Discover Royal heraldry, learn how to sow and grow the new King’s favourite flower, more cathedrals sign up to Ring for the King, Exeter’s Cathedral Choir will sing the same music as heard in the Coronation, and the Princess Royal will be at Gloucester Cathedral to mark The Big Help Out Day.
Just some of the ways our cathedrals will celebrate the Coronation and you can join in too. Please check individual websites for up-to-date details.
The Coronation service will begin at 11am at Westminster Abbey – the start of a weekend of events to mark this historic occasion.
Visitors to Coventry Cathedral will make seedling pots and sow the King’s favourite flowers, Delphiniums, to take home this Thursday, there is crown making activities for families on Saturday and on Sunday the cathedral will mark the Coronation and the launch of its 2023 lunchtime organ recital series with a Coronation-themed recital by the Acting Director of Music featuring music by Handel, Boyce, Purcell and finishing with William Walton’s ‘Crown Imperial’.
There’s a Service in Celebration of the Coronation later that same day.
St Edmundsbury Cathedral is celebrating the Coronation with two exhibitions reflecting the monarchy and guided and self-guided tours highlighting the building’s royal connections.
The Suffolk Heraldry Exhibition showcases the colourful world of royal heraldry from just before the Norman conquest to the present day with examples of the arms of the Kings and Queens and is brought by Suffolk Heraldry Society and will run until 16 May.
Alongside the Heraldry Exhibition, the Cathedral will host Bronze Statuary and Sculptures of Historical figures and Depictions of Natural History, by sculptor Barry Davies. which includes Saint David, Llwelyn the Great; and King Henry V on the coronation throne in Westminster Abbey.
St Edmundsbury Cathedral has also announced its bellringers will take part in the ‘Ring for the King’ initiative. On Saturday 6 May, they will be ringing from 6.00pm to 7.30pm to celebrate the Coronation. On Sunday, they will ring a Quarter Peal at 9.00 am before the 10.00 am service – a 50-minute piece of non-stop ringing. On Monday 8 May, there will be a full peal of 3 hours and 30 minutes non-stop bellringing from about 10am.
See all of Coronation news here.
Its Civic Service on Sunday will draw inspiration from the Coronation Service held in Westminster Abbey. King Charles III was the patron of the Millennium Project. which saw the building of St Edmundsbury Cathedral tower from 1999 to 2005, with the vaulted ceiling finished in 2010. He visited the cathedral multiple times during the build and described the tower as, “a spiritual beacon for the new Millennium.” In 2011, a commemorative plaque for the project was installed at the Cathedral and the service was attended by King Charles III, then HRH The Prince of Wales, and the Duchess of Cornwall, now Queen Camilla.
Exeter Cathedral too has a special link to the new King who is Patron of the Exeter Cathedral 2020’s Development Appeal and the cathedral was the Royal couple’s first stop on their first official Royal Visit following the end of Coronavirus lockdown restrictions in 2021. It was the most recent visit in a long association between the cathedral and Royal Family, dating back nearly a thousand years.
To mark this special relationship, Exeter Cathedral Choir will sing the same music that will be heard during Saturday’s Coronation service at Westminster Abbey at its Special Coronation Service of Celebration on Sunday featuring the county’s faith and charity leaders, and defence forces. The event will finish with drinks and a toast to the newly-crowned King.
Dean Jonathan said organisers were anticipating a full house for the celebration, which will be the first of its kind at the cathedral for 70 years.
He said:
“In September last year, all of us at Exeter Cathedral felt the palpable, collective sense of loss, as people from across Devon gathered here to remember our beloved late Queen. So, it is going to be very moving to see so many of those people return on Saturday, this time in joy and celebration of the Coronation of our new monarch, King Charles III.
Exeter Cathedral’s bellringers will also attempt a new ‘full-peal’ – the bell ringing equivalent of a marathon – expected to last for three and a half hours. Paul Pascoe, Secretary to the Cathedral Ringers explained:
“For the full-peal on Saturday we will attempt a new method that has been named the ‘King Charles III Delight Royal.’ This is a lighter, brighter ring of ten, that is only made possible by an extra bell, given to the cathedral during the Silver Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II.”
Her Royal Highness The Princess Royal and Vice Admiral Sir Timothy Laurence will attend a special service of thanksgiving at Gloucester Cathedral on Monday, as part of the Coronation celebrations
The service, which will take place in the Cathedral from 11am, is part of the ‘The Big Help Out Day’, a nationwide initiative that aims to raise awareness of volunteering throughout the UK. Alongside celebrating the Coronation of The King and The Queen Consort, the focus of the service will be to give thanks to volunteers in the city, county and diocese who do so much to help others.
As part of the service, the Bishop of Gloucester and the Bishop of Tewkesbury will interview several volunteers from local organisations and there will also be a performance by young people from Gloucester-based charity, The Music Works.
The Right Reverend Rachel Treweek, Bishop of Gloucester, said:
“It is a great honour and delight that The Princess Royal and Sir Timothy Laurence will be with us at the Cathedral on the day of the Big Help Out, as we celebrate the Coronation of The King and The Queen Consort and highlight the positive impact of volunteers across our local communities. It will be a chance to thank all those who volunteer, and hopefully inspire others to give volunteering a go.”
Members of the public are warmly invited to attend this special service of thanksgiving, which promises to be a fun, joyful and memorable occasion. People are asked to register their attendance in advance via the Cathedral website.
All our cathedrals are offering special events and worship over the Coronation weekend. Please check your local cathedral for up-to-date details.
