The exhibition begins with Victoria Eugenie’s childhood as the granddaughter of Queen Victoria, born at Balmoral in 1887 and raised within the structured world of the English court. Known as “Ena” to her family, she grew up between Windsor, Balmoral, Buckingham Palace and Osborne House, until the deaths of her father in 1896 and Queen Victoria in 1901 brought her and her mother, Princess Beatrice, to Kensington Palace. Her debut at court in 1905 marked the beginning of the young princess’s life in London society.
A second section explores her arrival in Spain and the marriage to Alfonso XIII in 1906, a ceremony remembered as much for its splendour as for the tragic bombing on Calle Mayor. The exhibition presents the contrast between the magnificence of the wedding procession and the chaos unleashed by the anarchist Mateo Morral’s attack, which left dozens dead but spared the king and his queen.
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