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| london architecture |
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| top ten london |
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part of the essential architecture network |
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| Top Ten Essential Architecture | top ten London buildings | |||||||||||||||
| For a more complete list, see the main list | ||||||||||||||||
| 1 | Saint Paul's Cathedral | |||||||||||||||
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St Paul's Cathedral is a cathedral on Ludgate Hill, in the City of London, and the seat of the Bishop of London. The present building dates from the 17th century, and is generally reckoned to be London's fourth St Paul's Cathedral, although the number is higher if every major medieval reconstruction is counted as a new cathedral. |
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| 2 | Westminster Palace | |||||||||||||||
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The Palace of Westminster, also known as the Houses of Parliament, is where the two Houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom (the House of Lords and the House of Commons) meet to conduct their business. The Palace lies on the north bank of the River Thames in the London borough of the City of Westminster, close by other government buildings in Whitehall. The oldest part of the Palace still in existence, Westminster Hall, dates from 1097. The palace originally served as a royal residence but no monarch has lived in it since the 16th century. Most of the present structure dates from the 19th century, when the Palace was rebuilt after it was almost entirely destroyed by a fire in 1834. The architect responsible for rebuilding the Palace was Sir Charles Barry with Augustus Welby Pugin. The building is an example of Gothic revival. One of the Palace's most famous features is the clock tower, a tourist attraction that houses the famous bell Big Ben. The latter name is often used, erroneously, for the clock itself, which is actually part of St Stephen's Tower. |
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| 3 | Tower of London | |||||||||||||||
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The White Tower, the square building with turrets on each corner that gave it its name, is actually in the middle of a complex of several buildings along the River Thames in London, which have served as fortresses, armories, treasuries, zoos/menageries, mints, palaces, places of execution, public records offices, observatories, shelters, and prisons (particularly for upper class prisoners). This last use has led to the phrase "sent to the Tower" meaning "imprisoned". One widely known example was that Elizabeth I was imprisoned for a time in the Tower during her sister Mary's reign. |
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| 4 | Westminster Abbey | |||||||||||||||
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The Collegiate Church of St Peter, Westminster, which is almost always referred to as Westminster Abbey, is a mainly Gothic church, on the scale of a cathedral, in Westminster, London, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is the traditional place of coronation and burial site for English monarchs. |
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| 5 | Hampton Court | |||||||||||||||
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Hampton Court Palace is a former royal palace in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, south west London, United Kingdom. The palace is located 11.7 miles (18.9 km) south west of Charing Cross and upstream of Central London on the River Thames. It is currently open to the public as a major tourist attraction. The palace's Home Park is the site of the annual Hampton Court Palace Flower Show. |
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| 6 | Tower Bridge | |||||||||||||||
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Tower Bridge is a bascule bridge in London, over the River Thames. It is close to the Tower of London, which gives it its name. It is sometimes mistakenly called London Bridge, which is the next bridge upstream. The bridge is owned and maintained by Bridge House Estates, a charitable trust overseen by the Corporation of London. |
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| 7 | The British Museum | |||||||||||||||
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The central quadrangle of the British Museum in London was redeveloped to become the Queen Elizabeth II Great Court, commonly referred to simply as the Great Court, during the late 1990s. It was opened by Queen Elizabeth II in 2000. The court has a tessellated glass roof by Foster and Partners (Architects) and Buro Happold (Engineers) covering the entire court and surrounds the original circular British Museum Reading Room in the centre, now a museum. It is the largest covered square in Europe. The glass and steel roof is made up of 1,656 pairs of glass windowpanes; each of a unique shape because of the undulating nature of the roof. |
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| 8 | Windsor Castle | |||||||||||||||
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A thousand year old fortress transformed to a royal palace. This well known silhouette of a seemingly medieval castle was not created, however, until the 1820s by Jeffry Wyatville Windsor Castle, at Windsor in the English county of Berkshire, is the largest inhabited castle in the world and, dating back to the time of William the Conqueror, it is the oldest in continuous occupation. |
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| 9 | Nelson's Column- Trafalgar Square | |||||||||||||||
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The column was built between 1840 and 1843 to commemorate Admiral Horatio Nelson's death at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. The 5.5m (18ft) statue of Nelson stands on top of a 46 m (151 ft) granite column. The statue faces south, towards the Palace of Westminster and along Pall Mall, where his ships are represented on the top of each flagpole. The top of the Corinthian column (based on one from the Temple of Mars Ultor in Rome) is decorated with bronze acanthus leaves cast from British cannons. The square pedestal is decorated with four bronze panels, cast from captured French guns, depicting Nelson's four great victories. |
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| 10 | 30 St Mary Axe | |||||||||||||||
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30 St Mary Axe is a building in London's main financial district, the City of London. It is informally known as "The Gherkin", and sometimes as The Swiss Re Tower, Swiss Re Building, Swiss Re Centre, or just Swiss Re, after its owner and principal occupier. It is 590 ft (180 m) tall, making it the 2nd tallest building in the City of London, after Tower 42, and the 6th tallest in London as a whole. The building is famous for its daring architecture by Pritzker Prize winner Sir Norman Foster and ex-partner Ken Shuttleworth. The building was constructed by Skanska. |
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