Crystal Palace Terraces

Crystal Palace Park terraces, 1990s.

There must have been more of these statues along the terraces, but this is the only one left.   It's in reasonable condition considering what has happened to the rest of the stonework, caused by age and vandalism.

Crystal Palace Park terraces,  10 August 2016.

Here's a wider - and current - view of the terraces.  You can see the same statue just off centre.  Those plinths used to have stone vases ...

Crystal Palace Park terraces and stone vases, 1990s.

.. And cement rendering.  Their loss is due to vandalism.

In the background of the first photo you can see two of the park's sphinxes.  (Sphinges is an acceptable alternative, but then I think, if sphinx, sphinges then why not hinx, hinges?)   They are all in decent condition but are currently being refreshed, and are fenced off, so photo opportunities are limited.

Crystal Palace Park sphinxes, 10 August 2016.

There are four in this photo.  Two more are at the other end of the terrace.  They were all cast from an original in the Louvre.

The park also has these features:

"Laptop" auditorium, Crystal Palace Park, 10 August 2016.

This auditorium replaced a "temporary" one in the 1990s.  It is designed to have that rusty finish.  It received two awards: Civic Trust Award 1998, and Royal Institute of British Architects Regional Architecture Award 1998.  Small plaques showing these are on the other side of the neglected stage.

Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve memorial bell.  Crystal Palace Park, 10 August 2016.

This is a memorial to the fallen of the First World War.    There used to be explanatory plaques, but they have disappeared.  Luckily there are details on line.

Crystal Palace station.  Crystal Palace Park, 10 August 2016.

And the Victorian railway station, between the park and Anerley Hill.  I used to go to work from here, at a time when one of the rooms was used as a chapel by the Old Catholic Church, a small offshoot of Catholicism.  I could look through the keyhole and see the rich appurtenances inside. (Or so I recall it.)

I also noticed not far from the park a "Coffee and Brunch Kitchen" offering "cake, wine and beer" and opposite that, an Artisan Chocolate Café. These are an easy walk from where I used to live and were not there at the time!

Finally, a view of the wall outside the park:

It does actually say C.P.P., but a bit of Photoshop makes it look quite exotic.

Crystal Palace Park Maze

Crystal Palace Park Maze entrance, 12 August 2016

Not much remains of the Victorian aspect of the maze in Crystal Palace Park.  The whole thing is hidden behind a screen of trees, and it was badly out of condition in the 1980s until it was replanted in 1987. 

You can just see through the gate that the hedge is not particularly tall, only waist high.  It doesn't block your view at all, but that doesn't make it easier to get to the centre.  There's an escape route straight out from there, but once you are in the depths of the maze that does not help.

Crystal Palace Park Maze escape gate, 12 August 2016

This escape gate seems to be an original feature.  I think the posts were renewed at the time of the replanting. 

Since I lived nearby, the centre has been remodeled to feature paving decorated with a plan of the maze, installed by the Girl Guides organisation. 

Crystal Palace Park Maze centre feature, 12 August 2016

You can't step back far enough to get it all into a photo.  This is all very well, but when I lived there, the centre had a signpost showing the directions and names of the various entrances to the park.

Crystal Palace Park Maze centre signpost, 1990s.

You could see it from within the maze, and the helpful directions seemed to mock your attempts to actually reach the thing.  I liked this, clearly a Victorian original, and I wish they had retained it. 

Crystal Palace Park Dinosaurs

Crystal Palace Park dinosaur lake, 12 August 2016.  Spare head in the foreground.

I used to live near Crystal Palace Park, and we sometimes walked past the childrens' zoo and sat on a bench to read newspapers and try to stop the goats from eating them.  Goats and zoo are now long gone.  Around that time, parts of the park were refurbished, particularly the Victorian attraction that is the dinosaur lake.  The origin and much of the history of these dinosaurs is covered in Wikipedia, so I won't repeat it, but the repainting of the dinosaurs at that time does not seem to get a mention.

Since then it has been refurbished yet again.  I wonder how many spare dinosaur heads they have?  When I went back there this August I thought this (above) was the same head I remembered being put near an information point at the time of the repainting, but the details are different.

Crystal Palace Park, 1990s.  Spare dinosaur head.

Here's the earlier head.  The old photos in this post are internally dated February 1998, but that's when the negatives were scanned; the photos will have been taken earlier in the 1990s.  These days I make the date part of the filename.

Crystal Palace Park dinosaur lake, 12 August 2016.

The lake with its big models is really quite eye-catching. 

Iguanodons at Crystal Palace Park dinosaur lake, 12 August 2016.

These are the most spectacular models.  Those nose horns are now known to actually have been spiky thumbs, but they did the best with what they knew at the time.  That rather puny tree fern trunk under the Iguanodon's foot is a recent addition.

Iguanodons at Crystal Palace Park dinosaur lake, 1990s.

The original tree had died and shrunk away at this point, so a replacement is fair enough, but I don't think that tree fern would have stood up to the dinosaur.  They've also changed the colour scheme, and planted a much more appropriate, less Wordsworthian array of flora. 

I'll post some more about Crystal Palace Park - strictly speaking it's not natural history, but it is at least a park.