The royal family have become Britain's biggest soap opera |
IN A GALLERY tucked away around the back of Buckingham Palace, an exhibition elegantly titled ‘Queen Elizabeth II: Her Life in Style’ is currently doing a roaring trade.
Tickets are rarer than snaps of a laughing Enoch Burke, and all are sold out until next year – the original six-month April to October run has been extended out to 12 months. It has garnered glowing reviews, most particularly in the more patriotic publications of the English media.
The theme of the exhibition is quite simple; a curated collection of Queen Elizabeth’s wardrobe from lace-bedecked baby clothes to tweeds-and-headscarves to frocks and ballgowns, plus a couple of diamond bedecked tiaras which could take your eye out.
Last Sunday afternoon, the 1.30pm crowd formed an orderly queue – very orderly, given the preponderance of expectant grey-headed royalists who in all likelihood read The Daily Express as an actual newspaper rather than as an unintentionally hilarious Viz comic minus the jokes.
But there were plenty of tourists in the line too, sporting paper maps of London’s landmarks and the glazed expressions of the over-walked. Their numerous presence was also inevitable – after all, the former British monarch was a bona fide global figure, an A list instantly recognisable superstar who ruled Britannia and toured a world smelling permanently of fresh paint for an astonishing 70 years, from 1952 to 2022.
Or, in world leaders’ years, from Winston Churchill to (eye-roll) Liz Truss, and from President Truman to (facepalm) President Trump.
And once the queue made its orderly way through an airport-style security check, a genuinely fascinating exhibition awaited. The centrepiece is a circular room displaying an array of mostly vividly coloured formal gowns, each of which has a story to tell of how haute couture aligned with high politics.
A note under each dress details the intricate, meticulous work involved in each creation and it is not........