When Kensington Palace became a Royal Residence

by Andrea Zuvich

There’s something about Kensington Palace that immediately conjures up the word glamorous. Perhaps it is because in recent memory, it has been the home of notable, glamorous royals such as the late Princess Margaret, the late Diana, Princess of Wales, and also because of its current inhabitant, Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge. But what we now know of Kensington Palace is very different from what it once was. As I had the great honour to have been on the original team that developed the Garden History Tours at Kensington Palace, I learned first-hand about the history and rather more humble origins of the great royal palace – and I hope to share some of that here with you all today. 

Before modern Kensington became the playground of the world’s richest people, it was a sleepy verdant little village renowned for its purity of air. Royals have only inhabited the house since the late 17^th-century, when William III and Mary II moved in. But the history of the land goes back farther than that. According to Kensington Palace by W.J. Loftie, a late Victorian historian, the land upon which Kensington Palace now lies was (in the 14^th century) on an area called Neyt Manor, one of three manorial estates owned by the Abbey of Westminster. Indeed, archival documents and archaeological assessments from the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea state there was a Neyt Manor in 1386. Whatever building was left standing is believed to have been demolished in 1602.

A Jacobean house was built in 1605 for Sir George Coppin three years after the Neyt Manor structure was razed. Following Coppin’s death in 1619, it was purchased by the Finch family. Much later on, the house was named “Nottingham House” because Sir Heneage Finch was the Earl of Nottingham (since 1681).

In 1688, what is known as the “Glorious Revolution” occurred in which James II was ousted from power by his nephew/son-in-law William of Orange and James’s daughter/William’s wife and cousin, Mary. In 1689, William and Mary were crowned King and Queen, and they soon set out to find where to live. Why? You may well wonder, considering that they already had St. James’s Palace and Whitehall Palace. But Whitehall rested in an area by the River Thames that was full of fog, smoke, and generally unpleasant air. This wreaked havoc with King William’s chronic asthma and so more verdant climes were sought. They soon purchased Nottingham House from Daniel Finch, the 2^nd Earl of Nottingham (who happened to be his Secretary of State), for a whopping £14,000-18,000.

After this, they hired Sir Christopher Wren to expand and modernise the Jacobean building into something bigger and more fashionable. Construction work went on between 1689-1690. Unfortunately, Mary was a bit impatient with what she perceived to be the slow progress of the building. This can probably be attributed to her desire to make a comfortable home for William. She wrote to her beloved:

“the schafolds are up, the windows must be boarded up, but as soon as it is done, your own apartment may be furnished.”

Her over-eagerness to get the building works completed meant that the workman built too quickly, and so the quality of their work became a secondary consideration. Mary wrote (original spelling maintained): “This made me go often to Kinsington to hasten the worckmen, and I was so impatient to beat that place, imagining to find more ease there.”

As a result of this, sadly, November 1689 saw part of the newly-built building fall down ‘killing seven or eight workman’ – and this tragedy also occurred during renovation work to Hampton Court Palace. Mary characteristically blamed herself for these deaths.

Her diary continues: “This I often reproved my self for and at last it pleased God to shew me the uncertainty of all things…All this much as it was the fault of the worckmen, humanly speacking, yet shewed me the hand of God plainly in it, and I was truly humbled.”

The gardens were redone at this time as well, with heavily manicured box hedging – elaborately formed in the formal Baroque (modern) style which was then so popular. William and Mary spent nearly the same amount on these magnificent gardens as they did on the house! They both loved gardening and their previous homes in the Dutch Republic (The Netherlands), especially Paleis Het Loo, also had wonderfully symmetrical parterres in this elegant style. Sadly, none of their Kensington gardens exist to this day!

In 1690, the interior of the house began to be decorated with glorious woodcarvings from Baroque carver Grinling Gibbons. Visitors to Kensington Palace’s State Apartments can see these for themselves, in the King’s Presence Chamber and in Queen Mary’s Gallery. Outside the Queen’s Entrance, the monogram (entwined initials) of William and Mary is clearly visible above the doorway.

