Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins
Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins was an English sculptor and natural history artist renowned for his work on the life-size models of dinosaurs in the Crystal Palace Park in south London. The models, accurately made using the latest scientific knowledge, created a sensation at the time. Hawkins was also a noted lecturer on zoological topics.
Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins' mounted Hadrosaurus in Philadelphia in 1868, making it the first mounted dinosaur skeleton in the world.
Porcine Deer (Axis porcinus) from Knowsley Park
Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins' studio in Sydenham, where he made the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs
Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins' studio at the Central Park Arsenal, with models of extinct animals
The Crystal Palace Dinosaurs are a series of sculptures of dinosaurs and other extinct animals, inaccurate by modern standards, in the London borough of Bromley's Crystal Palace Park. Commissioned in 1852 to accompany the Crystal Palace after its move from the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, they were unveiled in 1854 as the first dinosaur sculptures in the world. The models were designed and sculpted by Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins under the scientific direction of Sir Richard Owen, representing the latest scientific knowledge at the time. The models, also known as the Geological Court or Dinosaur Court, were classed as Grade II listed buildings from 1973, extensively restored in 2002, and upgraded to Grade I listed in 2007.
Iguanodon sculptures in Crystal Palace Park.
The dinosaur models under construction at Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins' studio in Sydenham, c. 1853
The famous banquet in the mould of the Crystal Palace Iguanodon, New Year's Eve, 1853
Iguanodon models in 1995, before restoration, showing previous countershaded paint scheme with white undersides