It was the first Tuesday of the month, and we discovered that there was a special event at Sir John Sloane's Museum.
So after class, we queued up and waited to be let in.
Sir John Sloane was an architect and a rather eccentric, well-off man, by my estimation. He designed the Bank of England, in addition to many other great sites. It seemed however, that his passion was collecting, and turned his house into a museum. He had such large collections of relics, antiquities, and art that it filled the entire house.
He had so many paintings and artistic works, in fact, that there was not enough place on the walls to display them all. So, being a talented architect, he modified the walls so that they were multi-layered and hinged, and thus could swing open to display more art.
The first Tuesday of every month, the house-museum is lit only by candlelight, and it is very, very creepy. Among other sights within the house, there is a basement level, filled with everything from a room decorated especially for an imaginary monk, to an Egyptian Sarcophagus, to manacles and chains, to a statue of Apollo. In addition, there are so many bits and pieces of sculptures from all around the world. It is my personal belief that all of the missing pieces of friezes and statues in museums everywhere, are here, located somewhere in Sir John's museum.
As we left, the queue was still quite long, stretching down to the end of the block and beyond.
So after class, we queued up and waited to be let in.
Sir John Sloane was an architect and a rather eccentric, well-off man, by my estimation. He designed the Bank of England, in addition to many other great sites. It seemed however, that his passion was collecting, and turned his house into a museum. He had such large collections of relics, antiquities, and art that it filled the entire house.
He had so many paintings and artistic works, in fact, that there was not enough place on the walls to display them all. So, being a talented architect, he modified the walls so that they were multi-layered and hinged, and thus could swing open to display more art.
The first Tuesday of every month, the house-museum is lit only by candlelight, and it is very, very creepy. Among other sights within the house, there is a basement level, filled with everything from a room decorated especially for an imaginary monk, to an Egyptian Sarcophagus, to manacles and chains, to a statue of Apollo. In addition, there are so many bits and pieces of sculptures from all around the world. It is my personal belief that all of the missing pieces of friezes and statues in museums everywhere, are here, located somewhere in Sir John's museum.
As we left, the queue was still quite long, stretching down to the end of the block and beyond.
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