Wednesday, September 25, 2013

Buckingham Palace

Today was me and Lisa's first Adventure Wednesday. (Adventure Wednesdays have been so named since Lisa and I both have them off from classes and have decided to use them to have an adventure around London each week.) And what better way to start than by taking a tour of Buckingham Palace?! Especially since it's been exactly 60 years since the Queen's Coronation. Because a bunch of our other friends finished classes at 1:00, our whole group booked a tour for 3:00pm, stopping to grab lunch on the way. (Lisa and I both had very delicious prosciutto and mozzerella cheese paninis on fresh focaccia bread from a great cafe across the street from school that we will most definitely be returning to.)

In any case, we made our way on the tube to the Palace. To be quite honest, from the outside that we could see, the Palace looks like a lot of other grand buildings. (I know what you're thinking--don't grand buildings look, well, grand?) But it's the inside that's truly spectacular. Prior to entering the Palace we had to go through "airport security" and recieve little audio tour packs that we could listen to as we walked through the 19 State rooms that make up the tour. Unfortunately, pictures were not allowed to be taken inside, so I will do my very best to describe the highlights of the tour.

As we walked down the first hallway, our little audio tour guide narrated some astonishing facts about the Palace--like the fact that it has 775 rooms which include 19 State rooms, 52 Royal and guest bedrooms, 188 staff bedrooms, 92 offices and 78 bathrooms! I still can't comprehend the true size of this place considering the measly 19 rooms we saw were absolutely huge! The hallway led to an outdoor view of the quadrangle where we we listened to the description of the procession of carriages on the Queen's Coronation Day in 1953 and how the Palace and quadrangle area has changed over the last 250 years or so.

Once we returned inside, we were able to look into the Grand Hall, which was incredible, though all of the rooms we saw were. It was a huge space, the main area sunk slightly into the ground, with large bouquets of flowers everywhere, big marble coloumns, rich, elaborate funishings, bright windows and a big fireplace on the far side. After trying to take in this magnificent room, we turned to walk up the Grand Staircase which split into two as it curved upwards. The hallway of the staircase was adorned with these massive and beautiful old paintings. From there we walked a bit farther until we reached the Throne Room. Yet another gorgeous room, this one had a huge domed cieling that was decorated with a repeating pattern of shields that represented the three main parts of the United Kingdom: Great Britain, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. Huge windows with silk curtains lined the right side of the room and at the far side, on a raised dias, were the two thrones made specifically for the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh. Along the hall were also pictures and video footage from the actual Coronation Day that we paused to look at.
Next, we entered the Art Gallery, a extensive hallway completely covered in beautiful, original Old Master's paintings that make up an important part of the Royal Collection. We spent some time admiring the paintings before moving on to a room where a screen projection allowed us to watch select parts of the Coronation at Westminster Abbey. Watching it, it was hard for us to imagine what it must have been like to be a part of something like that, or to even have been alive to see it on television or hear about it on the radio. Seeing this black and white film of the young Queen, the Archbishop, and all of the other nobility dressed in specially designed royal attire and to think it began and ended in the very Palace, in some of the very rooms we were walking through, didn't seem quite real. And in the next room, we were able to view the actual dress and Coronation Robe that the Queen wore that day 60 years ago. According to one sign, the robe was hand woven and took 18 seamstresses 3,500 hours to make! I'd personally like to tell them that they did an amazing job, because to this day it still looks magnificent. But still, even looking at the Robe, as well as her tiara, dress, and other artifacts from that day, it didn't seem it was real. It was a bit like looking at very unique props from a movie. And not in a bad way necessarily, but it was difficult for the whole experience to really sink in since something such as that is truly so removed from our lives that we've only experienced it through movies and storybooks.
In any case, it was still amazing! The next room we entered was the Dining Hall which housed a few tables that were set the way they had been on the Coronation Day. All I could think was that if I sat there I wouldn't know which glass was for what and which fork or knife I was supposed to use first. Next was the Music Room where four Royal babies - The Prince of Wales, The Princess Royal, The Duke of York and Prince William - were all christened by the Archbishop of Canterbury. There were a couple more rooms we passed through, to be honest I can't remember the names of all of them, but I can tell you that literally every room is decorated and crafted to the first degree from floor to cieling to furnishing. It was unbelievable to imagine this place actually being someone's home. One of the last rooms we went through was the White Drawing Room, which was especialy pretty and which housed a secret door behind a huge mirror/fireplace that leads back to the Queen's private rooms of the Palace. (Yes everyone wanted to go see, but no one actually tried.) Like many of the rooms there was also a number of chandeliers, but one of them was so low Lisa suggested I try and touch it. I probably could've, but strangely enough British prison was not on my to-do list.

Finally, we walked the Marble Room which was lined with original marble scultpures before we came back outside. We were allowed to take pictures here, so we snapped a couple of group pics before walking a path through the south side of the gardens that led back outside the palace gates. Since I had yet to see the "tourist" view of Buckingham Palace, Lisa, Katie, Megan, and I walked around to the front where the Victoria Memorial stands to take more pictures.

I'm still reeling from the fact that we were able to take a tour, especially since it's only open for a limited time. It was so cool to be able to not only see the State rooms, but to also hear about how Buckingham Palace came to be how it now from rather sporadic additions since 1703 when it was originally Buckhingham House. And it's even crazier to imagine that it's actually a working building that is essentially the centerpiece of the monarchy when it so easy to think it of it as a musuem. Completely worth the trip and an excellent Adenture Wednesday!

So did you feel like you were there? Did I include enough? I apologize for the long-post, but I myself didn't want to forget anything haha. This is where I end for the day! Oh, and if anyone is curious I was able to switch my horrifying Psych class for a much more interesting (hopefully) Culturalism class that my friend Lisa is also taking. The other two classes I have attended so far (Media Transformations and Women, Gender, and Power) seem like they will be a good fit, and I'm looking forward to Creative Writing About London tomorrow! (I also did laundry for the first time today at the laundromat down the street, but that is a story for another time.) Goodnight!

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