The Sun.
London, England, 1860-03-03 00:00:00

THE OPERA FLORAL ARCADE.

The idea of a great central metropolitan market for
flowers has always been a favourite one with Mr. Gye, and
which that gentleman has' before proposed, though unsuc-
cessfully, to bring into use. The only good opportunity
which offered of carrying out the plan was to erect the
Arcade on the south of the new Opera, on that space of
ground where a pile of building materials so long offered an
unpleasant contrast to the Opera-house itself. This chance
has now been taken advantage of, and the improvement has
at last been perfected. From its proximity to the theatre,
and the general style of the design, most people were led to
imagine that the new building was chiefly intended to form
an ornamental accessory to the Opera-house. This, how-
ever, is quite a mistake. On a few of the State Opera
nights during the season the Arcade may be closed earlier
than usual to allow of its being swept, illuminated, and
thrown open to the frequenters of the Opera ; but beyond
three or four such gala nights in the year, the Arcade will
be nothing more or less than a flower-mart, the want of
which, it is stated, has long been felt among the floricul-
turists of the metropolis. Some twelve mcnths since a de-
tail of the chief dimensions of this building apeated in our
columns ; but, both from the fact that it has since been
entirely completed and decorated, and is now about to be
formally inaugurated by the Volunteer Ball of Wednesday
next, a general description of the whole structure will be of
interest to our readers.

The greatest and most important fault of all our glass
and iron buildings has generally been their deficiency in
anything like ornamental details, or, to speak plainly, their
extreme ugliness. The building of 1851 was bald and un-
artistic in the extreme ; while that of Manchester, not hay-
ing its size to redeem it, was even worse. So with the
Now York edifice ; so with that of Dublin. Nothing was
ever attempted in the way of ornament. All these buildings
have, in fact, been mere smith's work—artists have had
very little to do with them. From this great fault the
Floral Arcade has been redeemed by Mr. Gye's wishing to
have a tasteful structure, and finding an architect like Mr.
Edward Barry, capable of carrying out his wishes. The
ground-plan and shape of the building may be best described
as resembling the letter L, the largest and principal entrance
being by the side of the Italian Opera, at the end of the
longer arm of the letter, while the other entrance opens
upon Covent-garden Market, by the side of the Piazza, at
the end of the shorter arm. In a direct line from these two
entrances run the main arcades, and over the point formed
by their junction at right angles rises a lofty dome—the first
time that anything of the kind has been attempted in glass
and iron. The extreme length of the Arcade from the
Bow-street entrance to the west wall is no less than 228
feet, and the short arm from Covent-garden Market to the
theatre wall 100 feet. The width of each of the main ar-
cades is 75 feet, of which the light semicircular arched roof
occupies 50 feet, with two side aisles between the main
columns and the walls, each nearly 13 feet wide. The
springing of the arches for the roof is just 29 feet from the
ground, and on to the top of the arched roof is 57 feet ; the
roof is thus almost a perfect semicircle. The dome is also
nearly a complete hemisphere, 50 feet in diameter at the
base and 25 feet high, making the total height to the circu-
lar lantern it supports a little over 90 feef in all.
The Bow-street entrance—and of course that at Covent-
garden is similar to it—is exceedingly pretty and simple.
The doorways are deeply recessed, so as to do away en-
tirely with the flat, boxy, hard appearance which the en-
trances to such glass and iron buildings have generally con-
trived to monopolise. The raised iron arches which give
admission to the interior also aid considerably in removing
this flat effect, while the handsome cast iron cornice, or
moulding, passing across the base of the arched roof gives
lightness to the whole. The radii of the lofty roof, seen
from the outside, are highly ornamented, and spread out
like an elaborate fan ; and the outermost curve of the roof
over the entrance is surmounted with a kind of corona of
cast-iron work, ivhich gives a very graceful effect to the
whole. Glass and iron buildings are, of course, eminently
light in their construction, and this peculiarity, with the
ornamental features we have mentioned, is more noticeable
in the Floral Arcade than in any other 'building of the
same
sort. Of course the principle of light and elegant
design is fully carried out in the interior. The cast-iron
columns supporting the nave roof, instead -of being, as is
US ually the case, mere iron cylinders, rough and unadorned
as csntract lamp-posts, are all cast of a handsome pattern,
with ornamental bases and rich capitals, the latter per-
forated to ventilate the basement story beneath the market,
with which the hollow columns communicate.
All round the interior, at the springing of the arches,
is a gilt cast-iron moulding or cornice, of a very pretty
design. The aisles are, as we have stated, nearly 13 feet
wide and 30 high, the theatre wall forming the wall of the
north aisle, and the wall of the Arcade the south. The
latter is pierced with recessed windows to correspond in ap-
pearance with that of the theatre. The arches which carry
the roof of the nave are trellissed, and apparently of the
very lightest possible construction, though, slender as they
are in appearance, they are eminently strong in fact, and
have been tested with a strain far exceeding anything that
can ever come upon them, as in reality they have nothing
but themselves to support. Between the main arched ribs
or " principals" as they are termed, transverse bars of
" deck" iron, T shaped, stretch along the whole length of
each arcade, at intervals of about six feet apart, and are ri-
vetted to the arched principals in such a manner as to
give the whole roof the rigidity of one piece. The dome is
composed of 22 semicircular ribs, braced round with
wrought-iron horizontal supports. These ribs are not com-
pletely semicircular, but rather form a quarter of a circle,
all resting upon an iron collar in the centre, which carries
the lantern. The Covent-garden entrance continues the
public way of the Piazza along its front by a roofed glass
and iron gallery, 50 feet long by 2.5 feet broad. The base-
ment floor under the Arcade
is one of the most extensive
apartments, if wo may so term it, which has been excavated
anywhere in London, except in the regions of the docks. It
has the same large area as the building above it, and is no
no less than 16 feet high; 48 10-inch cast-iron columns
carrying the floor of the Arcade above on wrought-iron
girders, the spaces between which latter are filled in with
tiled arches, so as to make the whole place fireproof.
Through all parts of the building hot-water pipes pass for
keeping up the temperature during winter, and gas is of
course laid on to every part, so that in case of night fetes,
as with the Volunteer Ball next week, the whole structure
can be illuminated in the most brilliant manner.
In this sketch we have merely given an outline
of the chief arohitentural features of this handsome
building. The purpose for which it has been per-
manently erected is, as its name implies, that of a
flower-market, intended to bring together under ono roof,
specially adapted for the purpose, the immense trade which
is now scattered all over the suburbs of London in tho hot-

houses and grounds of our great florists and nurserymen.
Few that are at all acquainted with the statistics of the
flower market, the distance to which amateurs are now
obliged to drive in search of plants, and the many difficul-
ties caused by the chief growers having their grounds so
far removed, will doubt the large trade to which this mar-
ket will give a general centre. The whole area will, of
course, be divided among the principal growers, and all the
flowers will be arranged in large raised banks in the centre
nave, with smaller ones in the aisles. Seeds, cuttings, tools,
and ornamental garden furniturd of all kinds will be sold
only in the aisles, the centre being reserved exclusively for
flowers. Neither fruit nor vegetables will be sold there. So
much for the flower-market. But general attention is just
now more directed to its inaugural opening by the "Volun-
teer 801 l next Wednesday than to any part of its floricul-
tural future. No effort, apparently, is being neglected to
make this ball one of the best of its kind. All the columns,.
and, in short, all the onzWilental
oapitals, cornices, arches,