BRITAIN’S Queen Elizabeth has awarded a royal warrant to the family-owned London hotel which captured the attention of nearly two billion people around the world when Kate Middleton stepped from its doors on her way to marry Prince William.
The Goring Hotel where the now Duchess of Cambridge spent her last night as a single woman has been awarded a “Royal Warrant of appointment to HM The Queen for Hospitality Services”, the hotel said in a statement this week.
Jeremy Goring, whose family built the Belgravia hotel more than 100 years ago, said he believed it was the first royal warrant ever given to a hotel by Queen Elizabeth.
“To be able to display Her Majesty’s coat of arms is something that the staff will be enormously proud of,” Goring said. “It is made all the more special for us because I believe this is the first Royal Warrant The Queen has ever granted to an hotel.”
Royal warrants are a mark of recognition that tradesmen are regular suppliers of goods and services to the royal households, according the official website of the British monarchy.
Strict regulations govern the warrant, which allows the grantee or company to use the legend “By Appointment” and display the royal coat of arms on products such as stationery, advertisements and other printed material, in his or her premises and on delivery vehicles.
The Goring family continues to run the hotel 103 years after it was built by Jeremy’s great grandfather in 1910 and prides itself on offering the “very highest levels of hospitality to be found anywhere in the world”.
The 69-bedroom hotel located in Belgravia close to luxury shopping in the British capital and Buckingham Palace has been playing host to royal guests since it first opened its doors.
The coronations of George VI and the current queen saw the hotel filled with foreign royalty.
An estimated audience of two billion people tuned in to watch Middleton as she stepped from the hotel to a waiting car to head for her glittering wedding at Westminster Abbey on April 29, 2011.
A stay at the Goring can cost from £290 ($470) per night for a single “queen-bedded” room to £8,400 ($13,461) per night for the two-bedroom royal suite.
