A great deal of research has taken place into how the palace might have been furnished and decorated. In some cases we were able to use surviving records which told us about that there were a great many tapestries and also that James V had bought himself some four poster beds – a new fashion that was very popular among the rich and powerful in Europe.

    

Our experts have also taken inspiration from Scottish royal and noble residences of the time, using everything from stone carvings to wall and ceiling paintings as the basis for decorations in the palace. Furniture and fabrics, such as rugs and bed coverings, were a real challenge. Our researchers tackled this problem by studying everything from paintings, showing rooms inside great houses and castles, and inventories of people’s belongings, as well carefully examining surviving items in museum collections in the UK and overseas.

Top-quality craftsmen are now being commissioned to use authentic materials and techniques to refurnish and redecorate the palace. A team of weavers are also recreating a series of late medieval tapestries, telling the tale of the Hunt of the Unicorn, which will grace the walls of one of the Queen’s Inner Hall. While we can never know exactly what it would have looked like, we hope that a member of Scotland’s Renaissance royal family would feel very much at home.