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Isambard Kingdom Brunel Through Time - Signed

IKB was Britain's greatest engineer. He was the man who built everything on a huge scale including Britain's biggest ship, some spectacular bridges, a tunnel under the Thames and the magnificent Great Western Railway from London to Bristol.

What's inside 'Isambard Kingdom Brunel Through Time'

Brunel left an unsurpassed legacy of industrial architecture and design, from the vaulted roof of Paddington station to the iron-hulled SS Great Britain, from the Clifton Suspension Bridge to the Tamar Bridge (which bears his name on its approaches).

His life was one of superlatives; bigger, wider, taller and faster. As the historian Dan Cruikshank put it, Brunel was quite simply 'a one-man Industrial Revolution'.

Here, John Christopher tells the story of the man and his tunnels, bridges, railways, ships and buildings, with many new illustrations accompanying the old, showing the changes time has made to Brunel's greatest legacy - the things he designed and built that we still take for granted and use every day, over a century and a half since his death.

Isambard Kingdom Brunel Through Time - the details

Author: John Christopher (signed)
Publisher: Amberley Publishing 2010
ISBN: 9781848689633
Format: Softback 96 pages
Size: 235 x 165 mm
Condition: New

Part of the Droids Books Collection

Brunel in London - Signed

Brunel and London might not seem an obvious association, but John Christopher puts the case that it was London, not Bristol, that was the most important centre of Brunel's activities.

Making the case for Brunel in London

It was here that he lived, worked and died. London is dotted with examples of his works, some obvious and some less so, from the subaquatic Thames Tunnel between Wapping to Rotherhithe where he cut his engineering teeth and was almost killed in a sudden deluge, to the Hungerford suspension bridge between Charing Cross and the South Bank - mostly forgotten but parts of it still exist - the two stations at Paddington serving the Great Western Railway main line running to the west and, of course, his final steamship, the vast Great Eastern built at Millwall, which marked the end of his career and his life.

Less familiar are Brunel's connections with the Crystal Palace, designed by Joseph Paxton for the Great Exhibition of 1851, and the two towers he built when it was relocated to Sydenham in south London.

John Christopher, an acknowledged expert on Brunel, takes us on a tour of London, examining the relationship between city and engineer.

This is one in a series of books about rediscovering Brunel’s works in your area. See also Brunel in Gloucestershire, Brunel in Cornwall, and Brunel in Bristol.

Brunel in London - the details

Author: John Christopher (signed)
Publisher: Amberley Publishing 2014
ISBN: 9781445618555
Format: Softback 96 pages
Size: 235 x 165 mm
Condition: New

Part of the Droids Books Collection

Brunel in Cornwall - Signed

John Christopher, an acknowledged expert on Isambard Kingdom Brunel, takes us on a tour of Cornwall which marks the extreme south-western extent of Brunel’s kingdom.

What to expect from 'Brunel in Cornwall'

Cornwall is surprisingly rich in Brunel's works. The Royal Albert Bridge, which crosses the River Tamar, connected the broad gauge network with the Cornwall and West Cornwall railways – both engineered by Brunel – to take the trains coming from Paddington all the way to Penzance via a series of over sixty spectacular timber viaducts.

The original viaducts have gone now, either modified or replaced over the years, but in many cases the masonry piers remain like rows of monolithic sentinels. As a result there is much to reward the Brunel hunter, including the branch line south to Falmouth plus many surviving examples of his railway stations. There are other connections, literally.

His Great Eastern steamship was the first vessel to successfully lay a telegraphic cable to connect Europe and the USA – a story told at the historic Porthcurno Telegraph Museum near Land’s End.

This is one in a series of books about rediscovering Brunel’s works in your area. See also Brunel in London, Brunel in Gloucestershire, and Brunel in Bristol.

Brunel in Cornwall - the details

Author: John Christopher (signed)
Publisher: Amberley Publishing 2014
ISBN: 9781445618593
Format: Softback 96 pages
Size: 235 x 165 mm
Condition: New

Part of the Droids Books Collection