The central quadrangle of the British Museum in London was redeveloped to a design by Foster and Partners, from a 1970s design by Colin St John Wilson,[1] to become the Queen Elizabeth II Great Court, commonly referred to simply as the Great Court, during the late 1990s. It was opened by Queen Elizabeth II in 2000.
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The court has a tessellated glass roof designed by Buro Happold[2] and executed by Waagner-Biro, covering the entire court and surrounds the original circular British Museum Reading Room in the centre, now a museum. It is the largest covered square in Europe.[3] The glass and steel roof is made up of 4,878 unique steel members connected at 1,566 unique nodes and 1,656 pairs of glass windowpanes making up 6,100m2 of glazing;[4] each of a unique shape because of the undulating nature of the roof.
Controversially, some of the stone in the court is from France, rather than being Portland Stone from southern England as agreed in the original contract with the masons.
Within the Great Court, there are shops and a café. It remains open after the British Museum itself has closed for the evening. The court acts as a central linking point for the museum, somewhat like I. M. Pei's Louvre Pyramid in Paris.
The central courtyard of the British Museum was occupied by the British Library until 1997 when it moved to St Pancras. At that time the entire courtyard was filled with bookshelves, three stories high (the 'Bookstacks'). To get from one side of the museum to the other visitors had to go round.
Once the Library had moved out, the bookstacks were cleared and the Great Court constructed in this central courtyard. A new 'ground' level was created, a storey higher than the original courtyard, with the space below used to accommodate the Clore Conference Centre and the African galleries (which had been housed at the Museum of Mankind since 1970).
The South Portico was largely rebuilt, with two new lifts incorporated for disabled access to the upper levels of the museum.
A new gridshell glass roof was provided over the entire courtyard to create a covered space at the centre of the museum.
The British Library Reading Room at the centre of the courtyard was retained and refurbished for use as the Museum library and information centre. As the Reading room had no outer wall - the bookstacks coming right up to the back of the reading room shelves - a new outer wall was created to protect the Reading room, to support the new roof and the conceal the ventilation ducts serving the spaces below.
North of the Reading Room there is a block with a museum shop at ground level, a gallery for temporary exhibitions above and a restaurant above that, just below the glass roof.
Upon the Great Court's opening to the public in 2000, twelve sculptures from the British Museum's collection were installed on the main floor of the concourse:
There were initial plans for a new, thirteenth sculpture to be commissioned from Anish Kapoor, but these were scrapped.
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