Alexandra Palace

Alexandra Palace from the south

The front of the Alexandra Palace in London

Alexandra Palace was built in an area spanning Wood Green and Muswell Hill, North London, England in 1873 as a public recreation, education and entertainment centre and North London counterpart of The Crystal Palace. The Great Hall and West Hall are used as an exhibition centre and conference centre operated by the trading arm of the charitable trust which owns the building and Park. There is also an ice skating rink. Since 1995 the Palace has been a Grade II listed building. It was designed to be ‘The People’s Palace’ and later nicknamed (allegedly by Gracie Fields)[1] “Ally Pally”, and in 1936 became the headquarters of world's first regular public ‘high definition’ television service, operated by the BBC. The Alexandra Palace television station was located on the site and its iconic radio tower is still in use. The original Studios A and B still survive in the south-east wing. The original Victorian Theatre with its stage machinery also survives. The structure is currently on English Heritage's Buildings at Risk register. There is currently an application to upgrade the listing by Hornsey Historical Society, which originally got the Palace Grade II listed (against the opposition of trustee Haringey council), and the BBC. The nearest tube station is Wood Green, from which the Palace is a short walk.

History

Alexandra Palace on fire in 1873.

The rebuilt Palace in 1875.

File:Allypallyrosewfromse.jpg

The rose window on the south-east front

In December 1858 the architect Owen Jones, who had been involved with the Crystal Palace, exhibited drawings for a proposed 'Palace of the People' to be constructed on the hilltop between Muswell Hill and Wood Green. The Great Northern Palace company was established, but was unable to raise the finance for the project. However, the idea lived on and on 23 July 1863 Alexandra Park was opened to the public. It was named after Alexandra of Denmark who had married Prince Edward, the Prince of Wales, four months earlier. In September 1865 construction of the palace commenced, but to a design different from Jones'. The palace covers some seven and a half acres In 1871 work started on a railway line to connect the site to Highgate Station. Work on both the railway and the palace was completed in 1873 and, on 24 May, Alexandra Palace and Park was opened. Only sixteen days later the palace was destroyed by fire, killing three members of staff. Only the outer walls survived.

With typical Victorian vigour,the palace was quickly rebuilt and reopened in May 1875. It contained a concert hall, art galleries, a museum, a lecture hall, a library, a banqueting room and a theatre. An open-air swimming pool was constructed at the base of the hill in the surrounding park; the pool is now long closed and little trace remains except some reeds. The Grounds included a Horse Racecourse with grandstand, Japanese village, switchback ride, boating lake and a par 9 golf course. The Willis organ installed in 1875 is still working, but its restoration is continuing.

In 1900 the Palace and Park’s owners were threatening to sell it for development, but a consortium of local authorities led by Hornsey Urban District managed to raise enough money to purchase them in the nick of time. By the Alexandra Park and Palace (Public Purposes) Act, 1900, a charitable trust was set up; representatives of the purchasing local authorities became the trustees with the duty to keep both Palace and Park “available for the free use and recreation of the public for ever". Ironically, it is this very duty that the present trustee, Haringey council, is currently trying to overturn, protesters fear, by selling the whole Palace to a commercial developer. The Palace passed into the hands of the GLC and in 1979 to Haringey council.

The building has a wealth of history, for example, during World War I the park was closed and the Palace and grounds were used as an internment camp for German civilians.

The roof construction of the Alexandra Palace

In 1935 the trustees leased part of the palace to the BBC, which used it as the production and transmission centre for their new BBC Television Service. The antenna was designed by Charles Samuel Franklin of the Marconi company. The world's first public broadcasts of high-definition television were made from this site in 1936. Two competing systems, Marconi-EMI's 405-line system and Baird's 240-line system, were installed, each with its own broadcast studio, and were transmitted on alternate weeks until the 405-line system was chosen in 1937. The palace continued as the BBC's main TV transmitting centre for London until 1956, interrupted only by World War II when the transmitter found an alternative use jamming German bombers' navigation systems (it is said that only 25% of London raids were effective because of these transmissions).

During the early 1960s, an outside broadcast was given from the very top of the tower, in which the first passage of a satellite across the London sky was watched and described. After that it continued to be used for news broadcasts until 1969, and for the Open University until the early 1980s. The antenna mast still stands, and is still used for local analogue television transmission, local commercial radio and DAB broadcasts. The main London television transmitter is at Crystal Palace in South London.

In 1980 the trustee ( Haringey) decided to refurbish the building but a couple of days after the Great British Beer Festival and during Capital Radio's Jazz Festival a second disastrous fire started under the organ and quickly spread, it destroyed half the building. Again, the outer walls survived and the eastern parts, including the Theatre and the BBC TV studios and aerial mast, were saved. In this fire parts of the famous Organ were destroyed, though it had been dismantled for repairs and some parts were salvaged. Some of the damage to the palace was repaired immediately but Haringey Council overspent on the restoration. Later the Council was severely criticized for this in a report by Project Management International.

An ice rink was installed in 1990. Primarily intended for public skating, it has also housed ice hockey teams including Haringey Racers, Haringey Greyhounds and briefly London Racers.

The Theatre was greatly altered in the early 1920s with the General Manager McQueen-pope spending the war reparation money on refurbishing the auditorium. he abandoned the understage machinery which produced the effects necessary in Victorian melodrama, some of the machinary is preserved and a current project is restoring some of it to working order. after these changes, the theatre was leased by Archie Pitt, then husband of Gracie Fields, who appeared in the theatre. Fields also drew an audience of five thousand people to the Hall for a charity event.

