Description: In my hunt for the ultimate icon of London I somewhat wavered between several structures – I think you probably can't find a single one as representative of London as let's say Eiffel Tower is of Paris – but the area around the Parliament Square is probably unique in being a location of several candidates (and within a view of another one, the London Eye): the Westminster Abbey, Houses of Parliament and the Big Ben. For visitors, especially the foreign ones, the contest for the most iconic icon of London would be probably a toss-up between the Tower Bridge and the Palace of Westminster (aka Houses of Parliament) with its landmark clock tower, commonly known as the Big Ben. The Big Ben has been voted the most popular landmark in the UK in a survey of 2,000 Britons.
The nick-name Big Ben is thought to originally applied to the Great Bell (a 14-tonne main bell of the Westminster clock), then to the clock as a whole, and by extension, to the clock tower.
The tower and the clock was designed by an eminent Gothic Revival architect, Augustus Pugin (who went mad and died soon after designing it) and remains, together with the whole rebuilt Palace of Westminster, one of the masterpieces of the style. It is 96m high, with the bottom two-thirds constructed of brick with limestone cladding and the top section, a framed cast-iron spire. The clock sits 55 metres above ground and the clock faces are 7 metres in diameter, filled by pieces of opal glass. The small hand is almost 3m long, and the minute hand is over 4m long.
I have a somewhat ambivalent attitude to the Gothic Revival style in architecture. Where I grew up, the 19th century was a somewhat barren period, architecturally, and I was thought that all the neo, mock and revival styles that appeared then were not worth much attention. Only on arrival in the UK I realised that the neo-Gothic (as well as other neo- and eclectic buildings) could be recognised among the greatest works of architecture in the country. I learned to appreciate, and even admire the Gothic Revival masterpieces, although I don't actually like them that much, .
Still, the Westminster Palace in general, and Pugin's tower in particular are seriously impressive, beautiful even, despite their over-the-top, Victorian, gothic as well as Gothic stylisation. The architects of these buildings created something more than a mockery or even a revival of of a medieval style of building. The use of cast iron elements in the spire is particularly inspired, making a link with the outstanding engineering achievements of the 19th century.
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