Museum · Historic precedent
Robert Chisholm · Thiruvananthapuram, India · 1880
Key featuresKerala gabled roofs and polychrome brick walls adapted for natural ventilation of the halls.
The Napier Museum is an art and natural history museum situated in Thiruvananthapuram, India.
Some of the building features include a gothic roof and minarets. The Napier Museum, a landmark of the city, is noted for its unique ornamentation and architectural style, which is influenced by Indian, Chinese, Kerala and Mughal schools of architecture.
The museum has a bandstand with concealed speakers and special acoustics. In the old days, the band of the Travancore Nair Brigade would play there every Friday. Later, the police band would play on Saturdays.
The museum owns a garden which has many varieties of flowers and trees. It also shelters the oldest living rubber tree in Kerala. It was brought there in 1876 from Ceylon and planted in the museum grounds by Visakham Thirunal.
The museum grounds are home to the Thiruvananthapuram Zoo, one of the oldest zoological gardens in India. The zoo was established in 1857 over 55 acres (220,000 m2) of land. It also contains the Sree Chitra Art Gallery, a separate art gallery established in 1935.
The set of museums, along with the zoo, are managed by the Department of Museums and Zoos, a branch of the Department of Cultural Affairs of Kerala.
Shortened from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.
