Check out 90 years of the Queen's style at Buckingham Palace

Where ever the Queen goes she is always a focus of attention, so whatever she wears is going to be talked about; remember the fuss over her rather bright green outfit at this year's Trooping the Colour?  When you visit Buckingham Palace this year, you can enjoy their special exhibition which traces her fashion choices during the 90 years of her life. 

Buckingham Palace, one of the great symbols of London, is open to the public each summer when the Queen goes to Scotland for her holidays. You can explore the many state rooms with their sumptuous decor, furnishings and works of art and learn about the history of this grand building.  Each year they put on a special exhibition and this year's is called: Fashioning a Reign:90 Years of Style from The Queen's Wardrobe, and I'm going to give you a peek inside!. 

We see her how her outfits have changed over the years to reflect fashion and the first room you visit has a piece from each of her decades including matching outfits that the Queen and her younger sister wore to the coronation of George Vl,  a dress worn when she met Marilyn Monroe (or rather the other way round!) and culminating in the wonderful pink dress worn for the London 2012 Olympics opening ceremony and the film of her greeting James Bond and 'jumping' out of the helicopter.  This last dress illustrates the level of planning involved in working on the Queen's wardrobe as the video was made in March so the outfit had to be agreed back then for the event taking place at the end of July. What a memorable moment from London 2012. A second dress was made for the stunt jumper but we are assured this is the one worn by the Queen.

** Dresses and coronets  worm by the Queen and Princess Margaret to their father's coronation 1937

** A Norman Hartnell dress for the 1956 film premier with Marilyn Monroe

The 'Olympics' dress of 2012 by Angela Kelly  

In her younger years we would often see the Queen on horseback, riding side saddle in stylish military outfits, cut away from the waist to accommodate this strange riding position. She was the first female monarch to serve in the forces when in 1945 she served in the ATS (Auxiliary Territorial Army) and we can see her own uniform. It's hard to imagine Her Majesty doing car maintenance but those were tough times for the country and she wanted to do her bit. 

Queen's ATS battle dress

We see her wonderfully tailored jackets, one of which has a flexible beret which gives the option to change the plumage to reflect the regiment she was representing or inspecting. 

The Queen has kept faith with a few top couture designers, namely Normal Hartnell and Hardy Amies and has added Stewart Parvin and Angela Kelly among others . Her unswerving support for British fashion has helped promote London's place as a world fashion capital. This has included a small coterie of hat designers and a gallery of hats showcases a few of these. 

The famous Hartnell wedding dress from 1947 is on display with its 9 foot veil and shoes. It was a triumph as it needed to fit this historic occasion and yet Britain was still subject to rationing so care had to be taken to not overplay the luxury element - he succeeded! The theme was renewal in the post war period so springtime flowers can be seen in the embroidery. 

A wedding dress fit for a Queen

By the time of the coronation in 1953 Hartnell had a freer hand and his design looked back at the wedding dress but features much more elaborate embroidery with symbols of the 4 UK nations and the Dominion nations  The Queen was closely involved in its design and had considerable input through series of 8 reworked sketches. 

The coronation dress

Embroidery detail from the wedding dress

The Queen has many roles: head of state, head of the armed forces, head of the chivalry orders as well as a member of a family with lots of events and need outfits for each of these. Those worn on her state visits were really interesting as we saw how symbols of the country being visited were incorporated into day and evening wear. 

In this photo we can see a pink cherry blossom decorated dress worn to China next to a blue and cream dress with maple leaves along the colour join for a visit to Canada, and the yellow dress was worn to Australia giving a nod to their national colour. 

This dress was for Her Majesty's visit to the Olypmics in Montreal in 1976 so it incorporates the Olympic rings. 

What I really liked about this section was the chance to see the dress on the mannequin alongside a photo of the Queen wearing the dress during the official visit. Firstly you can see the outfit Her Majesty wore to Saudi Arabia in 1979, being sure to cover up to respect Saudi customs. 

Here the dress for the visit to Nigeria in 1956 features a neckline which echoes African tribal necklaces. 

