No.1 Royal Crescent in Bath is celebrating Christmas this year in true extravagant Georgian style! From the dining room table groaning under the weight of teetering sugar sculptures and decadent puddings, to the highly-scented dried oranges hanging in the Servants Hall, visitors are in for a real festive treat.
No.1 Royal Crescent will be sumptuously decorated with traditional foliage such as bay, yew and herbs, and gilded fruits and foodstuffs. The museum will replace its usual ‘Georgians at Home’ immersive audio-visual tour with a special ’12 Tales of a Georgian Christmas’ tour, which invites visitors to experience Christmas as it would have been celebrated over 200 hundred years ago.
A Christmas mouse trail will run alongside the tour for the enjoyment of families, and, once they’ve finished, children can have a go at making their own masquerade masks too!
Since February, of this year the museum has offered children free entry when accompanied by a paying adult, offering excellent value for families.
“No-one over-indulged like wealthy Georgians did, and Christmas-time particularly highlights this – one only has to look at our dining room table with its array of various festive confectionary to understand how extravagantly Georgians would have celebrated,” says Patrizia Ribul, Director of Museums at Bath Preservation Trust (BPT).
“Visitors to the museum today can enjoy a special immersive Christmas story-telling playing in each room of the festively-decorated house, along with a children’s mouse hunt and creative activities. Meeting Father Christmas is a Bath Christmas highlight in our festively-dressed museum.
“My favourite element of the Christmas décor is the unexpected Christmassy aromas – particularly in the Kitchen and the Servants’ Hall.”
The festive decorations will extend outside the Georgian house to the beautiful locally-sourced Christmas tree, which has been generously sponsored for a second year running by fellow local business Hawker Joinery. Hawker Joinery began in 1919, and its team are specialists in producing high-end joinery for Bath, Bristol and Wiltshire.
The museum’s gift shop will be stocked with all things Christmas and, for one day only, the team will be taking its enchanting shop offering onto the streets of Bath with a stall at the ever-popular Bath Christmas Market. Make sure you pop along to the chalet on Milsom Street on 1 December for lots of fabulous gift ideas and a large dose of Christmas spirit!
The gift shop, recently nominated for a Museums + Heritage Award, offers a superb choice of quality Christmas gifts from brands including Fable, Moorcroft and Clavis & Claustra, with plenty of options to suit all ages and interests.
For tickets and more information about Christmas at No.1 Royal Crescent, visit www.no1royalcrescent.org.uk and follow @No1museum on Twitter, @no1royalcrescent on Instagram and @No1RoyalCrescent on Facebook.
General Admission – 12 Tales of a Georgian Christmas (18 November – 31 December)
Marvellous Mouse Trail – free with Museum entry (18 November– 31 December)
Meet Father Christmas – (2 December– 24 December)
Christmas family fun: Make a masquerade mask – (16 December– 31 December)