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State visits in the U.K. Have more often been hosted at Buckingham Palace, the iconic royal landmark in central London.

But with the palace undergoing extensive renovations, state visits have been relocated to Windsor, west of London.

Today’s welcome for Trump at Windsor Castle includes a guard of honour with the state colours of the Grenadier Guards, Coldstream Guards and Scots Guards. It’s the first time, the palace noted, that such an occasion has featured three state colours — usually only one would be on parade.

Central to any state visit is all the pomp and pageantry on display.

“It’s very much what the U.K. Is known for internationally, and for any world leader to be seen amongst all that is always likely to play well back at home,” Prescott told me.

It’s also one of the reasons a state visit to the U.K. Is highly prized by world leaders, he said, noting that one of Trump’s predecessors, Barack Obama, once said: “State dinners at Buckingham Palace are a little different to state dinners anywhere else.”

This applies to Windsor Castle as well, Prescott said.

“For this state visit, this is the biggest ceremonial that the U.K. Can offer — minus the [public] carriage procession due to security concerns.”

While so much attention has been focused on Trump, this is also a significant moment for his host, King Charles

“This is likely to be the highest-profile state visit he will ever hold,” Craig Prescott told me.

Charles will be as keen as the British government that nothing go wrong over the next two days, the constitutional expert suggested,

“It’s also an opportunity for him to prove that he’s able to play his role in supporting British foreign policy, just like his mother did.”

The Royal Family has numerous carriages in its stable of horse-drawn transport — both open and closed.

Trump and Charles are riding in the Irish State Coach, a closed carriage made in Ireland that was exhibited in 1853 at the Great Industrial Exhibition in Dublin.

According to the Royal Collection Trust, the coach maker was hoping to get the attention of two distinguished visitors: Queen Victoria and her husband, Prince Albert. When they saw it, they bought it – and it eventually became one of Victoria’s favourite carriages.

More recently, Queen Elizabeth rode in this carriage back and forth for the state openings of the British Parliament.

Good morning, my name is Catriona Koenig and I’m an associate producer with the London, U.K. Bureau. I’m in Windsor today, outside of King Henry VIII Gateway, the principal entrance to Windsor Castle.

It’s relatively quiet in this area, with most of the crowd being made up of a large police presence, the media and Windsor Royal Ambassadors.

This could be partly because U.S. President Donald Trump won’t be doing a carriage procession through the town — just inside of Windsor estate — so the public won’t be able to see him.


Ann Jones is from the area. She’s retired and comes here every week to get coffee with her friends. She told us that she’s not a fan of Trump.

“When President Macron was here a few weeks ago and the French flags were up just like here now, he went through the town. This time, [Trump] can’t come through the town. And that says a lot, doesn’t it? How the people must be feeling,” she said.

There's plenty of ground for disagreement between U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer and U.S. President Donald Trump, whether it's the U.K.'s plan to recognize Palestinian statehood, its firm opposition to Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine or the impact of U.S. Tariffs on British exports.

Those issues have the potential to make the pair's joint news conference, scheduled for Thursday, fraught.

Yet through multiple meetings since Trump's inauguration — including at the G7 summit in Alberta in June, at a Trump golf course in Scotland in July and again at the White House in August — relations between Starmer and the president have appeared generally cordial.

Starmer has used what John Rentoul, chief political commentator for the U.K. Newspaper The Independent, calls a "flatter Trump" strategy but says it remains to be seen whether it will win Trump over on Ukraine.

"Trump is mercurial," Rentoul told The World Today, a publication of Chatham House, the London-based foreign policy think-tank. "Starmer needs to keep up the pressure and to exploit Trump's love of British pageantry to the full."

Much has been made of the potential pitfalls involved with the timing of Trump's visit.

For one, Britons staged massive protests, including one featuring a now infamous blimp of Trump as a baby, last time the U.S. President was in office and received the state-visit treatment.

According to the BBC, a YouGov poll in July found only 16 per cent of Britons surveyed said they have a positive view of Trump.

After the president and his wife, Melania Trump, arrived Tuesday, protestors projected images of Trump and Jeffrey Epstein onto Windsor Castle, where the couple is staying during their visit. More protests are planned later today.

Starmer has faced mounting pressure to apologize to victims of Epstein for appointing Peter Mandelson as U.K. Ambassador to the U.S.

Mandelson has since been dismissed from the posting after his relationship with the financier became public, including the fact he sent messages of support after Epstein was convicted of sex offences.

Similarly, Trump's own links to Epstein have been under scrutiny, and Starmer could be asked why he would fire Mandelson but organize a state visit for Trump.

Starmer is expected to formally recognize Palestinian statehood at the United Nations General Assembly next week — something the Trump administration is against.

State visits are a regular part of the royal calendar, but this one has some significant differences from others.

“One big difference is how ‘closed’ this is,” Craig Prescott, a constitutional expert and lecturer in law at Royal Holloway, University of London, told me via email just now.

“There’s no carriage procession or any moment for President Trump to meet ordinary people.”

That’s not like the recent visit by French President Emmanuel Macron, which included a carriage procession around the streets of Windsor. Trump’s visit later this morning has a procession, but it is within the grounds of Windsor Castle.

Prescott says the closed nature of the visit shows the security concerns surrounding it — and how carefully managed it is.

“The U.S. Is the U.K.’s closest ally and maintaining positive relations with the U.S. Has always been the U.K.’s No. 1 foreign policy objective. With President Trump, this is more complex than usual, and the promise of the state visit has been one key element in maintaining [that].”

Good morning. My name is Janet Davison, and I look after our biweekly newsletter that explores royal issues and analysis, The Royal Fascinator.

Ahead of the state visit, I was talking with some of my regular sources about its significance and what to watch for as U.S. President Donald Trump is hosted at Windsor Castle, the oldest and largest occupied castle in the world.

Justin Vovk, a royal historian and member of the advisory board of the Institute for the Study of the Crown in Canada, pointed out to me that Trump’s visit is at the request of the U.K. Government.

That means it’s the Crown’s responsibility to put the best foot forward and rise above partisan politics or personal opinions.

“This will be a moment in which some people will sing the monarchy's praises for its ability to remain neutral and diplomatic. There will be others who will criticize it for not using it as an opportunity to push back against Trump, to publicly call him out,” Vovk told me.

“But that's not what the monarchy does.”

My colleague Mike Crawley, based in Washington, D.C., wrote yesterday that the visit's biggest moments of substance will come during the banquet this evening during speeches by Trump and Charles.

The King's speech will come first, along with a toast to the guest, then Trump's speech.

Watch for how Trump's banquet speech compares and contrasts with the King's.

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