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LOUIS HAGHE (1806-85)
Queen Victoria and Prince Albert lunching with the Emperor and Empress of the French at the Crystal Palace, Sydenham
dated 1855Pencil, watercolour and bodycolour | 29.7 x 48.4 cm (whole object) | RCIN 920231
On the fifth day of the visit, Victoria and Albert took the Emperor and Empress to visit the Crystal Palace at Sydenham. This innovative structure, which Albert called ‘a real work of art’, was first erected in Hyde Park for the Great Exhibition of 1851, and then dismantled and rebuilt at Sydenham as a centre for leisure and entertainment. Victoria recorded that their guests were ‘delighted & much surprised at it’.