Victoria and Albert’s Museum


Fascinating little exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum looking at the crucial role of the museum’s name sakes in the first decade of its existence to mark 200 years since their births.

The show centred on a case of gifts the couple gave to the museum with lovely watercolours and illustrations of the early years of the museum around the walls and a good narrative of the history of the museum and their involvement.

The museum was born out of the Great Exhibition organised by Albert and it aimed to educate and reform design in Great Britain and its collection started with objects purchased from the exhibition. There were lovely watercolours of the interiors of the Crystal Palace where it was held.

The museum itself began in Marlborough House and moved to Brompton Park House in 1854 when the collection was added to with the purchase of the collection of Jules Soulages. The show looked at the designs for designs for a cultural quarter in Kensington on land bought near the Crystal Palace site with money raised from the exhibition and how Victoria and Albert took an interest in the designs and supported its opening.

Closes 26 August 2019

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