Mary died from haemorrhagic smallpox in 1694, plunging her husband into a deep grief. John Evelyn, the diarist and courtier, visited the now-sole-monarch William in 1696 at Kensington House and said of it:

“I went to the King’s house at Kensington with some Ladys: The House is very noble, tho not greate; the Gallerys furnished with all the best Pictures of all the Houses, of Titian, Raphael, Correggio, Holbein, Julio Romano, Bassan, V. Dyke: Tintoret, & others, with a world of Porcelain; a pretty private Library; the Garden about it very delicious.”

King William III died in 1702, leaving the throne to his sister-in-law, Anne, who became the last of the Stuarts. The famous statue of William III that faces High Street Kensington is a 20^th-century addition – a gift from Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany in 1907. I hope that those who are able to visit Kensington Palace in the future will take a moment and think about this – about the time when Kensington Palace first became a royal residence.

All photos © Andrea Zuvich.

           

Sources:

·         Ashworth, Helen. York Place Kensington. The Heritage Network, via Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. Access date: 27/02/2015.

·         Beard, Geoffrey. The Works of Grinling Gibbons. John Murray Publishers Ltd, London, 1989.

·         Evelyn, John. Diary.

·         Faulkner, Patrick A. Nottingham House: John Thorpe and his Relation to Kensington Palace.  Archaeology Data Service. Access date: 27/02/2015.

·         Howard, Philip. The Royal Palaces. Hamish Hamilton, London, 1970.

·         Loftie, W.J. Kensington Palace. 1898.

·         Mary II, Queen. Letters & Memoirs, 1689.

·         Tinniswood, Adrian. His Invention So Fertile: A Life of Christopher Wren. Pimlico, London, 2002.

·         Williams, Neville. Royal Homes of Great Britain from Medieval to Modern Times. Lutterworth Press, London, 1971.

·        WORK 38/428. Sir George Coppin’s House, Kensington. National Archives, Kew, UK.


