Calcutta City Guide
Explore Victoria Memorial, this huge marble museum a uniquecombination of classical European architecture and Mughal motifs.
Built in 1912 with the white marble, in memory of Queen Victoria, is one of Calcutta's most beautiful monumental legacies from the Raj. The Prince of Wales inaugurated it. With beautiful garden grounds, the Victoria memorial houses a large bronze statue of the Queen Empress, besides paintings, Manu- scripts and other objects of historic values in its Museum and Art Gallery.
The white marble building at the Southern end of Calcutta's maidan continues to be the city's pride and joy. The Victoria Memorial, with its formal gardens and water courses was conceived by Lord Curzon to commemorate the British Empire at its peak. Other colonial monuments within the city have either been obliterated with time or have been renamed or demolished. But the popularity of the "VM" seems to endure for ever.
The Memorial consists of numerous hybrid features: it has Italian-style statues over its entrances, Mughal domes in its corners and tall elegant open colonnades along its sides. The building was designed by Sir William Emerson and its construction was completed in 1921. The main attraction at the memorial is the huge sombre statue of the Queen, which is flanked by two ornamental tanks. Made of Makrana marble from Jodhpur, the Memorial is capped by a dome bearing a revolving bronze figurine symbolizing victory.
