| Albert Memorial (picture by Peter Watts) |  |
Albert Memorial
Photographer Description of Albert Memorial
Panorama showing the Albert Memorial in Hyde Park. The panorama also shows the Royal Albert Hall across the road. The Albert Memorial is a popular tourist attraction in London.Albert Memorial - Further Information
The Albert Memorial in London is a testament of the devotion of Queen Victoria to her Prince Consort, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha who died of typhoid fever in 1861. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert married in 1840 at the Chapel Royal in St. James's Palace. The loss of Prince Albert affected Queen Victoria deeply, and for the rest of her life until her death in 1901, she wore black on all occasions except her jubilee. One of the achievements of Prince Albert was the Great Exhibition at Crystal Palace in 1851, and the statue of him is holding a catalogue of this.The Albert Memorial was one of several statues and buildings built in memory of the Prince. Others nearby include the Royal Albert Hall and the Victoria and Albert (V&A) Museum. The Albert Memorial opened in 1872 and is designed in Gothic Revival fashion with a large figure of Prince Albert seated ceremonially at the center of the ornate canopy. Above the head of Prince Albert are allegorical figures of Agriculture, Manufacture, Engineering, and Commerce, the industrial achievements of the Victorian era. Representations of the morals of the Victorian era continue up the pinnacle of the monument to represent Faith, Hope, Charity, and Humility nearest the top. The Albert memorial about 175 feet high.
Four flights of steps lead up to the pavilion in which the Prince Consort is seated. At the corners of each of these are statues representing the four continents of Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas. The base of the pavilion is surrounded by the Frieze of Parnassus, an elaborate composition showing 169 individual architects, composers, painters, poets, and sculptors of the time, and thus celebrating the Victorian Arts.
The canopy of the Albert Memorial is supported by four grey granite pillars. Each one is cut from a single stone of gray granite from the Castle Wellan Quarries in Northern Ireland, weighs about 17 tons and took 8 men 20 weeks to polish. Surrounding these are red granite pillars from Ross of Mull. The capitals are of Darley Dale stone and the Arches made from Portland Stone. The statue of Prince Albert is seated on a pedestal made of pink granite and marble.
During WWI the Albert Memorial was painted black but recent restoration has all the different shades and stones, and Prince Albert is now covered in gold leaf.
Travel Directions and Getting There:
The nearest tube station to the Albert Memorial is Hyde Park Corner, but South Kensington is not too far away down exhibition road and past the Museum district where you will find the Natural History, Victoria and Albert and Science Museums.
Travel Directions and Getting There:
Tube: High Street Kensington (Circle, District), Knightsbridge (Piccadilly), South Kensington (Circle, District, Piccadilly)