This is an Editor’s Choice from the #EHFA archives, originally published February 28, 2015.

~~~~~~~~~~

Andrea Zuvich is an independent seventeenth-century historian and anthropologist specialising in the House of Stuart (1603-1714). Zuvich obtained degrees in History and Anthropology at the University of Central Florida and is the host of the popular ‘The Seventeenth Century Lady’ blog. Zuvich is also a historical consultant for TV, film, and radio. She most recently appeared in BBC Four’s ‘Charles I: Downfall of a King’. She was one of the original developers of and leaders on the award-winning Garden History Tours at Kensington Palace and has written six books about the Stuart period. Zuvich is also a trained actress and professional voice-over artist, narrating audiobooks and providing voice work for several mobile apps.

Connect with Andrea on social media:

Twitter

Instagram

The 17th Century Lady Website

Mary II of England: A Queen of Gardens

by Margaret Porter

“Her rooms should be abundantly furnished each day with all kinds of flowers.” – Prince William of Orange (later King William III), to his gardener Charles du Boisson.

“In Gardn’ing, especially Exoticks, she was particularly skilled.”– Stephen Switzer.

Mary of Orange, with citrus tree & pet parrot

Princess Mary of York, eventually Princess Mary of Orange, and ultimately England’s Queen Mary II was an enthusiastic plantswoman and garden-maker. From her early years, when her education was supervised by the botanically-minded cleric Henry Compton, she was an avid gardener. During her years in Holland she and her husband created extensive gardens at their palaces. And when the Glorious Revolution placed the couple on her deposed father’s throne, they imported Dutch styles for gardens and architecture to England.

From 1689 to 1696, the monarchs’ expenditure on their royal gardens totaled £83,000, in modern currency approximately £7,275,000 or $11,471,000. Three-fourths of the sum was spent at Hampton Court alone.

Hampton Court Palace, Surrey

Hampton Court Palace and Gardens, late 17th century

Because King William, an asthmatic, could not live comfortably at damp and draughty Whitehall Palace, he and Mary immediately settled on Hampton Court as their country palace.

They commissioned extensive alterations from Sir Christopher Wren. They also designated William’s Dutch confidant and Mary’s fellow plant collector, Willem Bentinck, Earl of Portland, as Superintendent of the Royal Gardens.

One of the Cibber urns

In 1689 Daniel Marot, responsible for some of the couple’s garden designs in Holland, and nurseryman George London laid out the first parterre on the East Front, filled with grass or coloured gravel in imitation of Le Notre’s work at Versailles. The large semi-circle was edged with lime trees for shade. The wrought iron gates by Tjou and great stone urns carved by Caius Gabriel Cibber remain, as does the Queen’s Bower, created by training wych elms over an arched tunnel one hundred yards in length, twenty feet tall, and twelve feet wide. The landscape was further adorned with thirteen fountains and numerous sculptures. The Privy Garden received a new parterre design. Names of the adjacent series of walled gardens indicate what grew there: the auricula quarter, the orange quarter, the flower garden, and so on. Tropicals and “exoticks” resided in specially designed glass cases.

Large sums were spent and great efforts made to fill the new hothouses and flower beds. As an example, records reveal a payment to “Jas. Road, Gardiner, for going to Virginia to make collections of plants, £234 11s 9d.” Dr. Leonard Plukenet, the botanical curator, received £200 per year, as specialist in “tropical and foreign plants, cuttings, roots or seeds.” In January 1691, the gardens consisted of patterns “laid in grass plats and borders…narrow rows of dwarf box in figures like lace patterns. In one of the lesser gardens a large greenhouse divided into several rooms, and all of them with stoves under them.”

Summer display of citrus and exotics, as in Mary's lifetime

These hothouses also contained the tender items brought over from Holland. The death of Gaspar Fagel, one of William’s advisors, coincided with the Glorious Revolution. His family sold the contents of his garden collection to William and Mary, which were transferred to Hampton Court over a period of two years. By September 1692 the last of the “orange trees, lemon trees, and other … trees” arrived in England. In 1892 some of the oranges were removed to Windsor. The rest of the collection survived in situ until 1921.

From mid-May throughout the summer Mary's arrangement of citrus trees, oleanders, olives, yuccas, and agaves—grown in large wooden tubs or in blue-and-white ceramic vases—is recreated on the terrace beside the former orangery. In colder months these are replaced with bay, laurustinus, holly, Portugal laurel, and Spanish broom.

Agave growing in 17th century reproduction tub

