Description
A brilliantly conceived biography of Joseph Paxton, horticulturist to the Duke & Duchess of Devonshire at Chatsworth, architect of the Crystal Palace at the Great Exhibition of 1851 and one of the greatest unsung heroes of the Victorian Age
Read More
In the nineteenth century Joseph Paxton, a man with no formal education, strode like a colossus. Head gardener at Chatsworth by the age of twenty-three, he built enormous glasshouses, ambitious waterworks and gathered plants from all over the world, including the largest collection of orchids in England. But it was the Crystal Palace, home of the Great Exhibition in 1851, that secured Paxton's fame. Six times the size of St. Paul's Cathedral his design, doodled on a piece of blotting paper, was the architectural triumph of its time.
Read Less