The Royal Albert Hall of Arts and…

The Royal Albert Hall of Arts and Sciences, completed in 1871, forms the practical part of a national memorial to the Prince Consort—the decorative part is the Albert Memorial directly to the north in Kensington Gardens, today separated from the Hall by the road Kensington Gore.

The great glass and wrought-iron dome roofing the hall is forty-one meters (one hundred and thirty-five feet) high.

Around the outside of the hall is a great mosaic frieze, depicting "The Triumph of Arts and Sciences", in reference to the Hall's dedication.

Originally designed with a capacity for eight thousand people, it will accommodate as many as nine thousand (although modern safety restrictions mean that today’s maximum permitted capacity is five thousand five hundred and fifty-four including standing in the Gallery).

The Great Exhibition, for which the Crystal Palace had been built, had been held in London’s Hyde Park in 1851.

A great success, the exhibition had  led Prince Albert, the Prince Consort, to propose the creation of Albertopolis, a permanent series of facilities in the area for the enlightenment of the public.

The Exhibition's Royal Commission bought Gore House and its grounds (on which the Albert Hall now stands) on the advice of the Prince.

Progress on the scheme was slow and in 1861 Prince Albert had died without having seen his ideas come to fruition.

However, a memorial had been proposed for Hyde Park, with a Great Hall opposite.

The Hall, designed by Captain Francis Fowke and Colonel H.Y. Darracott Scott, was originally supposed to have been called The Central Hall of Arts and Sciences, but the name was changed by Queen Victoria to Royal Albert Hall of Arts and Sciences when laying the foundation stone as a dedication to her deceased husband and consort.