Brighton

Brighton

Brighthelmstone, as Brighton was originally called, was transformed from a small fishing town into a fashionable resort in the mid-18 th century. Famous Brighton and it's neighbour Hove, is situated on the south coast of England. Surrounded by the rolling landscape of the South Downs, 50 miles from London. The city is lively, slightly eccentric, has wonderful contrasts and offers a wide variety of activities and well known sights. Brighton also called 'the beach of London' has 150.000 inhabitants.

Modern Brighton is a seaside resort, attracting visitors from all over the world. Especially the seafront is always popular for strolling along the new looking, fife-mile-long beach, enjoying the sea air and having a drink one of the cafes at the promenade. From the promenade you have a fantastic view of the two historical piers. The tourist attraction is the Palace Pier, which is longer than 500 metres and was built in1899. The pier is definitely worth a visit because it offers a lot of amusements. There are some cafes, souvenir shops, bars and traditional fish and chips restaurants. Other attractions on the pier are for example a roller coaster, a cart track and game halls.

Brighton's West Pier is a magnificent and unique English seaside promenade. Besides the Royal Pavilion it is another landmark of Brighton. This pier has been built over 30 years ago by Eugenius Birch. However, it has been closed, after falling into decay and suffering storm damage, since 1975. Furthermore the pier is hardly unaltered so it is probably the finest existing pier of the world. The West Piers component is of historical and architectural importance.

Next to the Palace Pier is the Sea Life centre with it's display of marine life and a transparent tunnel passing through a large aquarium. This tunnel invites you to take a stroll around the seabed, surrounded by 70 species of sea creatures in natural habitats. There is fun for the whole family, with a full programme including talks, feeding displays and demonstrations.

The oldest, world famous part of Brighton is called The 'Lanes'. Those 'Lanes' are the former centre of the fishing village. It is a combination of the 18 th and 19 th century buildings based on Brighton's original medieval street plan. The narrow, brick paved streets offers a large supply of restaurants, boutiques and jewellers.

Although Britain is very expensive, Brighton has a wide selection of shops which have reasonable prices. Especially at the new developed Churchill Square, Brighton's new 9 metre shopping centre, you find really good clothes.

Brighton is also well known because of it's fantastic and amusing nightlife. At each corner of the streets you find some of Britain brightest and liveliest night-clubs or discos. Last year, when I was in Brighton, I personally experienced this lively city. Unfortunately, it's not allowed to go to discos or night-clubs under 212 years. Any way I preferred  to go to the beach in the evening because there happened always a lot of things. It was so much fun to sit on the beach and meet different people from all over the world. Until now I haven't seen any other cities than Brighton in England, however, in my opinion it is an exiting city where I experienced three funny and amazing holidays.

The Royal Pavilion

Formerly a small fishing village and haven for smuggling, Brighton became popular as a resort, when it's frequent visitor, the 21 - year old Prince of Wales, later King George IV, purchased a farmhouse here in 1786. In line with his extravagant lifestyle, the farmhouse was redeveloped extensively to become the Marine Pavilion. The rebuilding of the farmhouse was by the Neo Classical architect Henry Holland in 1787.

The interior was decorated in the Chinese style and a circular stable in the Indian style was added.

Becoming Prince Regent in 1811, George IV commissioned John Nash to further develop the building, which was finished in 1822. The result was an Indian style palace with a widely oriental interior with a riot of onion domes an minarets, a blend of opulent Chinese interiors, extravagant as the Prince himself. You'll view exquisite furniture and works of art as you wander through the beautiful restored rooms of this dazzling summer palace which changed Brighton from a sleepy seaside village to a fashionable community giving rise to elegant white and cream regency terraces, squares and crescents.

These buildings are now known as The Royal Pavilion and The Dome.

The Royal Pavilion is famous throughout the world and has to be one of the most extraordinary creations in England, if not Europe. The Royal Pavilion along with the Palace- and West Piers are the most prominent landmark of Brighton.

It is hard to believe that this oriental wonderland was born form the imaginations of a man who had never ventured further east than Germany.

Although some predictions said that it was an absurd waste of money and would be a ruin after half a century or more, the Pavilion could survive a disastrous fire, a extensive hurricane damage and let's not forget Queen Victoria who removed everything including the kitchen sink. But Victoria couldn't stand Brighton, with the strange palace and so she gave the building which cost half a million Pound for ridiculous 50000 Pound to the city.

Outside, the Gardens of the Pavilion, which are not extensive, have been returned to then 1826 appearance.

Food has always been an important place in life at The Royal Pavilion, from the time of George IV has so dedicated too food and proud of the Pavilions 'modern' kitchens that he once dined in there along with his servants. George IV  loved food so much that by the time when he was 57, he weighted 23 stone.