Why Kensington is a Royal Borough

Kensington has a long association with Royalty, since newly crowned William III and Mary II bought a small suburban villa, then known as Nottingham House in 1689 to be their country retreat. Now called Kensington Palace, it was transformed and added onto over the years by Stuart and Georgian monarchs and extended by Sir Christopher Wren into the Palace it is now.

Queen Caroline shaped the palace and gardens and Queen Victoria was born there in 1819 and spent her childhood in Kensington Palace until her accession in 1837.

In 1901 royal status was conferred on Kensington, one of only four Royal Boroughs.

It is said that Queen Victoria and her mother shared a bedroom in The Palace until she reached the age of 18. On hearing the news of her accession to the throne, one of the future Queen’s first acts was to command her very own bedroom.

Visitors to the Palace can still see a history of Victorian times in Kensington Palace and learn about the “Kensington System”. This was the way to raise a monarch in waiting as practised by Queen Victoria’s mother, The Duchess of Kent.

In 1965, The Royal Borough of Kensington was merged with the metropolitan borough of Chelsea after it was decided to reduce London from 86 urban authorities to 32 Boroughs

The photograph above shows one of very few of the original signs depicting Kensington as it was before the 1960s merger.

Do you know of any others?