Acclaimed Cornish theatre company WildWorks has been commissioned to reinterpret the sumptuous state rooms at Royal Kensington Palace with a series of extravagant installations, Simon Parker attended the preview

FOR many Cornish children growing up in the 1960s, one of the highlights of the year was a visit to Redruth's magical grotto.

Situated on the first floor of the town's West End Stores, excited youngsters entered through a nondescript door leading from the street. It felt like being smuggled into an illicit other-world. Once inside, expectant eyes lit up as their senses were bombarded with an array of wonders: whirring machines, twinkling lights, jumbles of objects in display cases, discordant music and people dressed in outlandish costumes.

For some children the experience was an absolute delight, while others were left baffled, disconcerted and even a little bit scared. But one thing was certain: few ever forgot the experience.

Being ushered into Kensington Palace through a tatty corridor and up a similarly nondescript back staircase was somehow reminiscent of those West End Stores days. Again there was a feeling of expectation mixed with trepidation and mischief. But this was no department store, it was a royal palace, the home of kings, queens and princesses for three hundred years. And, what's more, disreputable people were sneaking inside. Children had already been scrawling on the walls. It was a revolutionary's dream. But who was holding the bomb?

Well, the people put in charge of the said "bomb" are WildWorks. The question was: would they detonate it?

WildWorks, a Cornish theatre company whose past projects include Souterrain at Dolcoath, near Camborne, and The Beautiful Journey at Devonport Dockyard in Plymouth, had been invited to tell a story within the walls of this regal edifice – and it was left up to them to choose what story that would be.

The commission came about because a £12 million refurbishment meant much of the valuable furniture needed to be removed from the palace's state rooms. Historic Royal Palaces, the organisation which runs Kensington, had to decide whether to close to the public for two years while the work was under way or to try something different.

The result is The Enchanted Palace, a collaboration between WildWorks and several of the country's top fashion designers, including Vivienne Westwood, Stephen Jones, Boudicca and Echo Morgan. The premise for WildWorks' presentation is that the refurbishment has disturbed the fabric of the building, releasing the memories and stories of former inhabitants.

Focusing mainly on the lives of seven princesses who were closely connected to Kensington Palace – Mary, Caroline, Charlotte, Victoria, Anne, Margaret and Diana – the team of artists, makers and actors led by Bill Mitchell and Sue Hill have built an experience that is part theatre, part storytelling, part gallery installation.

With ingenuity, craftsmanship and a lots of laughs, the WildWorks team has created a complex world of royal history through exhibits, interactive theatre, storytelling, soundscapes and projection, revealing tales of love and hate, surprise and sadness, secrets and jealousy.

Those familiar with the WildWorks' style will recognise the tried and tested device of filling boxes with assorted artefacts – some precious, some everyday, some kitsch – and of multiple assemblages of objects intended to create a mood, a moment, an era. For those new to the company's work, however, the sight of it in such opulent surroundings will be something of a revelation. A proportion of the work is self-explanatory, while other areas are intriguingly obtuse, a dense poem brought to life. Ultimately, much of what is on show in The Enchanted Palace is left up to the individual visitor to decide upon. Nothing is quite spelled out, providing only hints, germs, moments, which are capable of sparking something deep and significant in one person and perhaps nothing whatsoever in another.

Climbing from the entrance stairway, WildWorks actors and palace staff are on hand to guide and interpret as much or as little as required. And there's plenty to choose from, whether it is the "dress of tears" or the whispered voices of long-dead servants, a milliner's homage to a smirking Sir Isaac Newton or the People's Throne, thousands of toy soldiers preparing to be slaughtered by rubber balls or the flight of a rebellious princess, a projection of dancing lovers or a wild fox garlanded in hedgerow blooms.

One section in particular stands out as truly deserving the description of being "enchanted". The Room Of The Dancing Princesses is bathed in blue light, its size artificially increased by the addition of floor-to-ceiling mirrors on two opposing walls.

Into this chamber, where resident monarchs held their Privy Councils, have been placed glass cases housing exquisite gowns worn by Margaret and Diana. At the feet of one are hundreds of white feathers, at the other a scattering of leaves.

What makes the room extraordinary, however, is the "planting" of a forest of Cornish birch trees, each about 15 feet in height and rooted to the floor. Visitors on preview day responded in various ways to The Room Of The Dancing Princesses. One said it symbolised the "obscenity of opulence" while another thought it "a celebration of beauty". Or perhaps the trees are actually a clever allegory of nature and ordinary people wrestling the palace from a former ruler, the frocks lying where they were abandoned by a dictator fleeing a post-revolutionary palace. Or perhaps not.

The man with the answers is Bill Mitchell, who headed the team that dreamt up The Enchanted Palace theme.

"I keep having to pinch myself to believe we're really working in here," he said. "But one of things we are trying to achieve is to reinforce the view that ordinary people really should be in here. I'm not a royalist and one of my first impressions of the place was that all the beauty, the carvings, the paintings, were not made by kings and queens, but by 'the people'. So this is about the people retaking possession. I want visitors to walk into rooms, to sit down at tables, to knock over toy soldiers, to open drawers, to walk in a wood, to have a holiday in here, to gradually feel a part of the palace, at home here, and to feel a little of the lives that went on here."

One person in no doubt about the success of WildWorks' involvement is Clair Corbey, who has welcomed visitors to the palace for nine years. A fan of the Victorian period, she said: "I'm loving it. I'm at work and I'm having fun. What I love most is that now the story of the palace is about the people who lived here rather than about the fabric of the building, the furniture and the paintings."

Rhiannon Goddard, project manager for Historic Royal Palaces, agreed, saying: "We wanted to do something really spectacular during the time of the building works.

"Several companies were invited to look at the project but WildWorks' response was by far the best. We wanted something interactive that visitors could really get involved in and we were interested in something theatrical. We loved the idea that the building work had disturbed memories and shaken loose the stories of the palace."

More than three-quarters of the visitors to Kensington Palace are overseas tourists and of the remaining quarter only a very few are Londoners. Rhiannon says she hopes the contribution of WildWorks and the fashion designers will bring in a different clientele.

"Everything about the show is grounded in history but we want it to be a visual feast and an interactive experience rather than a series of history lessons," she added. "It is now less about furniture and more about people. For the first time we have brought some of their stories to life, which perhaps we haven't done in the past."

An enterprise of this sort and on this scale inevitably sparks a number of questions. What would the royals of the past think if they could see what had been done to this place of exclusivity and untold wealth? What, for that matter, will today's Royal Family think, should they choose to visit? Are WildWorks, by their very presence, condoning such privilege, and by taking the king's shilling effectively getting into bed with the Establishment? Or does their presence in fact mean that we – the people – now own the place?

Perhaps the only way to find out is by sneaking up the back stairs and taking the palace by storm.

The Enchanted Palace is at Kensington Palace in London (nearest Tube: Queensway) until June 2012. For information on opening hours and ticket prices, visit www.hrp.org.uk/kensingtonpalace or www.wildworks.biz