Memories of Crystal Palace: A Tour Through Time

The Crystal Palace is one of London’s great lost landmarks. The imposing iron and glass mansion was built to house the Great Exhibition of 1851 and, at one point, it was the largest enclosed space in the world. It was also the most popular tourist attraction in the country for 70 years – until November 1936 when, sadly, it burned to the ground.

On this walking tour from Crystal Palace Station, I’ll paint a picture of this enormous, gleaming building that stood atop south London’s tallest point as a monument to optimism and progress. I’ll take you back to that time as you explore the lost Crystal Palace and Park, walking in the footsteps of its original visitors on the grounds where this elegant edifice once stood, remembering the events that led to its rise and fall.

Along the way, you’ll meet some of the most eminent and eccentric Victorian scientists, sculptors, architects, and botanists of their day, and find out how one man stole his rival’s discoveries. On this 90-minute walking tour, you’ll make your way through lost colonnades, flanked by tropical plants, and into what was once the palace’s main body. You’ll learn everything about the menu that was available to visitors, from the cost of a rail ticket to the types of palace souvenirs people bought.

Some of the incredible sites of lost palace exhibits you’ll visit include:

• A Pompeiian House from before the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD, reconstructed by the Victorians to look as if it were still inhabited
• A recreation of the Spanish palace of the Alhambra, planted with fragrant flowers
• Sites from ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, medieval and renaissance Europe

The Crystal Palace has been called “the most important single location for music making in the United Kingdom” during the 1800s. On this tour, you’ll hear the earliest surviving recording of live music-making in the world, recorded here in an 1888 concert with 4,000 singers.

I’ll tell you about Crystal Palace Park’s rich history and how it served as:

• A Victorian circus which boasted over 200 performers, nine elephants and seven lions
• One of the earliest aquariums ever built, boasting over 303 different species and 80,000 gallons of seawater
• The Festival of Empire, which included three-quarter scale models of all the British Commonwealth’s parliament buildings
• A Formula 1 racing track, where new world speed records were set
• A host to the FA Cup finals for twenty years, on the football ground here that eventually gave way to the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre

You’ll also have a chance to get a glimpse of the famous (if wildly inaccurate) Crystal Palace Dinosaurs, which have called Crystal Palace Park home since 1854. The world’s first theme park also includes constructed geological formations to educate visitors about the changing face of the earth over millions of years.

The tour follows a circular route and returns to the starting point at Crystal Palace Station.