Housing numerous museums and being the site of the Great Exhibition of 1851, South Kensington, in West London, is known for its value as a cultural centre. In 1983, a new building entered this historic centre of culture and added to it, albeit in a decidedly un-English way. The Ismaili Centre was designed to be a meeting place, academic institution, and place of worship for the 8,000 Ismaili Muslims in Great Britain (Long) the first of its kind in the West. Located at 1 Cromwell Gardens, the Ismaili Centre is on one of the busiest streets in London, and is directly in the middle of the historic and cultural centre of South Kensington.
Although I will primarily focus on South Kensington, and the Ismaili Centre’s place within it, it is important to understand South Kensington in its urban context, as part of a larger whole. South Kensington is part of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, the second-smallest local authority in London geographically (the Corporation of London is smallest), and the most densely populated in all of Britain (Lightfoot 54). The Royal Borough is a relatively new entity, formed as a merger of the Royal Borough of Kensington and the Metropolitan Borough of Chelsea in 1965, and stretches from Notting Hill in the north all the way down to the river Thames. The former Royal Borough of Kensington (so titled by King Edward VII, whose mother, Queen Victoria, was born and raised in Kensington Palace) includes the area to the immediate north, west and south of Kensington Gardens, while the Metropolitan Borough of Chelsea further south still. (Lightfoot 5) As a whole, the Royal Borough is the most affluent area in Britain, with an average household income of £42,272 annually in 2006; almost double the national average of £25,000. (Lightfoot 6, 54) It is home to some of the most well known landmarks in London, including Kensington Gardens, Notting Hill, Harrods, the Royal Albert Hall, and the Victoria and Albert Museum.
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