Description
Lambeth Bridge is the red steel bridge over the Thames just upstream of the Houses of Parliament, linking Westminster to Lambeth Palace on the south bank, with the Palace of Westminster a short walk away through Victoria Tower Gardens.
The red is no accident. It matches the leather benches of the House of Lords, at this end of Parliament, while green Westminster Bridge, downstream, matches those of the House of Commons. At each end stand pairs of obelisks topped with stone pinecones.
A popular legend says the pinecones are pineapples, a tribute to John Tradescant the Younger, a Lambeth resident said to have grown the first pineapple in Britain.
Long before any bridge, a horse ferry crossed here, and Horseferry Road on the north bank keeps its name. The present five-arch bridge was opened by King George V in 1932, replacing a Victorian suspension bridge so shaky that it ended up used almost only by pedestrians.
The red is no accident. It matches the leather benches of the House of Lords, at this end of Parliament, while green Westminster Bridge, downstream, matches those of the House of Commons. At each end stand pairs of obelisks topped with stone pinecones.
A popular legend says the pinecones are pineapples, a tribute to John Tradescant the Younger, a Lambeth resident said to have grown the first pineapple in Britain.
Long before any bridge, a horse ferry crossed here, and Horseferry Road on the north bank keeps its name. The present five-arch bridge was opened by King George V in 1932, replacing a Victorian suspension bridge so shaky that it ended up used almost only by pedestrians.