A New Museum in South Kensington

The story of the development of the new museum buildings which eventually, in the early years of the twentieth century, became the Victoria and Albert Museum. The idea for the museum grew out of Prince Albert's Great Exhibition of 1851, which had attracted over six million visitors, and also out of the government's wish to improve the education of British designers. The fascinating if fractured growth of the buildings reflects the parallel growth of the museum's status from its beginnings as a rather suspect pioneering venture, and also the development of taste between 1850 and 1890. It also illustrates conflicting contemporary attitudes toward the economics of education and manufacture, craftsmanship and collecting, and bringing art to the people - or at least to those who had the leisure to visit museums.

© 1998-2008 The Roland Collection & Pira Intl.