Remembering Queen Elizabeth II

The roadshow marks the centenary of Queen Elizabeth II’s birth with a special episode filmed at Windsor Castle, featuring personal items – including childhood clothes and the coronation gown – and cherished mementoes from the people she inspired.

At Windsor Castle Fiona, Bruce is given unique access to a selection of Queen Elizabeth’s clothes, now part of the Royal Collection Trust and set to go on display in a special exhibition in the King’s Gallery at Buckingham Palace.

The episode begins with a look back at Queen Elizabeth’s early years, with items relating to her childhood, including a dress worn by Princess Elizabeth to mark her first birthday and a first pair of ballet shoes.

At the Guildhall in London, Hilary Kay meets a group of girl guides and learns about the 1st Buckingham Palace Guides Unit, which counted Princess Elizabeth and her sister Princess Margaret among its members in the 1930s and 1940s.

Roadshow experts at the Guildhall also get a close-up look at treasured mementos with a royal link brought in by viewers, from a sketch of the queen by the artist Terence Cuneo that led to the commissioning of his coronation painting, to a 70-year-old souvenir tin of coronation biscuits.

Inside the majestic Waterloo Chamber at Windsor Castle, Fiona gets to see some quirky pantomime costumes from the royal dressing-up box, worn by Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret when they staged fundraising pantomimes at Windsor Castle during the war years.

We hear a first-hand account from a lady who worked as a seamstress for the legendary couturier Norman Hartnell and see her scrapbook of embroidery samples from the queen’s coronation gown. And inside the magnificent Garter Throne Room at Windsor Castle, Fiona gets to see the coronation gown up close in all its glory, accompanied by curator Caroline de Guitaut.

Highclere Castle in Hampshire might be the place where Downton Abbey is filmed, but it is also the seat of George Herbert, the 8th Earl of Carnarvon, who also happens to be Queen Elizabeth’s godson. He explains his father’s close connection with the late monarch and her lifetime love of horses.

Back in the Waterloo Chamber at Windsor Castle, Fiona gets a look at an eclectic mix of precious items presented to the queen during state visits and now part of the Royal Collection, from a silk scarf gifted by Nelson Mandela to a Maori war club and a beautiful sculpture created by Dame Barbara Hepworth.

Lisa Lloyd visits a family firm of rocking horse manufacturers who immortalised several of the queen’s favourite steeds in wood, while Alexandra Gill meets artist Eleanor Tomlinson, whose charming illustration of the queen holding hands with Paddington Bear gained huge popularity at the time of the platinum jubilee.