen Victoria’s husband, Albert, Prince Consort. In 1848 he placed a proposal before British Parliament to set up a self supporting exhibition of the products of British Industry. However, Albert cannot be credited with inventing the concept of an Industrial Exhibition as the formula had already been successfully employed in England, but most particularly in France, on many prior occasions. At the end of the 18th century the Marquis d’Aveze – Commissioner of the Royal Manufactories of the Gobelins, of Sèvres and of the Savonnerie initiated the first of what was to become a series of Expositions which culminated in the highly successful French Industrial Exposition of 1844. After the success of the 1844 Exposition proposals were put to Parliament detailing the benefits such an Exhibition held in England would have on commerce and the British economy as a whole. These initial proposals were met with absolutely no support and it was not until 1848, and the involvement of the Prince Consort, that progress began to be made towards realising the event. |
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| 2 | Palm House at Kew Gardens | |||||||||||||
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"Sir Joseph Paxton (1801-65), who achieved fame with his all-glass, prefabricated — and incomparable — Crystal Palace Exhibition Hall of 1851, was the protagonist of glass in architecture. His conservatory at Chatsworth (1837; now, like the Crystal Palace, destroyed) was one of the great glass pioneers. "Inspired by Chatsworth, and by the eager searching of the times, Decimus Burton and Richard Turner designed the much larger Palm House in London's Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, where they were the supervising architects. Palm House is 363 feet long by 100 feet wide and rises to a height of 66 feet. Besides educating visitors in the natural world, one of the functions of English greenhouses at the time was to display the exotic range of plants and flowers that flourished in the British Empire." |
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| 3 | Leadenhall Markets | |||||||||||||
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The market dates back to the fourteenth century. It is open from 07:00-16:00 Monday to Friday, and sells fresh food; among the vendors there are cheesemongers, butchers and fishmongers. The ornate roof structure, painted green, maroon and cream, and cobbled floors of the current building, designed in 1881 by Sir Horace Jones (who was also the architect of Billingsgate and Smithfield Markets), make the building a tourist attraction. It was used to represent the area of London near the Leaky Cauldron and Diagon Alley in the film Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. It is also popular among local city workers specifically from the nearby Lloyd's of London building. |
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| 4 | Horse Guards | |||||||||||||
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Horse Guards is a large building in the Palladian style between Whitehall and Horse Guards Parade. It was built between 1751-1753 by John Vardy to a design by William Kent. The building was constructed on the site of the Guard House of the old Whitehall Palace, which had been destroyed by fire in 1698. The palace's tilt yard became the exercise ground of Horse Guards Parade, located behind the Horse Guards building. |
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| 5 | Guildhall | |||||||||||||
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The Guildhall is a building in the City of London, off Cheapside and Basinghall Street, near Bank. It has been used as a town hall for several hundred years, and is still the ceremonial centre of the City of London. The term Guildhall refers both to the whole building and to its main room, which is a medieval style great hall similar to those at many Oxbridge colleges. The Guildhall complex houses the offices of the Corporation of London and various public facilities. (Greater London also has a City Hall). |
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| 6 | Harrod's | |||||||||||||
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The store occupies a 4.5 acre site and has over 1 million square feet (over 92,000 square metres) of selling space. The Harrods motto is Omnia Omnibus Ubique - All Things, For All People, Everywhere. Several of its departments, including the seasonal Christmas department and Food Hall are world famous for the abundance and quality of goods on offer. The nearest tube station to the flagship store is Knightsbridge on the fashionable street of that name, so Harrods called itself "Harrods of Knightsbridge", and effectively expanded Knightsbridge to include itself. Mohamed Al-Fayed who bought the store in 1985 for £615 million is the current Harrods owner. |
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| 7 | King's College | |||||||||||||
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King's College. According to Brown, "King's College houses its Department of Theology and Religious Studies adjacent to Parliament on property granted by the Crown." The college's religion department is also the home of the Research Institute in Systematic Theology, one of the world's most advanced religious research libraries. Brown describes the research room vividly: "a dramatic octagonal chamber dominated by an enormous round table around which King Arthur and his knights might have been comfortable were it not for the presence of twelve flat-screen computer workstations." King's College has several campuses on both sides of the Thames, just above Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament. The Department of Theology and Religious Studies is in the School of Humanities. | |||||||||||||
| 8 | Bank of England | |||||||||||||
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The Bank of England is the central bank of the United Kingdom, sometimes known as "The Old Lady of Threadneedle Street" or "The Old Lady". The nearest London Underground station is Bank station. |
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| 9 | Freemasons Hall | |||||||||||||
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Freemasons' Hall in London is the headquarters of the United Grand Lodge of England and a meeting place for the Masonic Lodges in the London area. The site of the Freemasons' Hall in Great Queen Street between Holborn and Covent Garden has been a Masonic meeting place since 1775. |
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| 10 | Imperial College | |||||||||||||
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Imperial College London is a prestigious British academic institution focusing on science, engineering and medicine, complemented by a business school. Its main campus is located on the boundary between the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and the City of Westminster in London, with its front entrance on Exhibition Road. Imperial is a constituent college of the University of London, though it is set to be become an independent university by 2007. |
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| 11 | The Oxo Tower | |||||||||||||
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The original building was a power station, but in the 1920s it was acquired by the Liebig Extract of Meat Company, manufacturers of Oxo beef stock cubes. The building was largely rebuilt to an Art Deco design by company architect Albert Moore. Liebig wanted to include a tower featuring illuminated signs advertising the name of their product. When permission for the advertisements was refused the tower was built with four sets of three vertically-aligned windows, each of which "coincidentally" happened to be in the shapes of a circle, a cross and a circle. Liebig and the building were eventually purchased by the Vestey Group. |
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| 12 | Lincolns Inn | |||||||||||||
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