Tourists came especially to the Christmas market – and discovered that it does not exist

Hundreds of tourists have arrived at Buckingham Palace in London in recent days hoping to experience a new royal Christmas market, which has allegedly been set up outside the palace gates. The pictures they saw on social media showed fancy wooden stands, twinkling lights, snowy holiday decorations and a magical winter wonderland, but when they got there they discovered a completely different reality: the market never existed. All the images that showed the festive event were the creation of artificial intelligence, which created a convincing illusion that led tourists to believe that it was a real market.

The posts that spread on TikTok, Instagram and other platforms received thousands of shares and appeared in many languages, including Thai, Portuguese, Arabic and Armenian. Some have promised that this is the “first ever Christmas market outside the palace”, which many see as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. But when the visitors met the familiar iron gates of the palace, they found only the usual security area and the regular throng of visitors, with no sign of the market, festive lighting or stalls that appeared in the fake photos.

Brigida, a 25-year-old Polish tourist living in London, says she went to visit the market on a winter morning after seeing the photos on social media. Wrapped in a white fur coat, she admitted she was very disappointed when it turned out it was all an illusion. “I thought I would get to see it for the first time in history,” she says. “We got there because we thought it was real. We were really sad to find out there was nothing like that.” Other visitors also experienced similar confusion, including Emma Paxton, a chemical engineer from Boston, who says that at first she was completely convinced by the photos: “It looked quite real,” she says, “but a few days before I flew I already realized it was a fake.” Lucas, a Frenchman living in London, only discovered at the palace gates that the images were based on AI and admitted that this made him frustrated.

The phenomenon began in September, after the Royal Collection Trust (RCT), the body responsible for public visits to the palace, published a modest announcement about the opening of a small holiday shop within the museum grounds. This innocent message became raw material for creators on the web, who created using artificial intelligence tools a magnificent Christmas market full of details, including holiday lights that seem to be suspended in the air, areas closed to the public that have seemingly been opened, and a host of elements that do not exist in reality. It wasn’t until the posts went viral that tour guides and bloggers began to take notice and question what they were seeing. The blog Love and London pointed out a noticeable lack of logic in the images, including the complete absence of the security barriers that are always present in the place, as well as a variety of graphic details that suggest computer creation.

As the confusion grew, the RCT was forced to post a clarification on its official website, announcing that the holiday shop “is not a Christmas market” and that “there will be no such market at Buckingham Palace”. The palace staff itself also indicated that it was aware of the wave of rumors, but chose not to elaborate in response. At the same time, tourism officials in London stressed that the event was never officially announced and called on the public to turn to reliable sources of information only, especially at a time when the spread of misleading information could affect the planning of entire vacations.