Tea at Trianon: The Kitchen at the Brighton Pavilion

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Tuesday, April 7, 2015

The Kitchen at the Brighton Pavilion

From The Greasy Spoon:

The Pavilion was The Prince Regent's (later King George IV) saucy sea-side retreat; originally a relatively humble farmhouse, which the architect, John Nash, re-built as an extravagent "Hindoo" architectural fantasy between 1815 and 1822.

The Banqueting Room there is an extraordinarily grand dining room in the fashionable Chinoiserie taste, and unusually for time, the kitchen was built alongside so that dishes could be served without getting cold.

It's a tall room, taking its ight from skylights in the roof, and supported by four cast-iron and painted copper palm trees. The kitchen was designed to be innovative and modern for its day; gadgets included the latest steam heating technology and a a constant supply of water pumped from a nearby well into the Royal Pavilion’s own water tower. (Read more.)