No attempt has been made to recreate Mary’s aviaries. She collected exotic birds as well as exotic plants—she had a pet parrot—and alleys of her bird cages were an attractive and melodic feature of her gardens.

Hampton Court Gardens in springtime, showing Queen Mary's Bower.

Kensington House, Kensington

From their joint desire for a compact “country palace” like the ones they had known and loved in Holland, William and Mary purchased Lord Nottingham’s residence at the edge of Hyde Park. As at Hampton Court, they commissioned alterations undertaken by Sir Christopher Wren. Mary expanded the original gardens to twelve acres, with flower beds arranged in formal Dutch style. New paths were laid and filled with gravel. The cost of adding trees, plants and flowers was £700, and the total cost of garden improvements (exclusive of labour) was £12,495. The house—not yet designated a palace—had a kitchen garden and an adjacent orchard. A visitor in the winter of 1691 reported that the grounds were not “abounding with fine plants,” as the citrus trees spent the cold months in Mr. London’s Brompton greenhouses a mile away, “But the walks and grass are laid very fine.”

Kensington House gardens, as they were circa 1690-91, in a later print.

Here, in the waning days of 1694, Mary died of smallpox. Her sister Queen Anne later added the orangery, now a popular restaurant. In Queen Victoria’s reign Kensington Gardens was developed as the extensive public park we know today, with water features and walkways and monuments.

Whitehall Palace, London

Despite their preference for other locations, this palace served as the monarchs’ official residence. Its Privy Garden, devised by Cardinal Wolsey, had been improved by Henry VIII and subsequent Tudor monarchs. Partly destroyed during the Interregnum, it was repaired and enhanced by the Stuarts. A typical pleasure ground, it consisted of grass squares with paths between, and contained a sundial of which Charles II was very proud. His mistress Barbara, Lady Castlemaine (later Duchess of Cleveland) spread her freshly laundered underthings there to dry, as noticed and remarked upon by Samuel Pepys.

When living at Whitehall, Mary seldom had leisure time for garden improvements. She served as Regent during her husband’s long absences in summer and autumn, when he waged annual war against Louis XIV’s armies in Flanders. Her days were filled with burdensome official duties and council meetings.

The King was abroad in April 1691 when fire consumed a portion of the palace. Stones and building material were salvaged to carry out a plan of Mary’s, as reported by Luttrell the diarist: “There is orders given for building a fine terras walk under the lodgings at Whitehall, toward the waterside.” In 1693 he writes, “The Queen’s terras walk . . . facing the Thames is now finished, and curiously adorn’d with greens which cost some thousands of pounds.” No matter the state of the Treasury, there was always money for Mary’s plants! During the winter of 1698 a far worse conflagration consumed the entire palace, leaving behind only the Banqueting House as a remnant and reminder of its former glories.



Arrangements and Art

Queen Mary’s fondness for flowers was evident not only in her gardens, but also in the elegant rooms of her residences. She and her husband patronised the great Dutch and Flemish botanical and floral artists, whose lush and colourful still life paintings decorated her rooms and became part of the royal art collection. She was sometimes observed watching Jean-Baptiste Monnoyer paint floral decorations at Kensington. And Mary’s own portraits often contain urns overflowing with flowers, or an orange tree.

Still life by Jean-Baptiste Monnoyer

Delft pagoda vases and planter, Kensington Palace

Mary was an innovator in flower display as well, commissioning various containers from the ceramic factory in Delft—in traditional forms and others made to her specifications. Samples of these distinctive blue-and-white glazed vessels can be seen at Hampton Court and Kensington Palace. Huge ceramic tubs held shrubs. Pyramids and pagodas were used to show off individual blooms—not only tulips, but all varieties of flowers. Arrangements in bowls tended to be asymmetrical and free-flowing, as seen in the botanical paintings, with only the leaves of the flower stalks as greenery.

Many Stuart-era formal gardens were eradicated by Capability Brown and his followers in the late 18^th century—at Hampton Court and elsewhere. Garden historians have made great strides replicating the designs that Mary and her artisans created, to the delight of palace visitors in every season.

Delft planter at Hampton Court

All photos from the author's personal archives. Period prints and paintings via Wikimedia Commons and Google Images.

This is an Editor's Choice, originally published August 24, 2015.

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~

