Editing Joseph Paxton (section)

===Greenhouses===
[[Image:Victoria Regia LIN 1849-.jpg|thumb|upright|Annie Paxton standing on a ''[[Victoria amazonica]]'' leaf in the lily house; Paxton's design for the Crystal Palace took its cue from the organic structure of this plant.]]
In 1832, Paxton developed an interest in greenhouses at Chatsworth where he designed a series of buildings with "forcing frames" for [[espalier]] trees and for the cultivation of exotic plants such as highly prized pineapples.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Lausen-Higgins|first1=Johanna|title=A Taste for the Exotic: Pineapple Cultivation in Britain|url=http://www.buildingconservation.com/articles/pineapples/pineapples.htm|website=Building Conservation}}</ref> At the time the use of glass houses was in its infancy and those at Chatsworth were dilapidated. After experimentation, he designed a glass house with a ridge and furrow roof that would be at right angles to the morning and evening sun and an ingenious frame design that would admit maximum light: the forerunner of the modern greenhouse.

The next great building at Chatsworth was built for the first seeds of the ''[[Victoria regia]]'' lily which had been sent to Kew from the Amazon in 1836. Although they had germinated and grown they had not flowered and in 1849 a seedling was given to Paxton to try out at Chatsworth. He entrusted it to [[Eduard Ortgies]], a young gardener and within two months the leaves were {{convert|4.5|ft|m|abbr=on}} in diameter, and a month later it flowered. It continued growing and it became necessary to build a much larger house, the Victoria Regia House. Inspired by the waterlily's huge leaves – 'a natural feat of engineering' –  he found the structure for his conservatory which he tested by floating his daughter Annie on a leaf. The secret was in the rigidity provided by the radiating ribs connecting with flexible cross-ribs. Constant experimentation over a number of years led him to devise the glasshouse design that inspired the Crystal Palace.

[[File:Bananas.jpg|thumb|upright|left|Named after [[William Cavendish, 6th Duke of Devonshire|William Cavendish]], [[Cavendish bananas]] were cultivated by Paxton in the greenhouses of [[Chatsworth House]] in 1836.<ref name="Banana"/> They account for the vast majority of [[banana]]s consumed in the western world.<ref name="Banana">{{cite news|title=The imminent death of the Cavendish banana and why it affects us all|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-35131751|publisher=BBC|date=24 January 2016}}</ref>]]
With a cheap and light wooden frame, the conservatory design had a ridge-and-furrow roof to let in more light and drained rainwater away. He used hollow pillars doubling as drain pipes and designed a special rafter that acted as an internal and external gutter. All the elements were pre-fabricated and, like [[modular buildings]], could be produced in vast numbers and assembled into buildings of varied design.
[[Image:Chatsworth - Great Conservatory in the 19th century.JPG|thumb|upright|Great Conservatory at [[Chatsworth House|Chatsworth]], built from 1836 to 1841 and demolished in the 1920s.]]

In 1836, Paxton began construction of the Great Conservatory, or Stove, a huge glasshouse {{convert|227|ft|m|abbr=on}} long and {{convert|123|ft|m|abbr=on}} wide that was designed by the 6th Duke's architect [[Decimus Burton]].<ref>pages 97-99 Augustus Pugin versus Decimus Burton, by Guy Williams</ref> The columns and beams were made of [[cast iron]], and the arched elements of laminated wood.<ref name=hrh>{{cite book |title=Architecture:Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries |last=Hitchcock |first=Henry-Russell |year=1977 |publisher=Penguin Books |location=Harmondsworth |isbn=0-14-056115-3 |page=[https://archive.org/details/architecturenine00hitc/page/177 177] |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/architecturenine00hitc/page/177 }}</ref> At the time, the conservatory was the largest glass building in the world. The largest sheet glass available at that time, made by Robert Chance, was {{convert|3|ft|m|abbr=on}} long. Chance produced {{convert|4|ft|m|abbr=on}} sheets for Paxton's benefit. The structure was heated by eight boilers using {{convert|7|mi|km|spell=in}} of iron pipe and cost more than £30,000. It had a central carriageway and when the Queen was driven through, it was lit with twelve thousand lamps. It was prohibitively expensive to maintain, and was not heated during the First World War. The plants died and it was demolished in the 1920s.

In 1848 Paxton created the ''Conservative Wall'',<ref>page 100, The Works of Sir Joseph Paxton 1803–1865, George F. Chadwick, 1961, Architectural Press</ref> a glass house {{convert|331|ft|m|abbr=on}} long by {{convert|7|ft|m|abbr=on}} wide.