A proposal to create a memorial park for Queen Elizabeth II in central London was unveiled today after nearly a decade in the pipeline.
The plan – first shared with Royal Household in 2015 as an idea to mark the Queen’s 90th birthday – is to convert a strip of Buckingham Palace Gardens into a memorial park: a place of peace, beauty and tranquillity.
The gardens would run alongside Grosvenor Place, the busy road that runs from Hyde Park Corner towards Victoria. The current perimeter wall would be retained with an arch – or a number of arches – knocked through and a high security fence constructed along the new perimeter of Buckingham Palace Gardens.
“We had hoped this part of the Palace Gardens would be bequeathed to the nation by the Queen herself, but now – to mark her passing – the proposai is now to create a new Royal Park as a living legacy to our longest-serving Monarch,” said Stefan Simanowitz, founder of the (entirely independent) Buckingham Palace Park Project.
“As this period of official national mourning comes to an end, our thoughts turn to how we will mark Her Majesty’s memory, we are hopeful that this project might act as both a fitting tribute to the Queen and as well a welcome new green space in a congested corner of London.”
Stefan Simanowitz originally sent outlines of the proposal to the Royal Household in 2015 and received a response on 24 February 2016 from the assistant private secretary to the then Prince Charles. He wrote that the reasons for writing were very much appreciated, and that The Prince was interested to learn of the idea. He also wrote that Prince Charles had asked him to pass on his very best wishes.
No further action was taken, but after the passing of the Queen’s 90th birthday in 2016, the proposal was shifted to one marking her Platinum Jubilee in 2022 and has now been adapted to the current proposal for a memorial gardens.
Given his ecological and environmental credentials and his commitment to sustainable approaches to planning, the team behind the Buckingham Palace Park Project are hopeful that the new King will champion the proposal.
“Our vision is to have a place which will reflect Her Majesty’s love of nature and try and capture it in a beautiful walled garden, carved from just a sliver of the 42-acre Buckingham Palace Gardens. It will be an act of care towards London and its unique, fragile yet resilient ecosystem,” said Antonio Pisano, an architect who specialises in climate change resilient design and who first started working on the project in 2015.
“Our draft designs imagine a rich and diverse landscape which would include urban re-wilding, meadows and woodland with rich biodiversity echoing nature from all parts of the British Isles.”
Informal focus groups and surveys undertaken in the locality have shown the proposal to be popular with local residents and businesses as well as commuters and cyclists, one of whom described that stretch of busy road as “a dangerous, dirty and dead zone”.
The proposal is already attracting some high-profile support with Zack Polanksi the deputy leader of the Green Party and London Assembly member, describing it as “a beautiful idea.”
