__NOTOC__ 6 Burlington Gardens is a Grade II*-listed building in

Mayfair Mayfair is an affluent area in the West End of London towards the eastern edge of Hyde Park, in the City of Westminster, between Oxford Street, Regent Street, Piccadilly and Park Lane. It is one of the most expensive districts in the world. ...

, London. Built for the University of London, it has been used by various institutions in the course of its history, including the Civil Service Commission, the British Museum and, currently, the

Royal Academy of Arts The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly in London. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its purpo ...

History

University of London and the Civil Service Commission

The Italianate building was designed by Sir

James Pennethorne Sir James Pennethorne (4 June 1801 – 1 September 1871) was a British architect and planner, particularly associated with buildings and parks in central London. Life Early years Pennethorne was born in Worcester, and travelled to London in 1 ...

between 1867 and 1870 as headquarters for the University of London. It occupied the northernmost section of the former garden of

Burlington House Burlington House is a building on Piccadilly in Mayfair, London. It was originally a private Neo-Palladian mansion owned by the Earls of Burlington and was expanded in the mid-19th century after being purchased by the British government. Toda ...

. It was a grand building, but not especially large. The University of London is a federal university and this early central building contained little besides examination halls and a few offices; the premises of several of the constituent colleges were larger. The university vacated Burlington Gardens in 1900 for the Imperial Institute building in South Kensington. Briefly the headquarters of the

National Antarctic Expedition The ''Discovery'' Expedition of 1901–1904, known officially as the British National Antarctic Expedition, was the first official British exploration of the Antarctic regions since the voyage of James Clark Ross sixty years earlier (1839–184 ...

, in 1902 it was given to the Civil Service Commission.

Museum of Mankind

In 1970, this was the site of the Department of

Ethnography Ethnography (from Greek ''ethnos'' "folk, people, nation" and ''grapho'' "I write") is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures. Ethnography explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject o ...

of the British Museum, which housed its collections from the Americas, Africa, the Pacific and Australia, as well as tribal Asia and Europe, because of lack of space in the Museum's main building in

Bloomsbury Bloomsbury is a district in the West End of London. It is considered a fashionable residential area, and is the location of numerous cultural, intellectual, and educational institutions. Bloomsbury is home of the British Museum, the largest mus ...

. Between 1970 and 1997, the building, as the Museum of Mankind, hosted around 75 exhibitions, including many famous ones such as ''Nomad and City'', 1976, and ''Living Arctic'', 1987. It was created by Keeper of Ethnography Adrian Digby in the 1960s, and opened by his successor William Fagg. Fagg was succeeded by Malcolm Mcleod in 1974, and by John Mack in 1990. The museum ceased exhibiting at Burlington Gardens in 1997 and the Department of Ethnography moved back to the British Museum in Bloomsbury in 2004.

Royal Academy and private tenants

After the ethnography collection's return to Bloomsbury the building was purchased by the Royal Academy. In 1998 an architectural competition was held to connect it with Burlington House, which was won by Michael Hopkins & Partners. This was abandoned as the Heritage Lottery Fund was not persuaded that there was sufficient need for the project, which would have cost £80 million. In about 2005 the building was brought back into use by the Royal Academy, the tenant of the original wing of Burlington House and the wing which lies between the two buildings. It was used mainly by the Royal Academy Schools. On 29 August 2006, the building was damaged by a fire, but there was no loss of academy artworks as it was being prepared for a future exhibition. Giampietrino-Last-Supper-ca-1520

In 2006

Colin St John Wilson Sir Colin Alexander St John ("Sandy") Wilson, Royal Institute of British Architects, FRIBA, Royal Academy, RA, (14 March 1922 – 14 May 2007) was an English architect, lecturer and author. He spent over 30 years progressing the project to build ...

drew up a masterplan for the whole complex, which included a more modest link between the buildings than that proposed by Hopkins. However, Wilson died the following year, which led to another competition being held in 2008, won by

David Chipperfield Sir David Alan Chipperfield, (born 18 December 1953) is an English architect. He established David Chipperfield Architects in 1985. His major works include the River and Rowing Museum in Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire (1989–1998); the Museum ...

Architects. In order to raise capital for Chipperfield's design, the building was lent to the commercial gallery

Haunch of Venison Haunch of Venison was a contemporary art gallery operating from 2002 until 2013. It supported the work of contemporary leading artists, presented a broad and critically acclaimed program of exhibitions to a large public through international exhi ...

, which occupied the site from 2009 to 2011 while their existing building was being renovated. In 2012 space in the building was lent to the Pace Gallery, which occupies it on a 15-year lease. A second application to the HLF for £12.7m to go towards a £36 million project, was successful in 2013. This included a sculpture court in the bridge between the buildings, a lecture hall where that of the University of London originally stood and a permanent home for Giampietrino’s full-size copy of Leonardo da Vinci’s '' Last Supper''. The redevelopment was completed in 2018, in time for the academy's 250th anniversary that year.

References

External links