However after the BBC leased the eastern part of the Palace the theatre was only used for props storage space.

In June 2004 the first performances for about seventy years took place in the theatre, first in its foyer then on 2 July in the theatre itself. Although conditions are far from ideal the audience was able to see the potential of this very large space — originally seating 3000, it cannot currently be licensed for more than a couple of hundred. It is intended that the theatre will one day reopen but much costly restoration will be required first. The theatre will never again reach a seating capacity of 3000 (not least because one balcony was removed in the early part of the twentieth century as a fire precaution, when films started to be shown there) but it does seem likely that a capacity of more than 1000 may one day be achieved. A major season of the theatre company Complicite was planned for 2005 but the project, which would have included some repair and access work, was cancelled due to higher-than-anticipated costs.

The plans to replace all the charitable uses by commercial ones have encountered public and legal opposition.

A close up panorama of London from Alexandra Palace

A wide angle panorama of London from Alexandra Palace

Famous events

The Darkness performing at Alexandra Palace on 7th February 2006.

A plaque commemorating the birthplace of television.

The Observer Wildlife Exhibition held here in 1965 was an important early event in highlighting awareness of worldwide endangered species, and gained a very large attendance.

On 28 April 1967, a benefit event took place at the palace. "The 14 Hour Technicolor Dream", organised by the "International Times", demonstrated the importance of the quickly developing UK Underground scene. Although "underground" venues such as the UFO Club were hosting counter-cultural bands, this was certainly the biggest indoor event at the time. Performers included Pink Floyd, The Pretty Things, Savoy Brown, The Crazy World of Arthur Brown, Soft Machine, The Move and Sam Gopal's Dream (featuring Sam Gopal, Mick Hutchinson and Pete Sears). The exterior of the palace was also used as Victory Square in Michael Radford's 1984 film adaptation of George Orwell's novel 1984.

The Stone Roses played their first major gig in the south of England which became famous due to the fact that the band managed to sell the venue out before making major in-roads into the music press or making any national TV appearances.

The third annual European Social Forum (ESF) took place on 15–17 October 2004 in London, the main venue being Alexandra Palace.

On 31 August and 1 September 2005 Pixies held two long before sold out concerts ending their tour of Europe.

In October 2005 Kiss 100 FM celebrated its 20th anniversary with a club night featuring many famous past and present Kiss DJs performing.

Travis played here on 20 December 2003, the footage of which was used for their live DVD titled 'Travis - At The Palace'. Franz Ferdinand performed a 4-day residency at the venue in November/December 2005 (with support from Editors and The Rakes on the first two days, Roots Manuva and The Long Blondes on the third and The Cribs and U.N.P.O.C. (musician) on the last.) The Darkness (supported by The Ark and Juliette and the Licks) performed two shows at Alexandra Palace on 7/8 February 2006, as did The Kaiser Chiefs (plus special guests Graham Coxon & Polysics) when they performed on 21/22 April 2006. Morrissey also played a date at Ally Pally on 1 May 2006.

The very first Give It a Name music festival was held at Alexandra Palace on 2 May, 2005.

Alexandra Palace plays an important part in the 2006 Doctor Who episode "The Idiot's Lantern", set in 1953.

In 2006 a dance music rave promoted by Slammin' Vinyl under the name of Tranzmission was held at Ally Pally and the venue will host the PDC World Darts Championship from 2008

In November every year, a large fireworks display is held as part of London's Bonfire Night celebrations.

Razorlight played a gig to 7000+ audience members in 2004, with comedian Noel Fielding dressed as a character from his BBC Three TV show, The Mighty Boosh, called The Hitcher as an opening act. Fielding has implied that the gig did not go too well fo him because Razorlights audience are generally younger than The Mighty Boosh's, and some of the fans seemed frighteneed of his character, who has been likened to a 'Hoxton rapist'.

In October 2006 Keane played here for two nights with the support of special guests Captain (band) who made a big debut because of this event.

On 16-17 June 2007 the Palace hosted the first London Hackday which was affected by a lightning strike on the building resulting in rooftop vents opening and the hall being flooded.

On 20 April, 2007, Tiësto played to 10,000 people in one of his UK gigs with Edinburgh being the other city on his Elements of Life tour.

See also

Nearest places:

• Muswell Hill
• Wood Green
• Harringay
• Hornsey
• Crouch End

Access

• Nearest rail station: Alexandra Palace
• Nearest Tube station: Wood Green
• Address: Alexandra Palace, Alexandra Palace Way, London N22 7AY

Notes

• The band Kick Asteroid recorded a single entitled "shadow of the Palace" recounting semi-biographical events centered on the famous London landmark

External links

• Alexandra Palace (official site)
• Alexandra Palace (Victorian London)
• Save Ally Pally: history of recent ownership of the Palace, and campaign to preserve the Palace and the TV studios for access and use by the public
• Detailed history of early BBC TV broadcasts, with archive photos 2003-09-14
• Alexandra Palace Television Society
• Unofficial History of BBC Television at Alexandra Palace
• "Development threat to the palace, where television was born" (The Independent article on development plans, 30 December 2006)
• "TV studios under threat" (Local MP's blog on Palace's future, 29 October 2006)
• Pictures and Information About Alexandra Palace History
• Hornsey Historical Society
• More information on the 14 hour technicolor dream
• Alexandra Palace Organ Appeal
• Complicite scraps plans for Alexandra Palace rebirth (The Stage Online)

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