The royal seal of approval
How London’s top hotels are planning to celebrate The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee
TO mark The Goring’s part in the coronation celebrations 70 years ago, when the hotel hosted many of The Queen’s personal guests, the restaurant has prepared a new Platinum Jubilee menu that includes dishes inspired by that event and the special dinner held here on June 2, 1953 (www.thegoring. com). Choosing a favourite dish from the riches on offer is hard, but St Enodoc asparagus, ewe’s cheese, confit of egg yolk and barbecued white asparagus won out for me.
For a limited time only, guests staying in Hotel Café Royal’s two-bedroom Royal Suite will be offered the chance to visit the Tower of London and Crown Jewels on a private tour hosted by a Yeoman Warder. The lucky few will also be chauffeured there in a luxury Daimler once owned by The Queen Mother. The experience is available June 1–October 1, from £12,295 per night, and June 4–5 from £14,795 (www.hotelcaferoyal.com)
Brown’s Hotel has created the Jubilee Gintini, a gin, bitters and pink Champagne cocktail. It’s available at the Donovan Bar, June 1–August 1 (www.roccofortehotels.com/ hotels-and-resorts/brown-s-hotel)
If you check in for a two-night stay at ME London with your corgi in tow, you’ll receive a third absolutely free. The offer is available now until June 2, excluding Saturdays and Bank Holiday weekends (www. melondonhotel.com)
Claridge’s, often referred to as ‘the annexe of Buckingham Palace’, has been busy rummaging through its archives in preparation for a special exhibition ‘Claridge’s Royal Archive Windows’, available to view in the hotel lobby throughout the month of June. According to Claridge’s archivist Kate Hudson, treasures including ‘entries in Queen Victoria’s diaries, a fan created by the hotel to celebrate the coronation in 1911, photographs, original menus and letters’. The Fumoir and Claridge’s Bar will also welcome back the Windsor Rose cocktail, first served to mark The Queen’s coronation in 1953 (www.claridges.co.uk) Both The Connaught and The Rosewood are hosting street parties on June 5, in Mayfair and Holborn respectively. Tickets to The Connaught’s afternoon tea-style bash, complete with ice cream from the hotel’s pink patisserie cart and an English brass band, are available for guests and its neighbours. Tickets to The Rosewood’s Courtyard Party are available to all, from £275 per person.