The Princess of Wales made a visit to the new Young V&A museum yesterday where she marvelled at an airborne car, tried out an imagined undersea vehicle and was introduced to Frankenstein.
Kate who is a patron of V&A met with school kids from the local Globe Primary School on Wednesday at the newly reopened children's museum in Bethnal Green, east London to listen to their stories and admire their inventions.
A group of year three students proudly showed off their creations to the Princess in the build-it area of the Museum where they are urged to make anything they like from blocks and tubes, the Mirror reports.
The 41-year-old mother-of-three gave advice to one group on how to put together pieces to build their submarine creation and then tried it out herself by playfully pretending to put on a seatbelt and asking ‘Do I strap myself in?’
She said: "Does it sit on the bottom of the sea floor? Wow, that’s great."
Different groups were keen for the royal's attention and the Princess made sure to take a great interest in everyone's unique projects asking: ‘What is your invention?’, ‘What is that bit for?’ and ‘What do you want to be when you’re older?’
She was later taken to see a selection of expandable children's clothing made by Petit Pli that grow with the child as they age.
She jokingly remarked: "That would have been very useful."
The royal took the time to pause and admire a tiny white Microlino car suspended from the ceiling in the atrium before moving on to marvel over the best collection of historic dolls houses in the world.
Speaking with the Director of the V&A, Tristram Hunt, she said: ‘This is so inspiring, to have a place for children so young to get design inspiration.’
In the 'imagine' area of the museum, Kate met with another group of schoolchildren who were eager to tell her about the stories they had written based on objects in the museum.
Hands flew up when the Princess asked if anyone was interested in sharing theirs with one youngster retelling a story about how a butcher got 'whacked in the head', another one about a father accidentally spitting out food and a final tale about the Doctor Who Tardis.
Kate said: "He was laughing so much it went everywhere, oh no!"
She applauded at the end of each story and said to one child ‘the end, very good, I’d like to see that’, and then in exchange told the children her own stories about her three children.
She said: "They tell me stories all the time. George was brushing his teeth and suddenly his tooth fell out."
When the time came for the Princess to leave, two children ran up to give her a goodbye cuddle and she posed for a picture with the group.
Waving goodbye, she said: "I would like to come and do some more storytelling too, I’ll bring my kids next time. I’ve had a really fun time thank you, keep up the storytelling."
She was presented with gift bags for George, Charlotte and Louis with toys and notebooks inside.
After meeting the Princess of Wales, Lina, 7, said: "It was very nice meeting her, we were doing our stories, she was acting like a normal princess would.
"She said she had a good job and it was good meeting kids like us - but someone asked if she had her own castle and she said no, which is sad."
Zachary, 9, added: "She told us about her kids, she said George supports Aston Villa. I’ve never met royalty before."
Mr Hunt who took Kate around the Museum tour praised the Princess as he said: "Not only as a parent she’s interested in this space and as an art historian, but also this centre’s focus on early years development, that’s another area of interest for her.
"She was very good, listening to all the stories from the children, chapter after chapter, she was encouraging for their storytelling and wanted to know what objects they were drawing on for their stories.
"They wanted to hug her a lot. Because of the work on the early years and the leadership and conversations she is providing through the centre for early childhood and her message there is kind of “yes, cognitive development is really important in the early years, but so is socio-emotional resilience, so how do you build up self-control and those social skills in the early years?"
The museum which previously used to be the V&A Museum of Childhood is reopening to the public on July 1 after a three year renovation.
Local schoolchildren, parents and teachers all helped design the space as they contributed ideas for displays and even helped decide which art pieces would feature in the Museum.
It houses three new galleries called Imagine, Play and Design with each one being tailored for specific age groups from babies to teens.
Nearly 2,000 objects from the V&A's collections have been presented in new and playful ways with the pieces being specifically designed to inspire children's own creativity.
Marie Maxwell, executive head teacher at Bangabandhu and Globe Primary Schools said: "Our pupils had a wonderful time meeting The Princess of Wales today – they loved sharing their experiences on shaping the new museum and having the chance to shine a light on their local area too.
"It’s an experience they’ll never forget."
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