Explore: Stuart royal homes

ABOVE The Queen’s House, Greenwich, started by Anne of Denmark, wife of James VI & I RIGHT Queen Henrietta Maria, who continued the work BELOW The original Tulip Stairs

This luxurious private retreat for the king and queen was crammed with works of ar t celebrating their love for each other 3 A royal love nest

The Queen’s House, Greenwich represents a dazzling celebration of a royal couple’s mutual affection

Charles I enjoys a reputation as a connoisseur of art and architecture, but the most important surviving building from his reign was constructed for his wife, Henrietta Maria. Indeed, both she and Anne of Denmark, wife of James VI & I, were much more important patrons of architecture than their husbands – a point demonstrated by the Queen’s House in Greenwich.

Possibly intended originally as a sort of grandstand for watching the end of a deer hunt, the south aspect of the Queen’s House faced the royal hunting park and contained a large balcony for spectators; the north side was in the royal gardens of Greenwich Palace. Bizarrely, running through the middle of the house was a main road over which the building had to vault.

Anne commissioned Inigo Jones to build the Queen’s House, which remained incomplete at the time of her early death in 1619. Henrietta Maria continued the work, turning it into a luxurious private retreat for her and the king, crammed with works of contemporary art celebrating their affection for each other – what a tabloid newspaper might call a “love nest”.

It was a pleasure pavilion described as the “House of Delight”. Now set in manicured lawns, it originally fronted a large formal garden; the upper garden front was painted with colourful grotesques, while the queen’s rooms had gilded iron balconies with views of the garden and, distantly, the City of London. Today, the interior, much remodelled over the centuries, gives little sense of what it was like in the 1630s but displays art from the collection of the National Maritime Museum.

Elizabeth Castle, Jersey, briefly home in exile to the future king Charles II during the Civil War

4 Charles’ island retreat

Elizabeth Castle provided a convenient bolt-hole for a prince on the run

In early 1646, when it became clear that the forces of the king had lost the Civil War between the royalists and parliamentarians, Charles I sent his son – the future Charles II – to the Isles of Scilly and then on to Jersey. There the prince set up court in St Helier at Elizabeth Castle – a spectacular location made more impressive still during the 14 hours a day when the rising tide transforms it into an island.

Just below the highest point is the governor’s house which was hurriedly turned into a royal residence in 1646. On the ground floor was a hall and a parlour used by the royal guards; above was the prince’s withdrawing rooms and bedroom, with fine views over the bay. In the lower ward stood the chapel, where the prince sat in his own tapestry-lined pew. More tapestry, plate and fine furniture transported aboard one of Charles’s ships lent a suitably majestic luxury to the residence. When he was not out hunting, hawking or enjoying yachting in the bay, Charles dined (on gold plate) in public in his parlour, watched by spectators, and held receptions for the island’s gentry.

The prince left Jersey in June 1646. When he returned three years later, after the execution of Charles I, he was proclaimed king. The governor’s house was truly a royal palace, and he held court with all the pomp he could muster. In February 1650, he left for the last time – and the Channel Islands fell to parliament. Though much altered from its brief glory, the governor’s house can still be visited; guided walks reveal the castle’s wider story.

VISIT For more information on visiting Elizabeth Castle, go to jerseyheritage.org

5 The house of necessity

To escape the “pomp and gravity” of court, James VI & I retreated to a modest palace in Royston

James VI & I did not want to live in a building of state; in fact, he disliked Whitehall and avoided staying in London whenever possible. His preference was for a more informal life in the countryside where he could indulge his two favourite hobbies: hunting and writing. In the words of a Venetian visitor to his court, James favoured being “in retirement in remote places of which he is very fond, free and enjoying himself, without pomp or gravity, which are contrary to his nature”.

For his rural retreat, the king settled on Royston, a market town in Hertfordshire that he had first visited as he travelled south from Scotland to be crowned in London. He initially set up house in a series of converted inns; then, in 1607, he built a modest but fashionable brick house with two large rooms. As well as providing a base for hunting and hawking, it was close enough to Cambridge to allow access to books and scholars to satisfy his intellectual curiosity.

James called this a “house of necessity” – in other words, one in which only people who were necessary could stay. It didn’t have the facilities needed for the 600 or more people who inhabited Whitehall when he was in residence there. Instead, Royston gave James as much privacy as a 17th-century monarch could hope for.

Many of the former royal buildings still stand, including most of the king’s own house (currently a private residence) – though James would be bemused to find that his former buttery is now a fish and chip shop.

The “palace” built in Royston as an informal retreat for James VI & I →