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A political history of Britain in the places where it happened: parliament and palace, courts and counting houses, and the streets where people pushed back.
The Tudor palace that lost the monarch and kept the constitution.
Monarchy
Also in Royal London.
Henry VIII built it in the 1530s on the site of a leper hospital, and the red-brick gatehouse is one of the plainest Tudor survivals in central London. After Whitehall Palace burned it became the chief royal residence; George III preferred Buckingham House and the family left, but the paperwork never did. Foreign ambassadors are still accredited to the Court of St James's, and the accession of a new monarch is still proclaimed from its balcony. It explains the streets around it, too: the clubs, embassies and ceremonial routes of Pall Mall are there because the court was. The monarchy is not only a family in a palace - it is a court and a household, and this is where that older machinery is kept.
Not open, except guided tours on selected dates; Chapel Royal services on Sunday mornings, October to July
Charles III was proclaimed from the balcony over Friary Court on 10 September 2022, the ceremony the crowd could stand in the yard for.
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Data is compiled from public sources including OpenStreetMap, under the ODbL. Hours change often, so check before making a journey.