Drinking Tea at Buckingham Palace

There are several ways you may go about getting your tea at Buckingham Palace. Apart from the obvious ways as a family member or a ruling head of state, there are the invitations for the garden parties of the Queen. The newest way to get your tea at the Palace, though, is the Café just opened for the new tourist season. 

If you are not related to the Queen, the easiest way of squiggling out an invitation for tea is closed to you, at least until your next incarnation. Depending on your revolutionary inclinations, the same holds true for nationals of countries ruled by a monarchy; if you are not in line for the throne, you’ll have to find another way to get a cup of tea.

Again depending on your nationality, you might get yourself voted into the office of head of state; alternatively you might cheat your way through a Florida election scam, bribe or bamboozle your way into office, or use outright force. If that seems too much trouble for a cup of tea, you might opt for an easier way, too.

British nationals always have the possibility of being invited to one of the Queen’s garden parties. But these invitations depend on merit as much as on luck; you just have to be on the right list at the right time to get there, while getting an invitation the way my mother did might be virtually impossible these days.

But with this tourist season, the opening of the Café in the Palace gives just about anybody the chance to get their tea at a historical venue. Admittedly, it is a matter of price, and I am not talking of the prices in the Café, but the staggering entry fee to the Palace. But hey, the throw away comment ‘when we had tea at Buckingham Palace’ must be worth a few bob, wouldn’t you agree? And the entry fee is still less than at Disneyland.

To be fair, the curators put on a good show for the money. The shows they put up every year are dazzling, and this year’s exhibition is no exception. Called The Queen’s Year, it shows examples of jewellery, dresses and hats worn by the Queen as well as historical paraphernalia shown off during public ceremony. Also on show are gifts received by the Queen, they include the Underground Station sign for Buckingham Palace received from London Transport last year.

The entry price of £30.50 for The Royal Mews and the Palace is well worth the money for all the history and art on view. The ticket will be converted into a complementary one-year-pass for the trouble of kindly asking for it. And if you prefer your money going to the Queen instead of the government, you’ll just declare your payment a donation when buying the ticket; the Queen will not have to pay taxes on those tickets.

For opening hours and ticketing information, you’ll best access The Royal Collection.

Further reading
Bruce Castle or Lordship House  
St Botolph and a Head in a Glass Casket
Royal Correspondence in The Curiosity Cabinet