Anmer Hall

Anmer Hall is a Georgian country house in the village of Anmer in Norfolk, England. It is about 12 miles (19 km) north east of Kings Lynn, about 2 miles (3.2 km) east of the Queen's residence at Sandringham and about 2 miles (3.2 km) west of Houghton Hall. Anmer Hall was a wedding gift to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge from the Queen.

The current house was built in the 18th century and has formed part of the Sandringham estate since 1898. The house was registered as a Grade II* listed building in 1984 but was later de-listed.

History

The current late-Georgian house dates from the 18th century, although it may be built around an earlier core. It has two storeys and attic with dormer windows. The long south front comprises 13 bays, and was refaced with red bricks c. 1815. It has 13 ground-floor windows set in blank arches and a semicircular porch on two Tuscan columns, with 11 windows on the first floor. The three central bays are topped by a pediment. The north front is of rubble carstone and includes four c. 17th century ogee-headed sashes on the first floor. Renovations c. 1900 added a brick dressed skin to the north front, together with a projecting entrance porch and a tower towards the eastern end, in the corner formed with a carstone service wing also added c. 1900.

Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge

Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge (Catherine Elizabeth "Kate"; née Middleton; born 9 January 1982), is the wife of Prince William, Duke of Cambridge. Following his father Charles, Prince of Wales, William is second in line to succeed his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II, as monarch of the United Kingdom and 15 other Commonwealth realms.

Middleton grew up in Chapel Row, a village near Newbury, Berkshire, England. She studied art history in Scotland at the University of St Andrews, where she met William in 2001. Their engagement was announced on 16 November 2010, and she attended several royal events before they married on 29 April 2011 at Westminster Abbey. The Duke and Duchess have two children: Prince George and Princess Charlotte of Cambridge, who are respectively third and fourth in line to the British throne.

She has had a major impact upon British and American fashion, which has been termed the "Kate Middleton effect", and in 2012 and 2013, she was selected as one of the "100 Most Influential People in the World" by Time magazine.

Prince William, Duke of Cambridge

Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, KG, KT, ADC(P) (William Arthur Philip Louis; born 21 June 1982) is the elder son of Charles, Prince of Wales, and Diana, Princess of Wales. He is second in line to succeed his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II, after his father.

William was educated at four schools in the United Kingdom and obtained a degree from the University of St Andrews. He spent parts of a gap year in Chile, Belize, and Africa. In December 2006, he completed 44 weeks of training as an officer cadet, being commissioned in the Blues and Royals Regiment. In April 2008, he qualified as a pilot (earning his wings) by completing pilot training at Royal Air Force College Cranwell. He then underwent helicopter flying training in order to become a full-time pilot with the RAF Search and Rescue Force in early 2009. His more than seven-and-a-half years of full-time service with the British Armed Forces ended in September 2013.

William married Catherine Middleton, on 29 April 2011 at Westminster Abbey. Hours prior to the event, he was created Duke of Cambridge, Earl of Strathearn, and Baron Carrickfergus. Their first child, Prince George of Cambridge, was born on 22 July 2013, and their second, Princess Charlotte of Cambridge, was born on 2 May 2015.

Anmer, Norfolk

Coordinates: 52°50′06″N 0°35′03″E / 52.834863°N 0.584093°E / 52.834863; 0.584093

Anmer is a small village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk, situated about 12 miles (19 km) north by north-east of the town of King's Lynn, and 35 miles (55 km) north-west of the city of Norwich.

The place-name 'Anmer' is first attested in the Domesday Book of 1086, where it appears as Anemere. This name derives from the Old English 'aened-mere', meaning 'duck mere or lake'.Anmer Hall, the former residence of the Duke and Duchess of Kent, is located in the village: it is linked to the nearby Sandringham estate by a long straight road known as ‘The Avenue’. In 2014 Anmer Hall was renovated as the new country home of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

'Anmer' was the name of the horse belonging to King George V which occasioned the death of the suffragette Emily Davison at the 1913 Epsom Derby, after she stepped in front of it during the race.

The civil parish has an area of 5.86 km² and in the 2001 census had a population of 63 in 29 households. For the purposes of local government, the parish falls within the district of King's Lynn and West Norfolk.

Hall

In architecture, a hall is a relatively large space enclosed by a roof and walls. In the Iron Age, a mead hall was such a simple building and was the residence of a lord and his retainers. Later, rooms were partitioned from it, and the space next to the front door became the entrance hall. Today, the (entrance) hall of a house is the space next to the front door or vestibule leading to the rooms directly and/or indirectly. Where the hall inside the front door of a house is elongated, it may be called a passage, corridor (from Spanish corredor used in El Escorial and 100 years later in Castle Howard) or hallway.

Other meanings

The term hall is often used to designate a British or Irish country house such as a hall house, or specifically a Wealden hall house, and manor houses.

In later medieval Europe, the main room of a castle or manor house was the great hall. In a medieval building, the hall was where the fire was kept. With time, its functions as dormitory, kitchen, parlour and so on were divided off to separate rooms or, in the case of the kitchen, a separate building.