Dome of Discovery

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Coordinates: 51°30′13″N 0°07′06″W / 51.5037°N 0.1183°W / 51.5037; -0.1183
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Skylon and the Dome of Discovery

The Dome of Discovery was a temporary exhibition building designed by

Freeman Fox & Partners, in particular Oleg Kerensky and Gilbert Roberts
.

Like the adjacent

Jubilee Gardens, near the London Eye
.

The building

The dome had a diameter of 365 feet (111 m) and stood 93 feet (28 m) tall, making it at the time the largest dome in the world. It had a long escalator as its dramatic entrance, with the dome itself made out of aluminium.[3] Construction was contracted to Horseley Ironworks of Tipton,[4] with fabrication partly sub-contracted to Structural and Mechanical Development Engineers Ltd of Slough.[5] It was erected by Horseley on a site designed and prepared by Costain Group[6] from concrete and aluminium in a modernist style and housed many of the festival attractions. Internally the dome included a number of galleries on various levels housing exhibitions on the theme of discovery.

The exhibition

The theme of the exhibition in the Dome of Discovery was "British initiative in exploration and discovery is as strong as it ever was."[7]

The exhibition was divided into the following sections:

  • The Land
  • The Earth
  • Polar
  • Sea
  • Sky
  • Outer Space
  • The Physical World
  • The Living World

Keith Vaughan was commissioned to paint a 50-foot mural on the theme of discovery. No photographic record of this mural exists, although a sketch was included in Sotheby's 21–22 November 2017 sale.[8]

Demolition

In response to a public statement by

George Cohen and Sons, scrap metal dealers of Wood Lane, White City, and dismantled at their works in Bidder Street, Canning Town, on the banks of the River Lea. Some of the metal fragments were then turned into a series of commemorative paper-knives and artefacts. The inscriptions on the paper-knife read "600"[n 1] and "Made from the aluminium alloy roof sheets which covered the Dome of Discovery at the Festival of Britain, South Bank. The Dome, Skylon and 10 other buildings on the site, were dismantled by George Cohen and Sons and Company LTD during 6 months of 1952."[9]

Notes

  1. ^ George Cohen and Sons changed its name to "The 600 Group" when it moved its head-office to 600 Commercial road, Tower Hamlets, having sold the Wood Lane site to the BBC.

See also

References

  1. ^ "Prefab Icon: Dome of Discovery by Ralph Tubbs". Dwell. Retrieved 2 June 2017.
  2. ^ The Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC, Great Britain and Ireland 1900 AD-present, 1951,
  3. ^ "Dome of Discovery Engineering Timeline".
  4. ISBN 1-901522-90-3
    .
  5. ^ "Visit to a Demonstration given by the Structural and Mechanical Development Engineers Limited". The Structural Engineer. 1950. Retrieved 20 June 2016.
  6. ^ Costain Group: Did you know? - Point 8 Archived July 4, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
  7. HMSO
    , 1951.
  8. ^ "Keith Vaughan | Catalogue Note2, Sotheby's.
  9. ^ Skylon investigation, Front Row, BBC Radio 4.

External links

51°30′13″N 0°07′06″W / 51.5037°N 0.1183°W / 51.5037; -0.1183

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