Here Comes A New Public Art Gallery At Buckingham Palace, Multi Million $

[Patdwfsyte]

A major new art gallery, open to the public, is to be developed at Buckingham
Palace. It is understood that the multi-million-pound redevelopment of the
Queen's Gallery will be partly financed with proceeds from the public opening
of Buckingham Palace said PA news. Originally, the State Rooms at the Palace
were opened to the paying public to finance the restoration of fire damage at
Windsor Castle. Now restoration work at Windsor is complete, income from the
Palace summer opening and from visitors to the Castle can be diverted to the
multi-purpose art gallery project. Redevelopment of the Queen's Gallery, funded
by the Royal Collection Trust, will more than double the existing exhibitions
space. Work, under the direction of architects John Simpson and Partners, is
expected to start at the beginning of 2000 and be completed in time for the
Queen's Golden Jubilee in 2002. Royal Collection exhibitions will continue at
the gallery until late 1999. The Queen's Gallery occupies the site of a
conservatory built at the Palace in 1831 but converted to a chapel for Queen
Victoria in 1841. The chapel was destroyed in an air raid in 1940 and, at the
suggestion of the Duke of Edinburgh, was later converted into an exhibition
space, opening as the Queen's Gallery in 1962 to exhibit works of art from the
Royal Collection. More than four million people have visited the gallery.The
State Rooms at Buckingham Palace will this year open to the public from August
6 until October 4.