The interior of this elegant tower of steel and glass displaying over 2500 objects - swords, pikes, armour, guns, bayonets and many other things line the walls, creating fascinating patterns as you look directly upwards from the ground floor. Outside the tower, an enclosed staircase allows visitors to look through the round windows to seen selections of exhibits more closely as they climb between the different floors.
The background to the building of this museum is interesting - In 1990, after two years of preliminary research and deliberation, the decision was taken to establish a new museum in the north of England in which to house the bulk of the collection of world-wide arms and armour. The project was known as Strategy 2000, a scheme produced to provide the national museum of arms and armour with a suitable infrastructure to preserve, display and interpret its collections.
Strategy 2000 from its inception required the establishment of a new museum outside the Tower of London, the earlier home of the collection - space constraints within the Tower of London made it impossible for the museum to display or house the collections properly.
On 30 March 1996, the Royal Armouries Museum in Leeds opened to the public. The new building, designed by architect Derek Walker, is the headquarters of the Royal Armouries complex of museums, and houses the majority of the museum’s collections. The construction project, which cost a total of £42.5 million, was completed in just over two years.
The Leeds museum is built not only to display the national collection, but to tell the story of the development of arms and armour through the objects, a wide range of audio-visual presentations, computer interactives and interpretations to bring the subject to life. This approach to the presentation of the subject extends outside the museum building - there is a Tiltyard for demonstrations of jousting and other forms of mounted martial sport, as well as falconry.
Thank you all for your lovely comments and favs, which put this shot on the Trending page.
I have to confess to cheating a little with this shot - rather than pointing the camera upwards to take this, I used one of the conveniently placed mirrors and took a shot of the reflection.
Thank you all for your lovely comments and favs, which put this shot on the Trending page.
I have to confess to cheating a little with this shot - rather than pointing the camera upwards to take this, I used one of the conveniently placed mirrors and took a shot of the reflection.
Ian
Thank you Gillian, glad you like it!
Ian
Thank you Kathy, glad you like it!
Ian