The Horniman Museum and Gardens is a
museum
A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make these ...
in
Forest Hill,
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
, England. Commissioned in 1898, it opened in 1901 and was designed by
Charles Harrison Townsend
Charles Harrison Townsend (13 May 1851 — 26 December 1928) was an English architect. He was born in Birkenhead, educated at Birkenhead School and articled to the Liverpool architect Walter Scott in 1870. He moved to London with his family in 1880 ...
in the
Modern Style
The Modern Style is a style of architecture, art, and design that first emerged in the United Kingdom in the mid-1880s. It is the first Art Nouveau style worldwide, and it represents the evolution of the Arts and Crafts movement which was native ...
.
It has displays of
anthropology
Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of behavi ...
, natural history and musical instruments, and is known for its large collection of
taxidermied
Taxidermy is the art of preserving an animal's body via mounting (over an armature) or stuffing, for the purpose of display or study. Animals are often, but not always, portrayed in a lifelike state. The word ''taxidermy'' describes the proc ...
animals. The building is Grade II*
listed
Listed may refer to:
* Listed, Bornholm, a fishing village on the Danish island of Bornholm
* Listed (MMM program), a television show on MuchMoreMusic
* Endangered species in biology
* Listed building, in architecture, designation of a historicall ...
.
It is a
non-departmental public body
In the United Kingdom, non-departmental public body (NDPB) is a classification applied by the Cabinet Office, Treasury, the Scottish Government and the Northern Ireland Executive to public sector organisations that have a role in the process of n ...
of the
Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport
, type = Department
, logo = Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport logo.svg
, logo_width =
, logo_caption =
, seal =
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and is constituted as a
company
A company, abbreviated as co., is a Legal personality, legal entity representing an association of people, whether Natural person, natural, Legal person, legal or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members share a common p ...
and
registered charity
A charitable organization or charity is an organization whose primary objectives are philanthropy and social well-being (e.g. educational, religious or other activities serving the public interest or common good).
The legal definition of a ch ...
under
English law
English law is the common law legal system of England and Wales, comprising mainly criminal law and civil law, each branch having its own courts and procedures.
Principal elements of English law
Although the common law has, historically, be ...
. In 2022 the museum won
Museum of the Year
The Museum of the Year Award, formerly known as the Gulbenkian Prize and the Art Fund Prize, is an annual prize awarded to a museum or gallery in the United Kingdom for a "track record of imagination, innovation and excellence". The award of £ ...
, an award made by the
Art Fund
Art Fund (formerly the National Art Collections Fund) is an independent membership-based British charity, which raises funds to aid the acquisition of artworks for the nation. It gives grants and acts as a channel for many gifts and bequests, as ...
.
History
The museum was founded in 1901 by
Frederick John Horniman
Frederick John Horniman (8 October 1835 – 5 March 1906) was an English tea trader and founder of the Horniman Museum in London. He was brought up and lived in Croydon, Park Hill area.
Life
Frederick, born in Bridgwater, Somerset, was born ...
. Frederick had inherited his father's
Horniman's Tea
Hornimans is a brand of tea currently owned by JDE Peet's.
History
The original tea trading and blending business 'Horniman's Tea Company' was founded in 1826 in Newport, Isle of Wight, by trader John Horniman. In 1852, he moved the company t ...
business, which by 1891 had become the world's biggest
tea
Tea is an aromatic beverage prepared by pouring hot or boiling water over cured or fresh leaves of '' Camellia sinensis'', an evergreen shrub native to East Asia which probably originated in the borderlands of southwestern China and northe ...
trading business.
The proceeds from the business allowed Horniman to indulge his lifelong passion for collecting, and which after travelling extensively had some 30,000 items in his various collections, covering
natural history, cultural artefacts and musical instruments.
In 1911, an additional building to the west of the main building, originally containing a lecture hall and library, was donated by Frederick Horniman's son
Emslie Horniman
Emslie John Horniman (1863 – 11 July 1932) was a British anthropologist, philanthropist and Liberal Party politician.
The son of Frederick Horniman, sometime Liberal member of parliament for Penryn and Falmouth, Horniman was educated priv ...
. This was also designed by Townsend. A new extension, opened in 2002, was designed by
Allies and Morrison
Allies and Morrison LLP is an architecture and urban planning practice based in London and Cambridge. Founded in 1984, the practice is now one of Britain's largest architectural firms. The practice's work ranges from architecture and interio ...
.
The museum won the
Art Fund
Art Fund (formerly the National Art Collections Fund) is an independent membership-based British charity, which raises funds to aid the acquisition of artworks for the nation. It gives grants and acts as a channel for many gifts and bequests, as ...
