London’s Millennium Dome was briefly mooted to become a tribute to Princess Diana, it has been revealed.
Classified documents released from during Tony Blair’s term as Prime Minister in the late 1990s uncover proposals to turn the UK landmark into a memorial to the Princess of Wales, who died in a car crash on 31 August 1997.
A letter sent to Blair from his director of communications Alastair Campbell two days later includes a suggestion from Sam Chisolm, who sat on the Dome’s board, that the “Millennium project be completely refashioned, the site extended, to accommodate, for example, a hospital, businesses, charities, private residences, and the whole thing named 'the Princess Diana Centre’.”
Further correspondence from September that year, released by the National Archives in Kew, reveal how Chisholm visualised an “eighth wonder of the world” attraction incorporating a range of facilities, housing and technology that would become a “lasting and appropriate tribute by the people to Diana”.
When ministers warned that the proposal would “not go down particularly well with the royal family”, Chisholm claimed to consider this “as a pretty big plus”, the documents suggest.
It was also suggested that Princess Diana’s death could offer the government a credible reason to scrap plans to create the Dome, which was beset by concerns that it would not be completed in time, would fail to attract the necessary number of visitors to recoup costs, and that the building would overheat.
A letter from aide James Purnell to the Prime Minister in October 1997 said: “Clearly, there would be a significant political downside to cancelling the project.
“But if the risk of failure is too great or public attitudes harden before it's able to prove its success so that the political cost becomes intolerable, it would be better to take that pain now than far greater pain in the year 2000, much closer to an election.
“Moreover, Diana's death could give us a semi-plausible excuse to cancel.”
The Duke of Cambridge and Duke of Sussex unveiled a statue in tribute to their late mother, Princess Diana, at Kensington Palace on 1 July.
The new memorial, which is located in the Sunken Garden at the London palace, was revealed in a private ceremony on Thursday 1 July.
The date marks what would have been the 60th birthday of the Princess of Wales, who died at the age of 36 in August 1997 in Paris.
The brothers commissioned the statue in 2017 to mark 20 years since Diana’s death.
In a joint statement the brothers said: “Today, on what would have been our mother’s 60th birthday, we remember her love, strength and character - qualities that made her a force for good around the world, changing countless lives for the better.
“Every day, we wish she were still with us, and our hope is that this statue will be seen forever as a symbol of her life and her legacy.”
