The Great Exhibition of 1851

The events leading up to the Great Exhibition of 1851 were prompted by the success of the French Industrial Exposition of 1844, when it was suggested to the English Government that it would be most advantageous to British industry to have a similar exhibition in London. However the Government showed no interest.

It must be remembered that the French had already established a tradition of exhibitions.

However in England, few art-industry exhibitions were more than local affairs. The first building to be put up solely for the exhibition of manufactured goods was built in Birmingham in 1849, for an exhibition of the British Society. It included 10,000 square feet, and together with Bingley House, in the gardens of which it was erected, 12,800 square feet of exhibition space was available. In the same year, the first Exhibition of British Manufacturers took place, largely concentrating on precious metalwork.

Prince Albert, Victoria’s consort, was very much in favor of a self-financing Exhibition of All Nations. But even though this meant that the exchequer would have to pay no money, there was a lukewarm reception from Parliament. Albert’s plan was for a great collection of works in art and industry, ‘for the purposes of exhibition, of competition and of encouragement’, to be held in London in 1851. Such an Exhibition, he said, would afford a true test of the point of development at which the whole of mankind has arrived in this great task, and a new starting point from which all nations would be able to direct their further exertions.

The Society of Arts pressed ahead at this point, negotiating with a building contractor to erect a suitable building, advance prize money of 20,000 pounds and pay preliminary expenses, all to be repaid from receipts at the gate of the Exhibition. Next, a deputation was sent around the country to gather support, and the Government was persuaded to set up a Royal Commission.

The Royal Commission met for the first time in January 1850, and after digesting the concept that such an exhibition could make a profit, one of its first acts was to cancel the contract with the building firm, and call for voluntary contributions nationwide. In an attempt to whip up support, all the mayors from the whole country were invited to a sumptious banquet at Mansion House, to listen to Prince Albert argue the case for an Exhibition. The meeting was a great success.

The next stage was the setting up of ‘The Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851’, and a total fund of 230,000 pounds was raised. The size of the Exhibition was decided at 700,000 ft - bigger than anything the French had ever managed - and the Government was persuaded to treat it as a bonded warehouse, so that goods imported for the Exhibition need not have import duties paid.

The Commissioners set up a competition for designing the building, and 233 architects sent in designs: 38 from abroad, 51 from around England, and 128 from London. None were quite the right thing, thought the Commission’s Building Committee, who fortuitously had prepared and printed their own design. Despite much condemnation from the competing architects and others on grounds of ugliness and vast expense, the Committee proceeded to ask for building tenders for their own design.

However, one contractor, Messrs. Fox and Henderson, presented costs for an amended design, one amended so much, in fact, that it bore no resemblance to the Building Committee’s original proposal, but with the compelling advantage of a better price. Events moved fast.

The Crystal Palace, South Side

In its catalogue of the Exhibition, the Art Journal glowingly wrote:

"On entering the building for the first time, the eye is completely dazzled by the rich variety of hues which burst upon it on every side; and it is not until this partial bewilderment has subsided, that we are in a condition to appreciate as it deserves its real magnificance and the harmonious beauty of effect produced by the artistical arrangement of the glowing and varied hues which blaze along its grand and simple lines...

A total of six million people visited the Great Exhibition, and the whole event was a great success. It may fairly be described as having fulfilled its aims of 'exhibition, competition and encouragement'. It was also remarkably peaceful. As noted the following year in a contemporary magazine:

"Seventeen thousand exhibitors, who like the visitors were of almost every nation and kindred under heaven, entrusted the most valuable evidences of their wealth, their skill, their industry, and their enterprise to the guardianship of some fifty policemen, armed with no better weapon than a wooden baton. Day after day and night after night passed on, and no added force was requisite for the safety of the almost countless wealth deposited within these fragile walls. In no other country of the world could such an exhibition of the industrial arts have taken place."

The most successful competitors were the French, in terms of numbers of medals won. This was commented upon with mingled admiration and envy. However, by the time of the Exhibition of 1862, the mood had changed, and looking back, the Art Journal was moved to comment:

"Nationally that Exhibition startled England, chiefly by showing how much its artificers had to learn and its designers to unlearn. Generation after generation had gone on plundering from the French, until what was called French taste came to be considered as the highest standard in all that produced beauty in industrial art. It was but poetic justice to find that in the world's competition the glitter by which cupidity had been tempted was anything rather than pure gold.

There was no exhibition that ever matched the Great Exhibition of 1851, and it was one of the defining points of the 19th Century. Or as Prince Albert had said, 'a new starting point from which all nations would be able to direct their further exertions'.

What happened after the Exhibition finished? The Crystal Palace was disassembled and taken to Sydenham in 1852. The architect, Paxton, oversaw the re-erection of the building and it reopened in 1854 and was destroyed by fire in 1936. The park at Sydenham is still known as Crystal Palace, and there are still reminders of the great building, including the dinosaurs on an island in the ornamental lake. Some idea of how the huge building looked can be gained from the more-or-less contemporary iron and glass structures at Kew Gardens. The Great Exhibition made a vast profit, and this was invested in land at South Kensington, on which the fine museums that still exist today were built.

Ex. 2. What exhibitions held in our country do you know?