Birch Hall comes with a swimming pool, tennis court and a second two-bedroom home on its 2ha. But the royal sisters did not move in, and it was unoccupied for two years.
It’s reported that their mother Fergie did not want to move in, citing the costs of maintaining the property. Two years after the Queen made the purchase, it was sold due to “a change of circumstances”.
The money made from the sale was then put into a trust for Beatrice and Eugenie.
Speaking to the Mail at the time, estate agent Andrew Russell said, “The owners bought it from the trustees acting for the Queen in 1999.
“The trustees bought it in 1997 for the princesses and I imagine it was chosen because it’s a pretty house in a popular village and the gardens are a real draw, it’s more like parkland. But they never moved in.”
In 2016, the home was listed for £4.2 million (NZ$8.9m).
Beatrice may not have moved in to the home gifted to her by the Queen, but when she married her husband in a small ceremony in 2020, she wore one of Elizabeth’s own dresses from the 1960s.
The gown designed by Norman Hartnell had been worn by the Queen several times, while Beatrice styled it with the Queen Mary diamond fringe tiara also borrowed from the monarch, who wore it on her own wedding day.