's
Museum of the Year
The Museum of the Year Award, formerly known as the Gulbenkian Prize and the Art Fund Prize, is an annual prize awarded to a museum or gallery in the United Kingdom for a "track record of imagination, innovation and excellence". The award of £ ...
award in 2022. In November 2022, the museum returned a collection of 72 items that were stolen from the
Kingdom of Benin
The Kingdom of Benin, also known as the Edo Kingdom, or the Benin Empire ( Bini: ') was a kingdom within what is now southern Nigeria. It has no historical relation to the modern republic of Benin, which was known as Dahomey from the 17th c ...
, including
Benin Bronzes
The Benin Bronzes are a group of several thousand metal plaques and sculptures that decorated the royal palace of the Kingdom of Benin, in what is now Edo State, Nigeria. Collectively, the objects form the best examples of Benin art and were cre ...
, to Nigeria's
National Commission for Museums and Monuments
The National Commission for Museums and Monuments (NCMM), also referred to as National Museum of Nigeria was Founded in 1979 by the Federal Government of Nigeria with decree 77 of 1979 to be in charge of the collection, documentation, conservatio ...
.
Collections
The Horniman specialises in anthropology, natural history and musical instruments and has a collection of 350,000 objects. The
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 ...
and music collections have
Designated status
The Designation Scheme is an English system that awards "Designated status" to museum, library and archive collections of national and international importance. The Scheme is administered by Arts Council England (ACE). As of 2020, 152 collections ...
. One of its most famous exhibits is the large collection of stuffed animals. It also has an
aquarium
An aquarium (plural: ''aquariums'' or ''aquaria'') is a vivarium of any size having at least one transparent side in which aquatic plants or animals are kept and displayed. Fishkeepers use aquaria to keep fish, invertebrates, amphibians, aq ...
noted for its .
The Horniman housed some of the
Benin Bronzes
The Benin Bronzes are a group of several thousand metal plaques and sculptures that decorated the royal palace of the Kingdom of Benin, in what is now Edo State, Nigeria. Collectively, the objects form the best examples of Benin art and were cre ...
until 28 November 2022, when they were signed back unconditionally to Nigeria, from where the pieces were looted in 1897 by British troops.
Floor directory
Transport connections
Gardens
The museum is set in of gardens, which include the following features:
* A
Grade II
In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...
listed
conservatory from 1894 which was moved from Hornimans' family house in
Croydon
Croydon is a large town in south London, England, south of Charing Cross. Part of the London Borough of Croydon, a local government district of Greater London. It is one of the largest commercial districts in Greater London, with an extensi ...
to the present site in the 1980s.
* A
bandstand
A bandstand (sometimes music kiosk) is a circular, semicircular or polygonal structure set in a park, garden, pier, or indoor space, designed to accommodate musical bands performing concerts. A simple construction, it both creates an orname ...
from 1912
* An enclosure for small animals
* A Butterfly House
* A nature trail
* An ornamental garden
* Plants for materials, medicines, and foods and dyes
* A sound garden with large musical instruments for playing
* A new building, the Pavilion, for working on materials that are outside of the collections, such as from the gardens.
The gardens are also Grade II listed on the
.
Mosaic
On the London Road wall of the main building is a
neoclassical mosaic mural entitled ''Humanity in the House of Circumstance'', designed by
Robert Anning Bell
Robert Anning Bell (14 April 1863 – 27 November 1933) was an English artist and designer.
Early life
Robert Anning Bell was born in London on 14 April 1863, the son of Robert George Bell, a cheesemonger, and Mary Charlotte Knight. He studied ...
and assembled by a group of young women over the course of 210 days. Composed of more than 117,000 individual
tessera
A tessera (plural: tesserae, diminutive ''tessella'') is an individual tile, usually formed in the shape of a square, used in creating a mosaic. It is also known as an abaciscus or abaculus.
Historical tesserae
The oldest known tesserae ...
e, it measures and symbolises personal aspirations and limitations.
The three figures on the far left represent Art, Poetry and Music, standing by a doorway symbolising birth, while the armed figure represents Endurance. The two kneeling figures represent Love and Hope, while the central figure symbolises Humanity. Charity stands to the right bearing figs and wine, followed by white-haired Wisdom holding a staff, and a seated figure representing Meditation. Finally, a figure symbolising Resignation stands by the right-hand doorway, which represents death.
Totem pole
A
totem pole
Totem poles ( hai, gyáaʼaang) are monumental carvings found in western Canada and the northwestern United States. They are a type of Northwest Coast art, consisting of poles, posts or pillars, carved with symbols or figures. They are usually m ...
, carved from
red cedar, stands outside the museum's main entrance. It was carved in 1985 as part of the American Arts Festival by
Nathan Jackson, a
Tlingit
The Tlingit ( or ; also spelled Tlinkit) are indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America. Their language is the Tlingit language (natively , pronounced ), native Alaskan
Native may refer to:
People
* Jus soli, citizenship by right of birth
* Indigenous peoples, peoples with a set of specific rights based on their historical ties to a particular territory
** Native Americans (disambiguation)
In arts and entertai ...
