Hampton Court: Behind Closed Doors

It's autumn at Hampton Court and as the palace opens up to visitors, Chief Curator Tracy Borman receives an extraordinary call from Paul Fitzsimmons. Paul is a specialist in Tudor antiques, and he's bought a lot at auction on a hunch. Although he paid just £75 for it, he suspects it actually could be a rare object that might have belonged to Henry VIII's second wife, Anne Boleyn.

Head gardener Graham Dillamore and his team are hard at work in the grounds, preparing 120,000 bulbs for what should be the biggest tulip festival in Britain. The festival is also a reminder of Hampton Court's greatest plant collector, Queen Mary II, who brought thousands of different varieties to the palace in the 1600s, including rare tulip breeds - some of which Graham will be attempting to grow.

The staff prepare the biggest Remembrance Day memorial the palace has ever seen, with 125 steel silhouettes of soldiers being installed in the grounds. A young shire horse is put through his paces, and conservators work to protect a collection of tapestries that date back to the time of Henry VIII from moths. Richard Fitch, an expert on historic food recipes, is in the palace kitchens trying out some of the recipes from Tudor times, including one of Henry VIII's favourite dishes - eggs in moonshine.