Building
The Museum is based in St. John's Gate, a 16th century gatehouse in London, England that once formed the entrance to the Priory of Clerkenwell. This dates back to the 11th century and was once the English headquarters of the Order of St. John. From here Hospitaller Knights went out to the Holy Land and later to Cyprus, Rhodes and Malta. They served in hospitals treating pilgrims, and fought to defend Christian interests in the Holy Land and the Mediterranean.
Tours take visitors to the oldest surviving part of the medieval Priory, the Norman crypt, as well as the 16th century church above.
They then return to the Gate House, which after the Dissolution of the monasteries was put to many uses, with Shakespeare, Dr Johnson, Hogarth and Dickens all taking part in its story. The Gate was eventually bought back by the Order in the late Nineteenth century, and is now beautifully decorated with heraldry, stained glass, gilding and carving to create glowing interiors, designed by John Oldrid Scott. Here visitors can see the fine furniture and painting collections.
The Museum in the Gate House tells the story of the history of the Order of St. John and St John Ambulance. The Museum completed a spectacular renovation in November 2010, supported by funders such as the Heritage Lottery Fund and created with the help of a number of consultants, including the exhibition design company Metaphor. This redevelopment has given the Order's remarkable and internationally significant collection the context it deserves, including updating interpretative techniques, bringing more of the collections out of storage, and improving conservation conditions.
Read more about this topic: Museum Of The Order Of St John
Famous quotes containing the word building:
“... what’s been building since the 1980’s is a new kind of social Darwinism that blames poverty and crime and the crisis of our youth on a breakdown of the family. That’s what will last after this flurry on family values.”
—Stephanie Coontz (b. 1944)
“I love art, and I love history, but it is living art and living history that I love.... It is in the interest of living art and living history that I oppose so-called restoration. What history can there be in a building bedaubed with ornament, which cannot at the best be anything but a hopeless and lifeless imitation of the hope and vigour of the earlier world?”
—William Morris (1834–1896)
“The rage for road building is beneficent for America, where vast distance is so main a consideration in our domestic politics and trade, inasmuch as the great political promise of the invention is to hold the Union staunch, whose days already seem numbered by the mere inconvenience of transporting representatives, judges and officers across such tedious distances of land and water.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)