And finally on our mini tour of the exhibition, the green outfit Her Majesty wore for the 2016 Trooping The Colour. It was not nearly as bright as it appeared on the TV. The Queen wears bright colours so that people can see her in a crowd, especially as she is quite short (just 5ft 4in) but this year's green must have been the brightest yet - not bad for a 90 year old. 

2016 by Stewart Parvin 

One more photo I couldn't resist showing you because it shows the Queen during various ages, always smiling and waving to the crowds who have come out to see her as she wants to make their day. 

There is a lot more to see in the full exhibition and of course there are the wonderful rooms of the Palace to enjoy.  Don't miss the cafe for good snacks and the shop 'where the corgis hang out' (!) and the wonderful gardens on the way to the exit. 

For more information about visiting Buckingham Palace and Fashioning a Reign, visit their website.


Photo credits: starred photos (**) are courtesy of Elizabth Hawksley for which many thanks

Sue
@itsyourlondon 
www;itsyourlondon.co.uk

Even the vegetables have great stories to tell at Hampton Court Palace!

The humble pea came to the rescue of a city under siege! Back in 1644 during the English Civil War the city of Newcastle was under siege and the people were starving to death when a consignment of Carlin peas came through just in time to keep the city's population alive. Vicki Cooke, the wonderfully titled Kitchen Garden Keeper, delighted in telling us this story as we stood next to several rows of Carlin peas,  which are clearly no ordinary pea!

Here are the famous Carlin peas and that's not Vicki!

Hampton Court Palace is well known for its impressive historic buildings, impenetrable maze, annual flower show and enormous gardens. They've now added another good reason to visit as they've just opened their new Royal Kitchen Garden. I say 'new' but it really dates back to the time of Queen Anne when she decided that the land that Henry Vlll had used as a jousting yard, would be much better as a kitchen garden - good decision!  It was the main royal kitchen garden, supplying the other palaces. and was a working garden from 1689 to 1842. The scale is incredible as what we can visit is just one sixth of the garden that operated at that time. 

The walled kitchen garden - imagine it 6 times bigger!

I was invited to view the gardens before they opened to the public and was treated to a tour given by Graham  Dillamore, the Garden & Estates Operations Manager, who you can see standing among the peas in the photo above. He explained that they had 'broken ground' only last August and were amazed at how well the gardens were progressing after such a wet winter. He is clearly an expert gardener and it was encouraging to us amateurs to hear that even the professionals suffer from the unpredictability of nature. The soil was in bad shape when they first looked into it and needed a great deal of feeding and preparing before they could do their first planting, but look at the results! They have used the original plans dating back to 1736 to lay out the paths and passage ways between each section of vegetables.

Fabulous lettuces

Back in the days when Kings and Queens were the centre of society,  a Head Gardener could really make an impression if he produced exotic fruit early in the season. So they introduced raised beds filled with rotting manure which gave off heat during the cold winter months, hence they were known as 'hot beds'. Topped off with soil these beds could produced melons in spring and just imagine the King's delight and the Head Gardener' proud smile!

The gardens are full of unusual varieties, not just the peas, and each plant has a little flower pot to tell you what it is - a lovely touch.
 

It takes a lot of work to make gardens of this size flourish and I was impressed by the planting, so neat and well tended. There 3 full time staff, a trainee and lots of willing volunteers. Check out these edges, the regular planting and spot the gardeners hard at work:

Wonderful edging for the fruit and herb bed

Lettuces all in a row!

Staff and volunteers hard at work

As we were leaving we could smell the heady aroma of roses in full bloom so we took a little stroll through the gorgeous rose gardens where you can see the palace in the background.

Imagine the perfume from all these roses!

 The river at Hampton Court is truly beautiful, so I must show you just one more photo  before I close.  It's a quintessentially English view and you can see why they built a palace here!

The Thames at Hampton Court

I loved what they have done with this new kitchen garden space and look forward to seeing how the kitchen gardens progress over the seasons to come.

Bye for now,
Sue
@itsyourlondon
www.itsyourlondon.co.uk