Crowns! Scepters! Orbs! See the Amazing Royal Treasures Newly on Display at Westminster Abbey

Talk about from drab to fab: An area previously used as a storage space on top ofWestminster Abbeywill open as a gallery to the public for the first time ever on June 11.

While the Abbey had a smaller museum in the 11th-century undercroft off the cloisters until 2015, the new gallery offers space for four times as many objects for a total of 300. The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Galleries have been set up to unveil the story of Westminster Abbey in four parts: Building Westminster Abbey, Worship and Daily Life, Westminster Abbey and the Monarchy and The Abbey and National Memory.

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Some items on display will includePrince WilliamandKate Middleton’smarriagelicense (the Abbey has hosted 17royal weddings), Queen Mary II’s coronation chair used for William III and Mary’s joint coronation in 1689 and the Westminster Retable, the oldest surviving altarpiece in England.

Visitors will be able to take in the West Window, the Cosmati pavement and the entire Gothic nave from the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Galleries, a vista 20th century poet Sir John Betjeman called the “best view in Europe.”

The 65th anniversary of the Queen’s coronation is June 2. She is the longest-reigning monarch in history.

source: people.com