Ceilings of the Natural History Museum, London

Ceilings of the Natural History Museum, London.
The decorated ceilings of the Natural History Museum in South Kensington, London, were designed by the museum's architect Alfred Waterhouse, and were unveiled at the building's opening in 1881. The ceiling of the large Central Hall (pictured) consists of 162 panels, 108 of which depict plants considered significant to the history of the museum, to the British Empire or to the museum's visitors. The remaining 54 are highly stylised decorative botanical paintings. The ceiling of the smaller North Hall consists of 36 panels, 18 of which depict plants growing in the British Isles. Both ceilings make extensive use of gilding for visual effect. Built of lath and plaster to save costs, the ceilings are unusually fragile and require extensive maintenance and restoration. Since 2016 the skeleton of a blue whale has been suspended from the ceiling of the Central Hall.

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Eris (dwarf planet)

Eris (dwarf planet).
Eris is the second-largest known dwarf planet in the Solar System, slightly smaller by volume than the dwarf planet Pluto, although it is 27 percent more massive. Discovered in January 2005 by a team based at Palomar Observatory, it was named after Eris, the Greek goddess of strife and discord. The ninth-most-massive object directly orbiting the Sun, Eris is the largest object in the Solar System that has not been visited by a spacecraft. It is a member of a high-eccentricity population known as the scattered disk and has one known moon, Dysnomia. It is about 96 astronomical units (14.4 billion kilometres; 8.9 billion miles) from the Sun, roughly three times as far away as Pluto. Except for some long-period comets, Eris and Dysnomia were the most distant known natural objects in the Solar System until 2018 VG18 was discovered in 2018. Observations of a stellar occultation by Eris in 2010 showed that its diameter was 2,326 ± 12 kilometers (1,445.3 ± 7.5 mi).

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Elasmosaurus

Elasmosaurus.
Elasmosaurus was a large marine reptile in the order Plesiosauria. The genus lived about 80.5 million years ago, during the Late Cretaceous. The first specimen was sent to the American paleontologist Edward Drinker Cope after its discovery in 1867 near Fort Wallace, Kansas. Only one incomplete skeleton is definitely known, consisting of a fragmentary skull, the spine, and the pectoral and pelvic girdles, and a single species, E. platyurus, is recognized today. Measuring 10.3 meters (34 ft) long, the genus had a streamlined body with paddle-like limbs or flippers, a short tail, and a small, slender, triangular head. With a neck around 7.1 meters (23 ft) long, Elasmosaurus was one of the longest-necked animals to have lived, with the largest number of neck vertebrae known, 72. It probably ate small fish and marine invertebrates, seizing them with long teeth. Elasmosaurus is known from the Pierre Shale formation, which represents marine deposits from the Western Interior Seaway.

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Osbert Lancaster

Osbert Lancaster.
Osbert Lancaster (4 August 1908 – 27 July 1986) was an English cartoonist, architectural historian and stage designer. He became known in the 1930s for his books on architecture, aiming to amuse the general reader while demystifying the subject. Several of the terms he coined as labels for architectural styles such as "Pont Street Dutch" have gained common usage, and his books have continued to be regarded as important works of reference on the subject. In the Daily Express from 1938 to 1981 he drew the "pocket cartoons", a form he introduced to Britain. They featured a cast of regular characters, led by his best-known creation, Maudie Littlehampton, through whom he expressed his views on the fashions, fads and political events of the day. In 1951 he was commissioned to create costumes and scenery for a new ballet, Pineapple Poll. Between then and the early 1970s he designed new productions for the Royal Ballet, Glyndebourne, D'Oyly Carte, the Old Vic and the West End.