Viva Brighton Issue #80 October 2019

CURATOR’S CITY
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An 1820s view of the Music Room, showing the pagodas, uplighters and mantelpiece garniture that will return to the Pavilion.
Royal Pavilion & Museums, Brighton & Hove
YOU WERE ALWAYS ON MY MIND
A PRINCE’S TREASURE: FROM BUCKINGHAM PALACE TO THE ROYAL PAVILION
By the time this issue of Viva Brighton goes
to print six of the state rooms of the Royal
Pavilion and the King’s Library will be filled
with more than 120 spectacular objects, including
clocks, cabinets, candleholders, oriental
porcelain, Chinese nodding figures and 16-feet
tall porcelain pagodas, most of which were
originally made or purchased for the Pavilion
during George IV’s lifetime. They are coming
to us from Her Majesty the Queen’s Royal
Collection on a two-year loan basis, directly
from Buckingham Palace. They were removed
by Queen Victoria in 1847-48 following her
decision to cease using the Pavilion as a royal
residence. In the new east wing, or ‘Blore
Wing’ (after the architect Edward Blore) of
Buckingham Palace, Victoria and Albert reused
and reinterpreted the exotic interiors of the
Royal Pavilion, creating several rooms in the
Chinoiserie style they had admired in Brighton
(despite not liking the place in general). It
could be argued that many of the Pavilion’s
interiors only survive because they liked the
style so much.
Many original objects were returned over the
years by Victoria and other monarchs, such as
the spectacular chandeliers in the Banqueting
Room and the paintings on the Music Room
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