The Crystal Palace

by Peter Berlyn; Jr. Charles Fowler

The Royal Commission appear from the first to have been favourably impressed with Mr. Paxton's design, partly, no doubt, because its adoption would at once silence the great bricks-and-mortar objection to the occupation of the site in Hyde Park; and the result was that, on the 16th of July, Messrs. Fox and Henderson's tender of 79,800l. for Mr. Paxton's design was verbally accepted, and, as soon as the necessary arrangements could be made, the contract was formally concluded.

S Mr. Paxton himself has stated, the design for a building of such magnitude could not have been produced in so short a space of time without the aid of the experience he had gained in constructing other great buildings of a somewhat similar character; the progress of this experience Mr. Paxton has described in the lecture he delivered to the Society of Arts on the 13th of November, 1850, from which we have made the following extracts; and we hope to be excused by the reader for their copiousness, on the ground that no man can so well relate his own doings as the actor himself:—

"The Great Industrial Building now in the course of erection, and which forms the subject of the present paper, was not the production of a momentary consideration of the subject. Its peculiar construction, in cast-iron and glass, together with the manner of forming the vast roof, is the result of much experience in the erection of buildings of a similar kind, although on a smaller scale, which has gradually developed itself through a series of years. It may not, therefore, be uninteresting to give a brief account of the reasons which led me to investigate the subject of glass roofs and glass structures generally, and which have resulted in the Exhibition Building.

"In 1828, when I first turned my attention to the building and improvement of glass structures, the various forcing-houses at Chatsworth, as at other places, were formed of coarse thick glass and heavy woodwork, which rendered the roofs dark and gloomy, and, on this account, very ill suited for the purposes they were intended to answer. My first object was to remove this evil, and, in order to accomplish it, I lightened the rafters and sash-bars, by bevelling off their sides; and some houses which were afterwards built in this manner proved very satisfactory. I also at this time contrived a light sash-bar, having a groove for the reception of the glass; this groove completely obviated a disadvantage connected with the old mode of glazing, namely, the putty becoming continually displaced by sun, frost, and rain, after the sashes had been made for a short time, and the wet by this means finding its way betwixt the glass and the wood, and producing a continual drip in rainy weather.

"About this period the desire for metallic roofs began to extend in every direction; and as such structures had a light and graceful appearance, it became a question of importance as to the propriety of using metal sashes and rafters, instead of wooden ones, for horticultural purposes. After carefully observing the effects of those built by various persons, it became apparent to me that the expansion and contraction of metal would always militate against its general adoption, as at no season of the year could the sashes and rafters be made to fit.

"The extra expense, also, of erecting metallic-roofed houses was a consideration. In 1833 I contemplated building a new range of hot-houses; and being desirous of knowing how much they would cost, if erected of metal, a plan of the range was prepared and sent to Birmingham, and another to Sheffield, with a desire to be furnished with estimates for that purpose. The estimate from Birmingham was 1,800l.; and the other, from Sheffield, was 1,850l. These appeared to me such enormous sums, that I at once set about calculating how much the range would cost if built of wood under my own inspection; and the result was, that I was able to complete the whole range, including masonry (which was omitted in the metal estimates), for less than 500l.

"Besides the extra cost of metallic roofs, we must add the extreme heat of such houses in hot weather, and their coldness in times of frost; the liability to breakage of glass from expansion and contraction of the metal; the very limited duration of the smaller portions, as sash-bars, from corrosion, by exposure to the alternations of heat, cold, and moisture, inseparable from gardening operations, and which could only be prevented by making use of the expensive material, COPPER; and the difficulty, when compared with wood, of repairing any damages, as a wooden roof could at any time be set to rights by a common carpenter. These different items formed in my mind so many objections to its use, and the same disadvantages soon became generally apparent.

"It was now thought advisable by some parties that, in order to obviate the many disadvantages in the use of metal, the rafters and frame-work of the sashes ought to be made of wood, and the sash-bars of metal. This plan certainly presented more advantages than the other, yet it was quite obvious that materials so incongruous could never give satisfaction; and accordingly, in a few years, as I had anticipated, the rage for these structures gradually subsided, and the use of wood again became resorted to by most persons, as the best material for horticultural purposes.