Buckingham Palace

==Interior==
[[File:Plan of Buckingham palace.gif|thumb|upright=1.2|''[[Piano nobile]]'' of Buckingham Palace. The areas defined by shaded walls represent lower minor wings. {{paragraph break}}'''Note''': this is an unscaled sketch plan for reference only. Proportions of some rooms may slightly differ in reality.]]
The front of the palace measures {{convert|108|m|order=flip|round=5}} across, by {{convert|120|m|order=flip}} deep, by {{convert|24|m|order=flip|-1}} high and contains over {{convert|77000|m2|abbr=out|order=flip}} of floorspace.<ref>{{Cite web |date=12 November 2015 |title=Royal Residences: Buckingham Palace |url=https://www.royal.uk/royal-residences-buckingham-palace |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160509132429/https://www.royal.uk/royal-residences-buckingham-palace |archive-date=9 May 2016 |access-date=28 July 2019 |publisher=British Monarchy website}}</ref> There are 775 rooms, including 188 staff bedrooms, 92 offices, 78 bathrooms, 52 principal bedrooms and 19 [[state room]]s. It also has a [[post office]], cinema, swimming pool, doctor's surgery,<ref name="fact">{{Cite web |title=40 facts about Buckingham Palace |url=http://www.royal.gov.uk/LatestNewsandDiary/Factfiles/40factsaboutBuckinghamPalace.aspx |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111104182150/http://www.royal.gov.uk/latestnewsanddiary/factfiles/40factsaboutbuckinghampalace.aspx |archive-date=4 November 2011 |publisher=British Monarchy website}}</ref> and jeweller's workshop.<ref>{{Cite news |date=6 January 2016 |title=Queen honours jeweller with top personal award |work=Times of Tunbridge Wells |url=https://www.timesoftunbridgewells.co.uk/queen-honours-jeweller-with-top-personal-award |url-status=dead |access-date=2 June 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160701021803/https://www.timesoftunbridgewells.co.uk/queen-honours-jeweller-with-top-personal-award |archive-date=1 July 2016}}</ref> The royal family occupy a small suite of private rooms in the north wing.<ref name="Packard1982">{{Cite book |last=Packard, Jerrold M. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dfk_5uIFtqIC |title=The Queen and Her Court: A Guide to the British Monarchy Today |publisher=[[Simon & Schuster]] |date=1982 |isbn=978-0-6841-7648-2 |page=48}}</ref>

=== Principal rooms ===
The principal rooms are contained on the first-floor ''[[piano nobile]]'' behind the west-facing garden façade at the rear of the palace. The centre of this ornate suite of state rooms is the Music Room, its large bow the dominant feature of the façade. Flanking the Music Room are the Blue and the White Drawing Rooms. At the centre of the suite, serving as a corridor to link the state rooms, is the Picture Gallery, which is top-lit and {{convert|55|yd}} long.<ref name="Harris, p.41">Harris, p. 41.</ref> The Gallery is hung with numerous works including some by [[Rembrandt]], [[van Dyck]], [[Rubens]] and [[Vermeer]];<ref>Harris, pp. 78–79 and Healey, pp. 387–388.</ref> other rooms leading from the Picture Gallery are the [[Throne Room]] and the Green Drawing Room. The Green Drawing Room serves as a huge anteroom to the Throne Room, and is part of the ceremonial route to the throne from the Guard Room at the top of the Grand Staircase.<ref name="Harris, p.41"/> The Guard Room contains white marble statues of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, in Roman costume, set in a [[Tribune (architecture)|tribune]] lined with tapestries. These very formal rooms are used only for ceremonial and official entertaining but are open to the public every summer.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Visit the State Rooms, Buckingham Palace |url=https://www.royalcollection.org.uk/visit/the-state-rooms-buckingham-palace |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160306164557/https://www.royalcollection.org.uk/visit/the-state-rooms-buckingham-palace |archive-date=6 March 2016 |access-date=7 February 2016 |publisher=Royal Collection Trust}}</ref>

