Clock Tower known as Big Ben of the 19th century neo gothic Houses of Parliament on the River Thames London England
Clock Tower known as Big Ben of the 19th century neo gothic Houses of Parliament on the River Thames London England. Big Ben is the nickname for the great bell of the clock at the north-eastern end of the Palace of Westminster in London. The nickname is often also used to refer to the clock and the clock tower. This is the world's largest, four-faced, chiming clock and the third largest, free-standing clock tower in the world. It celebrates its 150th birthday in 2009, during which celebratory events are planned. The tower was raised as a part of Charles Barry's design for a new palace, after the old Palace of Westminster was destroyed by fire on the night of 22 October 1834. The new Parliament was built in a Neo-gothic Italian style. Although Barry was the chief architect of the Palace, he turned to Augustus Pugin for the design of the clock tower, which resembles earlier Pugin designs, including one for Scarisbrick Hall. The design for the Clock Tower was Pugin's last design before his final descent into madness and death, and Pugin himself wrote, at the time of Barry's last visit to him to collect the drawings: "I never worked so hard in my life for Mr Barry for tomorrow I render all the designs for finishing his bell tower & it is beautiful." The tower is designed in Pugin's celebrated Gothic Revival style, and is metres ( ft) high. The bottom 61 metres (200 ft) of the Clock Tower's structure consists of brickwork with sand coloured Anston limestone cladding. The remainder of the tower's height is a framed spire of cast iron. The tower is founded on a 15-metre (49 ft) square raft, made of 3-metre ( ft) thick concrete, at a depth of 4 metres (13 ft) below ground level. The four clock faces are 55 metres (180 ft) above ground. The interior volume of the tower is 4,650 cubic metres (164,200 cubic feet). Because of changes in ground conditions since construction (notably tunnelling for the Jubilee Line extension), the tower leans slightly to
Size: 3502px × 5290px
Location: Big Ben, Clock Tower, 19th century neo-gothic Houses of Parliament, London, England, United Kingdom
Photo credit: © Rfox9 / Alamy / Afripics
License: Royalty Free
Model Released: No
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