Remembering the Crystal Palace

The books in this case offer insight into the Crystal Palace's legacy following the Exhibition's close in October 1851. The newly-formed Crystal Palace Company purchased the structure for £70,000 (equivalent to over £5.6 million today) in 1852, thus beginning an expensive period of deconstruction and reconstruction as the Palace was moved to Sydenham. Joseph Paxton expanded and partially redesigned the Palace during the reconstruction process, organizing its interior into a series of courts which were designed to chart the ‘global’ (in a very limited sense of the term) history of art and architecture. The Company hired designer-architects Owen Jones and M. Digby Wyatt—both of whom had helped organize the interior of the Palace for the Exhibition—to design this timeline, and the two men travelled throughout Europe, west Asia, and north Africa reproducing sculptures and other art works for display in the fine art courts. The new Crystal Palace opened to the public on June 10, 1854. 

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