place

Friary Court

British royalty stubsBuildings and structures in the City of WestminsterPalaces in London
StJamesPalaceGuards
StJamesPalaceGuards

Friary Court is a part of St James's Palace in London, England. It is used after the death of a reigning monarch. The Accession Council meets to declare the new monarch from the deceased monarch's line. Once the monarch has made a sacred oath to the council, the Garter King of Arms steps onto the Proclamation Gallery which overlooks Friary Court to announce the new monarch. Friary Court has also been used in association with several other ceremonial functions, such as the christening of Prince George of Wales in the adjoining Chapel Royal. Aside from ceremonial functions it hosts royal charity events of which the Royal Family are an integral part.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Friary Court (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Friary Court
Stable Yard Road, London Victoria

Geographical coordinates (GPS) Address Nearby Places
placeShow on map

Wikipedia: Friary CourtContinue reading on Wikipedia

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 51.5044 ° E -0.1374 °
placeShow on map

Address

Saint James's Palace

Stable Yard Road
SW1A 1BH London, Victoria
England, United Kingdom
mapOpen on Google Maps

StJamesPalaceGuards
StJamesPalaceGuards
Share experience

Nearby Places

St James's Palace
St James's Palace

St James's Palace is the most senior royal palace in London, the capital of the United Kingdom. The palace gives its name to the Court of St James's, which is the monarch's royal court, and is located in the City of Westminster in London. Although no longer the principal residence of the monarch, it is the ceremonial meeting place of the Accession Council, the office of the Marshal of the Diplomatic Corps, and the London residence of several members of the royal family. Built by order of Henry VIII in the 1530s on the site of an isolated leper hospital dedicated to Saint James the Less, the palace was secondary in importance to the Palace of Whitehall for most Tudor and Stuart monarchs. Initially surrounded by a deer park and gardens, it was generally used as a hunting lodge and retreat from the formal court and occasionally a royal guest house. After the destruction by fire of Whitehall, the palace increased in importance during the reigns of the early Hanoverian monarchs but was displaced by Buckingham Palace in the late 18th and the early 19th centuries. After decades of being used increasingly for only formal occasions, the move was formalised by Queen Victoria in 1837. The palace now houses a number of official offices, societies and collections, and all ambassadors and high commissioners to the United Kingdom are still accredited to the Court of St James's. The palace's Chapel Royal is still used for functions of the British royal family. The palace was mainly built between 1531 and 1536 in red-brick, and its architecture is primarily Tudor in style. The Queen's Chapel was added in 1620s, and Clarence House was built directly next to it in the 1820s. A fire in 1809 destroyed parts of the palace, including the monarch's private apartments, which were never replaced. Some 17th-century interiors survive, but most were remodelled in the 19th century.

Queen Alexandra Memorial
Queen Alexandra Memorial

The Queen Alexandra Memorial on Marlborough Road, London, which commemorates Queen Alexandra of Denmark, was executed by the sculptor Sir Alfred Gilbert between 1926 and 1932. It consists of a bronze screen incorporating allegorical figures, set into the garden wall of Marlborough House. A late example of a work in the Art Nouveau style, it was regarded by the sculptor as his "Swan song".Before 1926 Gilbert was living in exile abroad, having fled Britain in 1901 bankrupt and disgraced after failing to complete the tomb of the Duke of Clarence in St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle. Gilbert later claimed that the Duke's mother, Princess Alexandra (Queen Alexandra after her husband's accession to the throne as Edward VII), was the only member of the royal family who supported him after this debacle. She is also supposed to have expressed a wish in her old age that Gilbert might execute her memorial, should he outlive her.In 1926 Gilbert was invited to return to Britain, a result of the machinations of his biographer, the journalist Isabel McAllister. She had the twofold aim of getting Gilbert to complete the Clarence tomb (which he had succeeded in doing by 1928) and to receive the commission for a memorial to Queen Alexandra, who had died the previous year. The artist Lady Helena Gleichen offered her studio in St James's Palace for Gilbert's use. The committee to Erect a Memorial to Queen Alexandra was set up in late 1926 and approached Gilbert in December of that year.The symbolism of the central sculptural group is explained by Gilbert in an "exegesis" he prepared for the Committee in 1927: Central Group—represents "Love Enthroned", supported by Faith and Hope, on either side, and Love is directing a Boy sent out across the "River of Life", which springs from beneath Her Throne—symbolizing Queen Alexandra's charity to Children, also the water typifies Her advent to Great Britain from across the water. The composition is in a style adapted from Perpendicular Gothic architecture, with three buttressed and pinnacled canopies over the figures and linenfold motifs on the screen. Two further allegorical statuettes appear on finials on the throne, that on the left representing Religion and the other without an attribute to help with identification, though Truth has been proposed as its subject.The two main inscriptions read QUEEN ALEXANDRA/ 1844 A TRIBUTE TO THE EMPIRE'S LOVE 1925 (on the bronze base) and FAITH, HOPE, LOVE./ THE GUIDING VIRTUES OF QUEEN ALEXANDRA (on the granite base below). A further inscription at the side of the bronze base reads A. B. BURTON. FOUNDER.The memorial was cast by A. B. Burton at the Thames Ditton Foundry. It was unveiled on 8 June 1932 (Alexandra Rose Day) by George V. At the unveiling ceremony the memorial was blessed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Cosmo Gordon Lang, and the choir of the Chapel Royal gave the first performance of Queen Alexandra's Memorial Ode, which had been composed for the occasion by the Master of the King's Music, Sir Edward Elgar, with lyrics by the Poet Laureate, John Masefield. On the following day Gilbert received his knighthood from the King at Buckingham Palace. The memorial was Gilbert's last completed public artwork, as he died in November 1934.

