The 54-metre-tall monument of Prince Albert was erected in 1872 by the order of Queen Victoria. With its ornate canopy, in the style of a Gothic ciborium over the high altar, elaborate sculptures and mosaics, it constitutes an exquisite example of Gothic Revival architecture.
The whole monument was designed by George Gilbert Scott. The final statue was cast in bronze and it shows Albert looking south. The central part of the memorial is surrounded by elaborate sculptures of 169 composers, architects, poets, painters, and sculptors. At the corners of the outer area there are also some allegorical sculptures.
The memorial’s canopy features several mosaics as external and internal decorative artworks. Each of the four external mosaics shows a central allegorical figure of the four arts (poetry, painting, architecture and sculpture), supported by two historical figures on either side. The pillars and niches of the canopy feature eight statues representing the practical arts and sciences: astronomy, geology, chemistry, geometry (on the four pillars) and rhetoric, medicine, philosophy and physiology (in the four niches). Near the top of the canopy’s tower there are eight statues of the moral and Christian virtues, including the four cardinal virtues and the three theological virtues. The virtues are: Faith, Hope, Charity and Humility, and Fortitude, Prudence, Justice and Temperance. The allegorical sculptures at the corners of the outer area include four groups depicting Victorian industrial arts and sciences (agriculture, commerce, engineering and manufacturing), and four groups representing Europe, Asia, Africa and The Americas.
The popularity of the Prince Consort led to the creation of several ‘Albert Memorials’ around the United Kingdom, and the Kensington memorial was not the earliest one. It took ten years to complete the monument and the cost £120,000 (the equivalent of about £10,000,000 in 2010) was met by public subscription.
By the late 1990s the Memorial had fallen into disrepair. A thorough restoration was carried out that included cleaning, repainting and re-gilding the entire monument, as well as carrying out structural repairs.