Northumberlandia
Northumberlandia (the "Lady of the North") is a huge land sculpture in the shape of a reclining female figure, which was completed in 2012, near Cramlington, Northumberland, northern England.
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Made of 1.5 million tonnes of earth from neighbouring Shotton Surface Mine, it is 34 metres (112 feet) high and 400 metres (1,300 feet) long, set in a 19 hectares (47 acres) public park. Its creators claim that it is the largest land sculpture in female form in the world.[1]
It is intended to be a major tourist attraction, with the developers hoping that it will attract an additional 200,000 visitors a year to Northumberland.[2] It was officially opened by Anne, Princess Royal on 29 August 2012.[3] A day-long Community Opening Event on 20 October 2012 marked the park becoming fully open to the public.[1]
Development
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Designed by American landscape architect Charles Jencks,[4] the sculpture was built on the Blagdon Estate, owned by Matt Ridley, a journalist, businessman and author of The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature.
The £2.5 million cost was borne by the Blagdon Estate and the Banks Group, who carried out the construction work. The construction is part of the development of an adjacent open-cast coal mine at Shotton. For this project, it was decided to use part of the excavated material to make a land sculpture rather than return it all to the surface mine, as is normally done at the end of such operations.
See also
References
- "Northumberlandia: The naked lady of Cramlington". BBC News. 1 September 2012. Retrieved 2 September 2012.
- "Work begins on 'Goddess of the North' in Northumberland". BBC News website. 8 April 2010. Retrieved 21 August 2011.
- "Northumberlandia: Princess Royal opens naked sculpture". BBC News. 2012-09-03. Retrieved 2012-09-03.
- Gilbert, Jonathan (17 June 2011). "Coming to the UK -- a half-mile long woman's body". Reuters website. Retrieved 21 August 2011.
External links
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