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Crystal Palace

Medal
1851 (made)
Artist/Maker
Messrs Allen & Moore (made)
Place of origin
Birmingham (made)

This medal depicts Christal Palace at the 1851 Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, London. It is made by Allen & Moore.
The Crystal Palace was a huge glass and iron structure erected in Hyde Park in London to house the Great Exhibition of 1851. The exhibition attracted over six million visitors and numerous firms capitalised on its success by issuing cheap, mass-produced medals as souvenirs.

Object details

Categories
Coins & Medals
Sculpture
Object type
Medal
TitleCrystal Palace (generic title)
Materials and techniques
Struck, tin alloy
Tin Alloy
Struck
Brief description
Medal, tin alloy, Crystal Palace at the 1851 Great Exhibition / Crystal Palace statistics, by Allen and Moore, English, 19th century, 1851
Physical description
The obverse of this white metal medal shows the Crystal Palace at the 1851 Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, London; in exergue, heads of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, jugate to the right, in ornamented frame flanked by genii. The reverse lists the structure's dimensions and value.
Style
Victorian
Marks and inscriptions
  • 'THE BUILDING AT LONDON, FOR THE / INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION / 1851' (obverse)
  • 'THE MATERIALS ARE / IRON AND GLASS, / IN SHAPE / A PARALLELOGRAM, / 1848 FT HIGH. / IT IS CROSSED MIDWAY BY / A TRANSEPT 108 FT HIGH, / ON THE NORTH SIDE IS AN / ADDITIONAL 936 FT IN LENGTH / BY 48 FEET IN BREADTH; / TOTAL AREA OF SPACE / 855,360 CUBIC FT; / OR NEARLY 21 ACRES ; / ESTIMATED VALUE / £150,000' (reverse)
Subjects depicted
The Crystal Palace
Great Exhibition
Place depicted
Hyde Park
Summary
This medal depicts Christal Palace at the 1851 Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, London. It is made by Allen & Moore.
The Crystal Palace was a huge glass and iron structure erected in Hyde Park in London to house the Great Exhibition of 1851. The exhibition attracted over six million visitors and numerous firms capitalised on its success by issuing cheap, mass-produced medals as souvenirs.
Bibliographic references
  • Allen, Leslie Lewis, The World's Show: Coinscraft's Catalogue of Crystal Palace Medals and Tokens, 1851-1936, London: 2000, p. 47, cat. HP-B095
  • Hawkins, R.N.P, A dictionary of Makers of British metallic tickets, checks, medalets, tallies and counters, 1788-1910, Baldwin and Sons, 1989.
  • Forrer, Biographical Dictionary of Medallists, London: Spink & Son, 1907
  • Brown, L., British Historical Medals 1837-1901: the Reign of Queen Victoria, London, 1987, pp. 163, cat. 2426.
  • Taylor, Jeremy, The Architectural Medal: England in the Nineteenth Century, London: 1978, pp. 136-7, cat. 165i.
Collection
Sculpture Collection
Accession number
CIRC.531-1963

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Record createdJune 24, 2009
Record URL
https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O311905/crystal-palace-medal-messrs-allen/
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