1997: Globe Theatre

    Today’s Globe Theatre is the third iteration of The Globe. The first Globe was opened in 1599 and was built by the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, which Shakespeare partly owned and wrote plays for. In 1613, the original Globe burnt down because of a cannon misfiring which caused the thatched roof to catch on fire. The Globe was rebuilt within a year and operated until all theatres were closed down because of a decree in 1642. The current Globe Theatre was opened in 1997 by Queen Elizabeth.

    The Globe itself is an open-air theater with no roof, like the original Globe. It can seat 1,570 people, different than the original’s ~3,000. The building is an icosagon, or a 20-sided polygon. The twelve signs of the zodiac are painted on the roof of the stage. The flag on the top tells what kind of play is currently playing, like the original - red means it's a tragedy, for example. 

The zodiac signs on the roof above the stage

 

    Sam Wanamaker, the founder of the Shakespeare Globe Trust, got his inspiration from seeing the replica of the Globe built for the Great Lakes World Fair in Cleveland, Ohio in 1949. England’s first recreation of the Globe was actually a scaled down concrete version painted to look like timber and erected at Earls Court. In 1970, Wanamaker decided to build a version of the Globe as accurately as possible and founded the Trust in 1971. Some examples of accuracy include the fact that’s it’s made from real timber and has a thatched roof. The Globe is the only building in London to have a thatched roof and had to get special permission because thatched roofs were outlawed after the Great Fire of 1666. Despite his hard work on his dream of building an accurate Globe, Wanamaker would die before it opened; he died in 1993. Despite that, his dream lives with the modern-day Globe.