=== Semi-state apartments ===
[[File:Obama and Duke Duchess of Cambridge.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|[[Prince William]] and his wife [[Catherine, Princess of Wales|Catherine]] greeting [[Barack]] and [[Michelle Obama]] in the 1844 room]]
Directly underneath the state apartments are the less grand semi-state apartments. Opening from the Marble Hall, these rooms are used for less formal entertaining, such as luncheon parties and private [[Head of state|audiences]]. At the centre of this floor is the Bow Room, through which thousands of guests pass annually to the monarch's [[garden parties]].<ref>Harris, p. 40.</ref> When paying a state visit to Britain, foreign [[heads of state]] are usually entertained by the monarch at Buckingham Palace. They are allocated an extensive suite of rooms known as the Belgian Suite, situated at the foot of the Minister's Staircase, on the ground floor of the west-facing Garden Wing. Some of the rooms are named and decorated for particular visitors, such as the 1844 Room, decorated in that year for the state visit of [[Nicholas I of Russia]], and the 1855 Room, in honour of the visit of [[Napoleon III]] of France.<ref>Harris, p. 81.</ref> The former is a sitting room that also serves as an audience room and is often used for personal investitures. Narrow corridors link the rooms of the suite; one of them is given extra height and perspective by [[saucer dome]]s designed by Nash in the style of Soane.<ref name="harrisp82">Harris, p. 82.</ref> A second corridor in the suite has Gothic-influenced [[Vault (architecture)|cross-over vaulting]].<ref name="harrisp82"/> The suite was named after [[Leopold I of Belgium]], uncle of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. In 1936, the suite briefly became the private apartments of the palace when [[Edward VIII]] occupied them.<ref name="fact"/> The original early-19th-century interior designs, many of which still survive, included widespread use of brightly coloured [[scagliola]] and blue and pink [[Lapis lazuli|lapis]], on the advice of Charles Long. [[Edward VII]] oversaw a partial redecoration in a [[Belle Époque]] cream and gold colour scheme.<ref name="Jones43">Jones, p. 43.</ref>

=== East wing ===
[[File:Royal Family Platinum Jubilee Balcony Appearance 2022.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|Queen Elizabeth&nbsp;II's final appearance on the balcony during her [[Platinum Jubilee of Elizabeth II|Platinum Jubilee]] celebrations in 2022]]
Between 1847 and 1850, when Blore was building the new east wing, the [[Brighton Pavilion]] was once again plundered of its fittings. As a result, many of the rooms in the new wing have a distinctly oriental atmosphere. The red and blue Chinese Luncheon Room is made up of parts of the Brighton Banqueting and Music Rooms with a large oriental chimneypiece designed by [[Robert Jones (designer)|Robert Jones]] and sculpted by [[Richard Westmacott]].<ref name="Harris, de Bellaigue & Miller, p. 87.">Harris, de Bellaigue & Miller, p. 87.</ref> It was formerly in the Music Room at the Brighton Pavilion.<ref name="Harris, de Bellaigue & Miller, p. 87."/> The ornate clock, known as the [[Qilin|Kylin Clock]], was made in Jingdezhen, Jiangxi Province, China, in the second half of the 18th century; it has a later [[Movement (clockwork)|movement]] by [[Benjamin Vulliamy]] circa 1820.<ref>Harris, de Bellaigue & Miller, p. 135.</ref> The [[Yellow Drawing Room]] has wallpaper supplied in 1817 for the Brighton Saloon, and a chimneypiece which is a European vision of how the Chinese chimney piece may appear. It has nodding [[Mandarin (bureaucrat)|mandarins]] in [[Niche (architecture)|niches]] and fearsome winged [[Chinese dragon|dragons]], designed by Robert Jones.<ref>Healey, pp. 159–160.</ref>

At the centre of this wing is the famous balcony with the Centre Room behind its glass doors. This is a [[Chinoiserie|Chinese-style]] saloon enhanced by Queen Mary, who, working with the designer [[Charles Allom]], created a more "binding"<ref>Harris, de Bellaigue & Miller, p. 93.</ref> Chinese theme in the late 1920s, although the [[lacquer]] doors were brought from Brighton in 1873. Running the length of the ''piano nobile'' of the east wing is the Great Gallery, modestly known as the Principal Corridor, which runs the length of the eastern side of the quadrangle.<ref>Harris, de Bellaigue & Miller, p. 91.</ref> It has mirrored doors and mirrored cross walls reflecting [[porcelain]] pagodas and other oriental furniture from Brighton. The Chinese Luncheon Room and Yellow Drawing Room are situated at each end of this gallery, with the Centre Room in between.<ref name="HarrisBellaigue1968">{{Cite book |last1=John Harris |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pscQAQAAMAAJ |title=Buckingham Palace and its Treasures |last2=Geoffrey De Bellaigue |last3=Oliver Millar |publisher=Viking Press |date=1968 |page=90}}</ref>