Internet surfers get a glimpse of life at 10 Downing Street

Internet surfers can get a glimpse of life behind Britain's most famous front door after the launch today of a virtual tour of 10 Downing Street.

The tour, which can be accessed on Prime Minister Tony Blair's website www.pm.gov.uk, features everything from the Cabinet table to the Grand Staircase with its portraits of every PM and the entrance hall with its famous porter's chair.

Mr Blair said he was pleased to be able to share the fascination of his official residence with viewers online.

"This is an excellent way of showing the tremendous history of this building," he said.

"I feel very lucky to live and work here and if we can share just a fraction of the fascination of this extraordinary place, then the tour will enthral a great many people online."

The tour was developed by Aral Balkan, founder and director of Ariaware and a renowned expert on "rich" internet applications and Flash multimedia.

He said: "I thought it was too interesting a project to pass up. Working on it has been very exciting and a great privilege.

"Downing Street is an extraordinary place and I hope to have captured a real sense of the history and importance that comes from going behind that door."

The tour reveals little-known information about No 10, including the fact that its bricks are not actually black, but yellow. They took on their distinctive colour due to smog, and people were so used to it by the time the building was renovated in the 1960s that they were painted black, rather than being cleaned to reveal their true shade.

The '0' in the number 10 on the door is painted at a slight angle in memory of the original door, which had a badly-fixed zero.

Copyright Press Association 2006