From the editor

摘要

When it was announced in October last year that Chinese developer ZhongRong Group was going to build a new Crystal Palace in the south London park, and on the footprint of Joseph Paxton's vanished original, it seemed a little far-fetched. Despite London Mayor Boris Johnsons press conference on the sweeping steps that lead to the ill-fated site (the monumental greenhouse caught fire on four separate occasions during its time on the Sydenham site, in 1866, in 1923, conclusively in 1936 and then once more in 1950, which erased it almost completely), there was an air of disbelief surrounding the proposal. And unlike, say, the 2012 Olympics project, which, from the moment London was announced as host city in 2005, captured the public's imagination, few jumped for joy at the prospect of seeing the palace rebuilt.