Trooping the Colour is a ceremonial event performed every year on Horse Guards Parade in London, United Kingdom, by regiments of Household Division, to celebrate the official birthday of the British sovereign. It is also known as the Sovereign's Birthday Parade. Similar events are held in other countries of the Commonwealth. In the UK, it is, with the State Opening of Parliament, the biggest event of the ceremonial calendar, and watched by millions on TV and on the streets of London.
Trooping the Colour, Horseguards Parade, Central London, June 2013
Trooping the Colour in 1956
Queen Elizabeth II with the Duke of Edinburgh at Trooping the Colour, June 2012
King Charles III (left), in the uniform of the Welsh Guards, is followed by William, Prince of Wales, Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh and Anne, Princess Royal in 2023.
Horse Guards Parade is a large parade ground off Whitehall in central London. It is the site of the annual ceremonies of Trooping the Colour, which commemorates the monarch's official birthday, and the Beating Retreat.
Trooping the Colour at Horse Guards Parade in 1956
The Coldstream Guards on Parade at Horse Guards, by John Chapman, c. 1755
Horse Guards Parade with the London Eye Ferris wheel in the background
Panorama of Horse Guards Parade, from the northwest corner. North: Admiralty Citadel, Admiralty Extension building; east: Admiralty House (with a scaffold at its cornice level), Household Cavalry Museum, Horse Guards, Dover House; South: Cabinet Office, garden wall and trees of 10 Downing Street, Mountbatten Green and small part of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office; west: St James's Park (at foreground, centre) the Guards Memorial.
