Welsand's in London

Visiting the Prince of Wales home

Today we took a tour of the Clarence House which is the official London residence of the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall. It was designed by John Nash for William IV in 1827. It is very much a working house. While it is beautiful and significant in size, a bit larger than my 750 square foot flat, it is not extravagant or gaudy. The thing that we liked most about it was that you were able to get up close and personal with the items in the rooms (of course you can't touch them, but if you wanted to you were in within the vicinity to do so). Prince Charles has the picture of his wedding to Camilla (the one that was in all the papers) framed on a table, and cheeky snapshots of the boys when they were little. There are some interesting art pieces and antiques that date back hundreds of years. A more recent addition to the house was a harp which was unbelievable gorgeous, my favorite piece! The tour was a mere 45 minutes, but it was personal instead of headsets like at Buckingham, but there was much less to see. The crowds are definitely smaller to get into the Clarence House as well, but it was worth the visit. Like Buckingham, the Clarence House is only open once a year for a few weeks.

After our visit to the Clarence House we were able to catch the changing of the guard ceremony at the Horse Guards Parade. It was quite uneventful, but the horses and uniforms the guards wear are gorgeous! We walked down "The Mall" to Leicester Square for a quick lunch as a family then onto the tube for Jer to get back to work and Sophie and I to head home for naps...what a Monday.

posted by Chris @ 3:32 PM