The majestic Bangalore Palace is located in Bengaluru in Karnataka, India. The area where the palace is standing originally belonged to a man who was the first Principal of the Bangalore’s Central High School, called Reverent Garrett.
The site where the palace was built in 1887 was purchased from the Reverend by King Chamarajenda Wadiyar. The construction of the building began in 1874 and was completed in 1878. After that, until 1887, many renovations, additions, and improvements were carried out.
The palace has arches, fortified towers, and battlements and it was built in the Tudor architectural style. The interior of the building is decorated with fine wood carvings and filled with relief paintings on the ceilings. The Edwardian and Victorian style furniture, adorning the 35 rooms, were bought from John Roberts and Lazarus. Most of the rooms in the buildings were built to be either bedrooms or swimming pools.
The stained glass and mirrors were extras, brought in from England, and the wooden fans and a manual lift were from General Electric. Today, on the ground floor, there is an open courtyard, with an accompanying ballroom for private parties. On the first floor is the Durbar Hall, where the king used to address the assembly, and this can be reached by climbing a richly decorated staircase. There are paintings from the 19th century on the walls of the palace, and some of them are Dutch and Greek. Another interesting feature in the palace is the dining table that belonged to Sir Mirza Ismail.
The possession of the property was transferred to two companies by HH Jayachamarajendra Wodeyar, in 1970. When the transaction was about to take place, it emerged that the deal was fraudulent, and so the only son of the Maharaja, namely Srikanta Datta Narsimharaja Wadiyar, instituted a civil suit against the companies.
Four years later, HH Jayachamarajendra Wodeyar died, and the legal battle continued. After Srikanta had won the suit, he began working on some renovations. The entire ballroom was redone, and the wooden parts of the palace were restored. Srikanta added new furniture and had the lamps replaced. More recently, one of the rooms was converted into a boutique which is an exhibition space for the garments of the royal family. After the ballroom was renewed, it was used for private parties and to sell photographs and silk scarves. For the garden, Mexican grass is used. Work on illuminating the place is in progress
Meanwhile, Srikanta gave 28 acres of the property to his five sisters. Currently, over the last few years, many exhibitions, marriage ceremonies, sports events and rock concerts have been held at the palace. Some of the most famous artists who have performed there are Elton John, Deep Purple, Metallica, The Rolling Stones, and the heavy metal band, Iron Maiden.
The band Metallica performed at the palace on October 30, 2011, and it was their first show in India. This was also the last concert in the area as the state government decided to stop giving permission for these kinds of events. However, all is not lost, as also inside the palace is an amusement park, known as ‘Fun World’, so alas, the enjoyment of this beautiful space can continue to be experienced in other interesting and peculiar ways.