Elizabeth II and the Opening of the Royal Collections

When a fire struck Windsor Castle in 1992, the Royal Collection’s furniture restorer was asked to select which treasures to save. Dozens of local truck drivers responding to a radio announcement showed up to remove the artworks and bring them to storage facilities. During the operation, the Queen surprised the restorer in her bedroom shouting to firefighters that the cabinet where she kept her most cherished mementos had no artistic value and was not worth saving. Mortified, he apologized profusely, but Her Majesty told him to carry on as though she were not there. The story, which he told to researchers at a Royal Collection Studies dinner, sums up the Queen’s immense respect for her staff and the freedom she gave them. The Crown, not Elizabeth as a private individual, owns the world’s largest private art collection, which includes 600 drawings by Leonardo da Vinci,…