The Oxford University Museum of Natural History Building, Oxford, UK

Abstract

The Oxford University Museum of Natural History (OUMNH) is now celebrated as one of the most important Gothic revival buildings of the nineteenth century. It is also a temple of science. Built between 1855 and 1860, the design of the museum building incorporated input from artists, scientists and cultural figures such as the writer, philosopher, art critic and polymath John Ruskin. The aim of the museum's founders was to teach science—and that the museum building itself should serve as a teaching tool. Geology played a key role in achieving this.