Margaret Porter is the award-winning and bestselling author of twelve period novels, nonfiction and poetry. Queen Mary's garden pursuits are featured in A Pledge of Better Times, her highly acclaimed novel of 17th century courtiers Lady Diana de Vere and Charles Beauclerk, 1st Duke of St. Albans (available in trade paperback and ebook). Margaret studied British history in the UK and the US. As historian, her areas of speciality are social, theatrical, and garden history of the 17th and 18th centuries, royal courts, and portraiture. A former actress, she gave up the stage and screen to devote herself to fiction writing, travel, and her rose gardens.

Author Website

Blog

Facebook Author Page

Twitter  
Amazon

Victoria's Early Years - Kensington Palace.

Recently I visited Kensington Palace to see the King's Grand Staircase, commissioned by George I in the early 1700's. Kensington Palace is still home to royalty (when in London, Prince William and his wife, Catherine, stay there) and since the 17th century has been entwined with royalty: from William III to Princess Diana, from George II to Princess Victoria - and it is the link to Victoria that struck me as particularly interesting.

 

Kensington Palace's connection to Victoria is obvious as you approach the building; an imposing statue of the young Queen stands outside the east façade. The composition of Victoria in her coronation robes was designed by her daughter, Princess Louise, and unveiled in 1893. The statue is a fitting reminder that three key events in Victoria's life took place at Kensington Palace.

Princess Victoria is born.
At Kensington Palace on 24 May 1819 a princess, Victoria, was born to the Duchess of Kent. The infant Victoria grew up at Kensington and had a somewhat lonely childhood. Her father died before she was a year old, and Victoria was kept isolated, away from the excitement of court life and without friends of her own age to keep her company.

Her mother, the Duchess of Kent, along with an equerry, Sir John Conroy, oversaw her education. They devised "The Kensington System" -which ostensibly was to equip Victoria for her future role as queen - whilst some people muttered it was also a means of keeping the young princess firmly under their control. 

Kensington Palace.

 Victoria's Accession to the Throne.

At 6am on 20 June 1837, Victoria was woken by her mother.  The news was so urgent that the 18 year old Victoria donned her dressing gown to receive the Archbishop of Canterbury and Lord Conyngham. It was their grave duty to announce that the King was dead, and Princess Victoria was now Queen.

"Lord Conyngham then acquainted me that my poor Uncle, the King, was no more ,and had expired at 12 minutes past 2 this morning, and consequently that I am Queen." 

That morning, the new queen held her first council meeting in the Red Saloon at Kensington Palace. This young woman was surrounded by much older men, including the Duke of Wellington and the Dukes of Sussex and Cumberland. The Prime Minister, Lord Melbourne had written a short speech for her and despite the circumstances it was noted that Victoria handled everything:

"With perfect calmness and self-possession."

Statue of William III, outside Kensington Palace.

 Meeting Albert, Prince of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.

There are few people, who haven't heard of Victoria's love for her husband, Albert. But did you know that the couple first met at Kensington Palace?
On 18 May 1836, Victoria caught sight of her cousin Albert, and his brother Ernest, as she loitered on the stairs at Kensington Palace. Albert made a good impression, as recorded in her diary:

"Albert, who is just as tall as Ernest but stouter, is extremely handsome; his hair is about the same as mine' his eyes large and blue, and he has a beautiful nose and a very sweet mouth with fine teeth."

 The visit went well and Victoria was delighted by the gift of a tame parrot. To encourage the romance, the Duchess of Kent threw a ball at Kensington at which Victoria and Albert danced until three in the morning. But time flew by all too quickly and when on Friday, 10 June, Albert departed Victoria wrote in her journal:

"I embraced both my dearest cousins most warmly, as also my dear Uncle. I cried bitterly, very bitterly…."

The rest of their courtship and marriage is, as they say, history!

Victoria was born, acceded to the throne and then found love at Kensington Palace - quite a legacy for a building still home to royals today!

Author- Grace Elliot ....and Widget.
 

Grace Elliot lives near London, where she works as a veterinarian. By night, Grace writes historical romance, much to the delight of her five cats - all vying for lap space. Her debut novel, ‘A Dead Man’s Debt’ was described as “historical romance at it's best”, by The Romance Reviews.

To find out more about Grace and her novels, please visit:

http://www.amazon.com/Grace-Elliot/e/B004DP2NSU/ref=sr_tc_2_rm?qid=1320779346&sr=1-2-ent

 

or Grace's blog: Fall In Love With History:

http://graceelliot-author.blogspot.com

or follow Grace on Twitter: @Grace_Elliot

Hope's Betrayal - click for link.