The Victoria and Albert Museum

Pictured below is the primary entrance to the Victoria and Albert Museum; we entered through an alternate entrance from the Tube and actually exited here.

Detail from the Entrance to the V&A

Didn't quite get what I wanted here.  You can see a statue of Prince Albert above the door.

Above the arch is a statue of Queen Victoria; unfortunately I beheaded her in this photo.

In the foyer, above the information desk is this Dale Chihuly chandelier, an

artist who got his start in Seattle.  Impressive.

The V&A is an interesting museum because of the number of different types of collections they have, including jewelry, textiles, and fashion, in addition to more traditional museum fare.

The first thing we saw when we entered the museum was a collection by designer Yohji Yamamoto, whose gender bending collections for men and women were astounding.  We were not allowed to take photographs in the exhibition itself, but we did get this shot from a teaser display in a gallery elsewhere in the museum.

While not a great picture, this shot does give you a sense of some of Yamamoto's work; this is the back of a men's suit.

One of the other reasons that we wanted to go to the V&A was because we knew that they had a section on . . . 

You can't have a section on Theatre and Performance without the skull from Hamlet

Set Piece:  Richard Burton as King Henry V

From the world of music: A concert costume from Mick Jagger

Lady Bracknell's costume from The Importance of Being Earnest

The museum even had a section where visitors could dress up in costumes.

From left to right:

Carl as Mr. Toad (from The Wind in the Willows)

Jordan as The Magician

Robert as The Chinaman

Scar and Sarabi from The Lion King

Dame Edna Everage's hat for Ascot

Dame Edna is from Down Under.  If you look closely, you will see the Sydney Opera House, waves around the base, and even a shark with rhinestone teeth at the left end of the house.

Quite appropriately, a set design for Sweeney Todd

Set for Long Days Journey into Night

This section of the museum also included sound effects machines (loved thunder), short films about creating movement, excerpts from major productions, a theatre box, and a full size realistic Rhinoceros from Ionesco's play by the same name.  Epic!