#r1932

Princess Margaret aged 21 months at 145 Piccadilly in London, her first home, c. May 1932. Royal Archive © The Royal Household, 2022.

Princess Elizabeth arrives at the Royal Tournament at Olympia in London in 1932.

Princess Elizabeth and Princess Margaret Rose on a rocking horse in the nursery at St. Paul’s, Walden Bury, the country home of their maternal family, the Bowes Lyon’s, in August 1932. Their mother, then the Duchess of York, had played on the same rocking horse as a child. © The Royal Collection.

The Duchess of York with her daughters Princess Margaret Rose and Princess Elizabeth. Photographed by Marcus Adams on 15 July 1932. © The Royal Collection.

Photographed in the garden of their maternal grandparents, Lord and Lady Strathmore, by Frederick Thurston in 1932. © National Portrait Gallery.

Photographed in the garden of their maternal grandparents, Lord and Lady Strathmore, by Frederick Thurston in 1932. © National Portrait Gallery.

Built as a symbol of love and fascination, the cottage was presented to the princesses by the people of Wales on the occasion of Princess Elizabeth’s sixth birthday in 1932. At a time when Welsh communities had been left worse off by the Depression than the rest of Britain, Y Bwythyn Bach was built by Welsh labourers using Welsh materials left over from the Llandough Hospital. Still standing today, the rooms are five feet tall and completely furnished in miniature items, with a staircase to the first floor, and also running water and electricity. The princesses cleaned and tidied their own home and adults were only allowed inside by invitation.

Photographed by Marcus Adams in July 1932. © The Royal Collection.