Hampton Court Palace
Palace Website
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Hampton Court Palace
Great Gate, Hampton Court Palace.jpg
The Tudor Great Gatehouse
Hampton Court Palace is located in London Borough of Richmond upon ThamesHampton Court Palace
Location in London Borough of Richmond upon Thames
General information
LocationHampton Court, Greater London, England
Coordinates51°24′12″N 0°20′15″W
Current tenantsHistoric Royal Palaces
OwnerKing Charles III in right of the Crown[1]
Website
<a href="http://www.hrp.org.uk/hampton-court-palace/" rel="noreferrer nofollow">www.hrp.org.uk/hampton-court-palace/</a> Edit this at Wikidata
Listed Building – Grade I
Official nameHampton Court Palace
Designated2 September 1952; 70 years ago
Reference no.1193127
Hampton Court Palace is a Grade I listed[2] royal palace in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, 12 miles (19 kilometres) southwest and upstream of central London on the River Thames.

The building of the palace began in 1514 for Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, the chief minister of Henry VIII. In 1529, as Wolsey fell from favour, the cardinal gave the palace to the king to check his disgrace. The palace went on to become one of Henry's most favoured residences; soon after acquiring the property, he arranged for it to be enlarged so it could accommodate his sizeable retinue of courtiers. The palace is in the possession of King Charles III and the Crown.

In the early 1690s, King William III's massive rebuilding and expansion work, which was intended to rival the Palace of Versailles, destroyed much of the Tudor palace.[3] His work ceased in 1694, leaving the palace in two distinct contrasting architectural styles, domestic Tudor and Baroque. While the palace's styles are an accident of fate, a unity exists due to the use of pink bricks and a symmetrical, if vague, balancing of successive low wings.[4] King George II was the last monarch to reside in the palace.

The palace is open to the public and a major tourist attraction, reached by train from Waterloo station in central London and served by Hampton Court railway station in East Molesey. Buses 111, 216, 411 and R68 stop outside the gates. The structure and grounds are cared for by an independent charity, Historic Royal Palaces, which receives no funding from the Government or the Crown.[5] The palace displays many works of art from the Royal Collection.

Apart from the palace itself and its gardens, other points of interest for visitors include the celebrated maze, the historic royal tennis court (see below), and a huge grape vine, the world's largest as of 2005. The palace's Home Park is the site of the annual Hampton Court Palace Festival and Hampton Court Garden Festival.

History
Tudor times

Hampton Court Palace, with marked reference points referred to on this page. A: West Front &amp; Main Entrance; B: Base Court; C: Clock Tower; D: Clock Court, E: Fountain Court; F: East Front; G: South Front; H: Banqueting House; J: Great Hall; K: River Thames; L: Pond Gardens; M: East Gardens; O: Cardinal Wolsey's Rooms; P: Chapel.
Thomas Wolsey, Archbishop of York, chief minister to and a favourite of Henry VIII, took over the site of Hampton Court Palace in 1514.[6] It had previously been a property of the Order of St John of Jerusalem.[4] Over the following seven years, Wolsey spent lavishly (200,000 Crowns) to build the finest palace in England at Hampton Court.[7] Today, little of Wolsey's building work remains unchanged. The first courtyard, the Base Court,[8] (B on plan), was his creation, as was the second, inner gatehouse (C) which leads to the Clock Court (D) (Wolsey's seal remains visible over the entrance arch of the clock tower[9]) which contained his private rooms (O on plan).[6] The Base Court contained forty-four lodgings reserved for guests, while the second court (today, Clock Court) contained the very best rooms – the state apartments – reserved for the King and his family.[10] Henry VIII stayed in the state apartments as Wolsey's guest immediately after their completion in 1525.