York House, St James's Palace
York House, St James's Palace

York House is a historic wing of St James's Palace, London, built for Frederick, Prince of Wales, on his marriage in 1736. It is in the north-western part of the palace on the site of a former suttling-house (canteen) for the Guards; it overlooks Ambassadors' Court and Cleveland Row to the west of the old Chapel Royal. Prince Frederick occupied it for about a year, until his quarrel with the his father drove him from Court. In 1795, Princess Caroline resided here before her marriage with the Prince of Wales, afterwards George IV. Prince Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, subsequently King of Hanover, lived here for a great many years; and the Duchess of Cambridge was identified with it from 1851 until her death in 1889. Later occupants included the future George V, the late Duke and Duchess of Gloucester from 1936 to 1970, and Princes Charles, William and Harry, who used it before moving to Clarence House.As Edward, Prince of Wales, the future Edward VIII lived at York House, before his refurbishment of Fort Belvedere in Windsor Great Park.The building includes a suite of somewhat low-pitched rooms on the ground-floor, several drawing-rooms on the first floor, a corridor in the rear, and the servants' rooms on the top storey; all facing Cleveland Row. The ceilings of the top floor are low, height having been sacrificed to that of the drawing-room floor; during the nineteenth century this was a common practice in London mansions. The name York House has been used at various times for other houses occupied by various Dukes of York, including those now known as Cumberland House, Dover House, Lancaster House and The Albany.

Boydell Shakespeare Gallery
Boydell Shakespeare Gallery

The Boydell Shakespeare Gallery in London, England, was the first stage of a three-part project initiated in November 1786 by engraver and publisher John Boydell in an effort to foster a school of British history painting. In addition to the establishment of the gallery, Boydell planned to produce an illustrated edition of William Shakespeare's plays and a folio of prints based upon a series of paintings by different contemporary painters. During the 1790s the London gallery that showed the original paintings emerged as the project's most popular element. The works of William Shakespeare enjoyed a renewed popularity in 18th-century Britain. Several new editions of his works were published, his plays were revived in the theatre and numerous works of art were created illustrating the plays and specific productions of them. Capitalising on this interest, Boydell decided to publish a grand illustrated edition of Shakespeare's plays that would showcase the talents of British painters and engravers. He chose the noted scholar and Shakespeare editor George Steevens to oversee the edition, which was released between 1791 and 1803. The press reported weekly on the building of Boydell's gallery, designed by George Dance the Younger, on a site in Pall Mall. Boydell commissioned works from famous painters of the day, such as Joshua Reynolds, and the folio of engravings proved the enterprise's most lasting legacy. However, the long delay in publishing the prints and the illustrated edition prompted criticism. Because they were hurried, and many illustrations had to be done by lesser artists, the final products of Boydell's venture were judged to be disappointing. The project caused the Boydell firm to become insolvent, and they were forced to sell the gallery at a lottery.