Albertopolis

Albertopolis is a nickname for an area in South Kensington, London, between Cromwell Road and Kensington Gore, which contains several educational and cultural sites, including

• Imperial College
• Natural History Museum
• Royal Albert Hall
• Royal College of Art
• Royal College of Music
• Royal College of Organists
• Royal Geographical Society
• Science Museum
• Victoria and Albert Museum

The area was purchased by the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 with the profits made from the Great Exhibition of 1851, which was held in a site in Hyde Park nearby to the north east. This is commemorated in the name of the principal north-south street laid out on their estate - Exhibition Road.

Prince Albert was a driving force behind the Great Exhibition and President of the Royal Commission, and the name "Albertopolis" was coined to commemorate and somewhat satirise his role in Victorian cultural life.

Close scrutiny of a map of the area reveals that there is a central axis between the Albert Memorial in Kensington Gardens to the north, and the central portal of south facade of the Natural History Museum. The Royal Albert Hall, Royal College of Music, the former tower of the otherwise demolished Imperial Institute (now the Queen's Tower of Imperial College) and the 1950s rear extension to the Science Museum are all aligned on this axis which cannot be seen on the ground, although the northern part can be glimpsed from the top floor of the Science Museum.

The closest tube station is South Kensington which is linked to the museums by a tiled underground tunnel beneath Exhibition Road.

See also

• Henry Cole
• Charles Wentworth Dilke

External links

• Victoria and Albert Museum walking tour of Albertopolis
• Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851