2-913-882 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Kensington Gardens - the Coalbrookdale Gates, Rotten Row, 1854. Cast iron gates made by the Coalbrookdale Company for the Great Exhibition of 1851, installed at park entrance, London. 'At the entrance from the King's-road...has been placed the Cole-brookdale [sic] Gates, which decorated the southern transept of the Crystal Palace, in Hyde-park. Thus, they are an interesting memorial of the first Exhibition, within a short distance of its very site. The Gates have, however, been altered to suit the position they now occupy. The wings which, as they stood in the Palace, curved forward and downwards from the centre gates, are now made quite straight, and on the same level, terminated by stone piers, upon which stand the original dwarf piers, with their elaborate vases, of a sporting character, being ornamented with stags' heads, admirably executed'. From "Illustrated London News", 1854.