Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Surrey, TW9 3AB

Phone:

0844 482 7777

Website:

www.hrp.org.uk/KewPalace

Opening times:

April-Sept daily 10:30-17:30 (last entry 17:00)

How to get there:

Tube: Kew Gardens

Entry fee:

Admission charge

Kew Palace is a fine example of the ‘artisan mannerist’ style popular in the early 17th century, and worthy of comparison with Forty Hall. A royal residence from the early 18th century, it is all that remains of George II and III’s palace at Kew. Formerly known as the Dutch House, it was built in 1631 for the Flemish merchant Samuel Fortrey. By the mid-18th century this fine three-storey block with its rubbed brickwork and Dutch gables was being used as an annexe to the royal residence known as The White House or Kew House, built in the 1730s by Frederick, Prince of Wales. As such it was the childhood home of George III, later the nursery for his own children and his retreat during the onset of his nervous disorder, porphyria. This was a role that the house played increasingly after the partial demolition of the White House in 1802. King George’s beloved wife Queen Charlotte spent the last six months of her life here in 1818, a year in which the palace also saw the marriages of two of their sons, the Dukes of Clarence and Kent. The latter married Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg and their daughter later became Queen Victoria, who opened the palace to the public in 1899.

Since 1996 the palace has been undergoing an extensive programme of restoration and re-presentation, still in progress at time of writing. The façade has been re-covered with its distinctive red brick-dust limewash over the Flemish bond brickwork. Inside, the wallpaper has been recreated from remaining fragments and the 18th-century brass door locks, engraved with the crest of Frederick, Prince of Wales, have been preserved. The re-presentation project focuses on the late 18th and early 19th centuries, when the house was most frequently in use by George III, Queen Charlotte and their children. Added attractions promised are a wax life cast of George III made by Madame Tussaud, a waistcoat specially adapted for him, and the shirt he wore during his illness, an image made famous in the film The Madness of King George III. Also on display is a remarkable ‘baby house’ or dolls’ house made both for and by the daughters of George III in 1780, complete with tiny Hepplewhite furniture and bright green wallpaper.