The Coronation of His Majesty George IV
The Prince Regent’s fondness for pageantry ensured that his coronation on 10th July, 1821 was the most lavish the country had ever seen. As many as twenty-seven tailors worked to fulfil the official orders, although the only one named as ‘robemaker’ was Ede and Ravenscoft’s own William Webb. It was the most outstanding event of his career and demanded all the skills and craftsmanship of his trade.
The firm’s records are fascinating. They reveal this prodigious tailor to have supplied robes to knights and officers of the orders of chivalry, mantles to forty-eight Knights Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath and 100 Knights Commander of the Bath. He even supplied mantles for the kings of arms, heralds and pursuivants, and many, many more coronation guests. The materials he used were of the highest order: hundreds of yards of crimson satin, white silk mantua, red sarsnet. With such a tremendous commission, it’s no surprise that he ranked third in the list of payments, receiving a total of £2,044 – a princely sum in those days.
With such splendour, pomp and pageantry, the coronation day, from the procession to the banquet, must have been simply breathtaking.
The coronations of His Majesty King William IV and then Her Majesty Queen Victoria both followed within twenty years of the coronation of George IV. As a result, many of the robes that had been painstakingly created for the 1821 coronation were used again at these two subsequent coronations. In both cases, Ede and Ravenscroft was again granted the royal warrant.