. The carvings on the pole depict figures from Alaskan legend of a girl who married a bear, with an eagle (Jackson's clan crest) at the top.
The pole is one of only a handful of totem poles in the United Kingdom, others being on display at the
British Museum
The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...
, the
National Museum of Scotland
The National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, Scotland, was formed in 2006 with the merger of the new Museum of Scotland, with collections relating to Scottish antiquities, culture and history, and the adjacent Royal Scottish Museum (opened in ...
in Edinburgh,
Windsor Great Park
Windsor Great Park is a Royal Park of , including a deer park, to the south of the town of Windsor on the border of Berkshire and Surrey in England. It is adjacent to the private Home Park, which is nearer the castle. The park was, for many ...
,
Bushy Park
Bushy Park in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames is the second largest of London's Royal Parks, at in area, after Richmond Park. The park, most of which is open to the public, is immediately north of Hampton Court Palace and Hampton ...
, the
Yorkshire Sculpture Park
The Yorkshire Sculpture Park (YSP) is an art gallery, with both open-air and indoor exhibition spaces, in West Bretton, Wakefield, in West Yorkshire, England. It shows work by British and international artists, including Henry Moore and Barbar ...
, the
Pitt Rivers Museum
Pitt Rivers Museum is a museum displaying the archaeological and anthropological collections of the University of Oxford in England. The museum is located to the east of the Oxford University Museum of Natural History, and can only be accessed t ...
at Oxford, and at Alsford's Wharf in
Berkhamsted
Berkhamsted ( ) is a historic market town in Hertfordshire, England, in the Bulbourne valley, north-west of London. The town is a civil parish with a town council within the borough of Dacorum which is based in the neighbouring large new town ...
.
[ p.3]
There is also a totem pole in the
Royal Albert Memorial Museum
Royal Albert Memorial Museum & Art Gallery (RAMM) is a museum and art gallery in Exeter, Devon, the largest in the city. It holds significant and diverse collections in areas such as zoology, anthropology, fine art, local and overseas archaeolo ...
in Exeter. It is displayed in their World Cultures galleries.
CUE building
The Horniman Museum contains the CUE (Centre for Understanding the Environment) building. This opened in 1996 and was designed by local architects Archetype using methods developed by
Walter Segal
Walter Segal (15 May 1907 – 27 October 1985) was an architect who developed a system of self-build housing, the
Segal self-build method. Based on traditional timber frame methods modified to use standard modern materials, his method eliminat ...
. The building has a grass roof and was constructed from sustainable materials. It also incorporates passive ventilation.
Gallery
Image:Horniman Museum interior.jpg, Museum main gallery
Image:HornimanGreenBuildingsmall.jpg, The CUE Building
Image:Conservatory at the Horniman Museum.jpg, The exterior of the conservatory
Image:Horniman Museum Conservatory.jpg, The interior of the conservatory
Image:HornimanBandstandsmall.jpg, The bandstand from 1912
Image:cmglee_Horminan_bandstand.jpg, The bandstand viewed from below in July 2013
Image:Horniman Museum - geograph.org.uk - 1253435.jpg, The Horniman totem pole
Image:Horniman_fruit_bat_skin_skeleton.jpg, A preserved fruit bat showing how the skeleton fits inside its skin
Image:Horniman_turtle_carapace_skeleton.jpg, A preserved turtle skeleton showing how the carapace connects with the rest of the skeleton
Image:Horniman_Museum_walrus.jpg, Canadian walrus
Image:cmglee_Horniman_natural_history_gallery_giraffe.jpg, The Natural History Gallery with the overstuffed walrus replaced with a giraffe model in July 2013
See also
*
List of music museums
This worldwide list of music museums encompasses past and present museums that focus on musicians, musical instruments or other musical subjects.
Argentina
* – Mina Clavero
* Academia Nacional del Tango de la República Argentina – Buenos ...
References
External links
*
Forest Hill image galleryThe Horniman Museum on Museums London directory of museums in London
{{authority control
Grade II listed parks and gardens in London
Parks and open spaces in the London Borough of Lewisham
Museums sponsored by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport
Natural history museums in London
Charities based in London
Musical instrument museums in England
Anthropology museums
Asian art museums in the United Kingdom
Music museums in London
Museums in the London Borough of Lewisham
Museums established in 1901
Buildings and structures completed in 1901
Grade II* listed buildings in the London Borough of Lewisham
Grade II* listed museum buildings
Arts and Crafts architecture in England
Art Nouveau architecture in London
Art Nouveau museum buildings
Museums established in 1911
Organisations based in the London Borough of Lewisham