‘Watch out Ant & Dec!’: The Repair Shop viewers praise King Charles and Jay Blades as a ‘great unlikely double act’ as the monarch jokes about hosting a ‘barn dance’ with the presenter on BBC special

• King appeared on a special episode of The Repair Shop this evening
• The monarch, 73, entrusted the team with two antiques in August 2021 
• Charles waited patiently for six months as experts restored a piece of pottery made for Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee and a 18th century clock 
• The sovereign cracked jokes with host Jay Blades during filming

The Repair Shop fans praised King Charles and Jay Blades as an ‘unlikely double act’ after the monarch joked about hosting a ‘barn dance’ for The Repair Shop host on tonight’s special episode of the hit show.

During the hour-long episode, King Charles turned to the team of experts for help restoring a piece of pottery made for Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee and a 18th century clock.

Giving Jay Blades a tour around the Dumfries House estate in Scotland, the duo then went inside to inspect Charles’ chosen artefacts in closer detail.

While speaking to ceramics expert Kirsten Ramsay, horologist Steve Fletcher and furniture restorer Will Kirk, Charles admitted that the priceless piece of pottery toppled over when someone was opening a window.

‘They didn’t own up,’ the monarch – who was still Prince of Wales at the time of filming in August 2021 – joked.

Having taken a closer look at the two items, Jay Blades told the King that the team would have to take them back to their headquarters in Lee-on-the-Solent. 

King Charles joked that he could host Jay Blades for a ‘barn dance’ on tonight’s special episode of The Repair Shop

Impressed viewers of tonight’s The Repair Shop praised King Charles and presenter Jay Blades as a ‘great double act’

‘We’re going to take these items to take a better look at them, and maybe you might join us at the barn,’ Jay told the sovereign. 

‘I’ve got a barn, you’ve got a barn,’ the monarch joked. ‘We can have a barn dance.’

Blades cheekily said: ‘I’ll put the kettle on,’ to which the King replied: ‘oh, will you?’

One excited viewer wrote: ‘King Charles and Jay Blades is the double act we didn’t know that we need.’

‘I’m afraid it is something I learnt from my grandmother, she had great fun putting a few together and trying to get them to chime at the same time in the dining room, which made it very enjoyable because everybody had to stop talking,’ added Charles (pictured right)

‘I’m afraid it is something I learnt from my grandmother, she had great fun putting a few together and trying to get them to chime at the same time in the dining room, which made it very enjoyable because everybody had to stop talking,’ added Charles (pictured right

Another said: ‘Jay Blades and King Charles is the TV double act I didn’t know I needed,’ while a third added: ‘Jay and King Charles casually having a natter.’

‘Watch out Ant & Dec. What a great double act these two are,’ praised another viewer.

During the chat, Charles opened up about clocks being the ‘heartbeat of the home’, which is why he especially wanted to get his antique fixed.

He continued: ‘To me I just love the sound, the tick-tock but also if they chime, that’s why I love grandfather clocks.

‘I find it rather reassuring in a funny way and they become really special parts of the house… the beating heart of it. So that’s why they matter to me

‘I’m afraid it is something I learnt from my grandmother, she had great fun putting a few together and trying to get them to chime at the same time in the dining room, which made it very enjoyable because everybody had to stop talking.’

Elsewhere in the episode, Charles labelled the lack of vocational education in schools a ‘great tragedy’ and said ‘not everybody is designed for the academic’.

In the episode, Charles meets students from the Prince’s Foundation Building Craft Programme – a training initiative that teaches traditional skills such as blacksmithing, stonemasonry and wood carving.

The monarch said: ‘I still think the great tragedy is the lack of vocational education in schools, actually not everybody is designed for the academic.

Elsewhere, the monarch (pictured on the show) chatted about his love of clocks, saying: ‘To me I just love the sound, the tick-tock but also if they chime, that’s why I love grandfather clocks’

The Repair Shop: A Royal Visit saw King Charles pay a visit to Jay Blades’ Lee-on-the-Solent barn

‘I know from The Prince’s Trust, I have seen the difference we can make to people who have technical skills which we need all the time, I have the greatest admiration for people.

‘I think that’s been the biggest problem, sometimes that is forgotten. Apprenticeships are vital but they just abandoned apprenticeships for some reason. It gives people intense satisfaction and reward.’

Charles said the thing he ‘really loves’ is students returning as tutors year after year – ‘filling the school gaps’, he said.

Before the results are unveiled six months later, Charles asks the crew: ‘Have you sorted this? The suspense is killing me.’

The monarch also lends Prince’s Foundation graduate Jeremy Cash to The Repair Shop to work with metalwork expert Dominic Chinea on a third item described as a fire set in the shape of a soldier with a poignant story behind its existence.

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