As this is one of my last weeks in London, I was determined to discover sites I had not previously seen. I was thrilled to visit another Palace as I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the architecture of Buckingham Palace. I was curious if Hampton Court Palace was going to have exciting architecture similar to Westminster Abbey and St. Paul’s Cathedral, or plain architecture like Buckingham Palace. Before visiting Hampton Court Palace I wondered what type of architecture it was, so I researched online. The morning of my visit to Hampton Court Palace I took the tube to Waterloo Station and a train to Hampton Court Palace. This was the most expensive ride I have taken the tube for so far. It costs about 10 pounds. When I arrived at Hampton Court Palace I was stunned by the size of the Palace. It was much larger than I expected. After I received my ticket and a map from Professor Spanagel I went with Sam Wile, Sam Moran, and Aram to discover the Palace. We followed the map in order to make sure we did not miss seeing anything. When walking around I noticed the Gothic architecture because of the similarity of windows and arch ways that I learned about in the group tour of Westminster Abbey. The windows were very detailed, so I took close pictures of them. The arch ways were almost fully rounded with a little indent at the top of them. I had a great time exploring the Palace and garden area. Everything at Hampton Court Palace was very neat. For example, the trees were trimmed perfectly (seen in attached photograph). I wonder how often they have to trim them, but my guess is about once a week. As a group Sam, Sam, Aram, and I tried going to the Royal Tennis Court, but it was closed for an event, so we were unable to see it. Visiting Hampton Court Palace has allowed me to see that not every Palace in England has simple architecture like Buckingham Palace. Through this visit, I have also realized that I have a much better understanding of different styles of architecture in London than I did before coming here because I was able to identify Gothic architecture just from viewing it. I was able to identify the variety architectures styles of Hampton Court Palace from a few features I saw.
Another area I wanted to visit was Leicester Square. When talking to friends and family about visiting London I have heard that Leicester Square is like the London Times Square. I did research to see what kind of stores and restaurants are in the area. I was curious what a London Times Square would look like, and I wanted to be able to make the comparison of the two places for myself. I live about an hour away from New York City, and I have visited Times Square several times. Sam Moran, Sam Wile, Sam Grillo, Aram, and I decided to walk there, get dinner, and see if the area compared to the Times Square that we are familiar with. It was significantly smaller than the one in New York City, but still really fun. There were stores like Lego Land and M & M world. New York has several giant tv screens with advertisements and videos continuously playing. There were only three screens, but the area was alive just like New York City. People were dressed in costumes and the whole area was lit up. I looked at my watch at one point in the evening, and I was surprised to see it was already 9:30pm because of how lit up the streets were. Overall, I am glad I visited, so I can now make the comparison between London’s and New York’s Time Square. All of the photographs attached are from Hampton Palace Court. The first picture is of the shaped trees. I thought this was unusual as I have never seen such large shaped trees before Hampton Court Palace. The other pictures I attached of Hampton Court Palace exemplify the Gothic architecture. The vaulted ceilings, exquisitely designed windows, and arches all show beautiful Gothic architecture. I am surprised that so much of the well-known architecture in London is Gothic. I think symmetry is aesthetically pleasing in architecture, so I really enjoyed viewing the clock tower and courtyard area of Hampton Court Palace because the architecture in those areas were very even. |