BoujeeKidsSilver Cross prams run from £900 to £2,500-plus. The honest question every new parent asks: is this craftsmanship and heritage, or a tax on anxious first-time buyers? The answer depends entirely on which Silver Cross you are looking at.
Silver Cross · coach-built flagship
Balmoral
A hand-finished carriage body on a sprung chrome chassis, the direct descendant of the prams that carried royal infants. Heavy and large, built for the carrycot stage, but it holds its value like almost nothing else in the nursery.
Check price at Silver CrossSilver Cross is really two companies wearing one badge. There is the modern, practical Silver Cross, the Dune 2 and Reef 2 travel systems that compete head-on with iCandy, UPPAbaby and Bugaboo on weight, fold and features. And there is the heritage Silver Cross, the Wave and, at the very top, the coach-built Balmoral. They are not the same proposition, and conflating them is how parents end up disappointed in either direction.
It depends which Silver Cross you buy
The Dune 2 (from ~£900) and Reef 2 (~£1,000) are genuinely good travel systems: compact, well-specced, easy to live with. But at that price they are competing in a crowded field, and they win on brand more than on any decisive feature. If you want a practical, modern pushchair, they are a fair choice, not a remarkable one.
The Balmoral is a different object entirely. It is a coach-built pram, a hand-finished carriage body on a sprung chrome chassis, the kind of pram that predates the travel system by a century. This is the one with the story, and the one worth interrogating.
The heritage is the product
Silver Cross was founded in 1877 by William Wilson in Yorkshire, and has built prams there, with interruptions, ever since. The coach-built Balmoral is the direct descendant of the prams that carried royal infants: hand-assembled, leather-trimmed, the body suspended on springs rather than bolted to a folding frame. “Coach-built” is not marketing. It means the pram body is constructed and finished by hand rather than moulded from plastic, and it is the single thing that separates the Balmoral from every pram in a chain-store showroom.
The build, in real terms
- Sprung suspension that genuinely glides over cobbles, gravel and country lanes. The ride is the point.
- Hand-finished carriage body, leather details, chrome chassis, built to be looked at for a decade.
- Carrycot and chassis as one, no separate newborn cot to buy.
- Reversible: baby faces you, then faces the world.
- 10-year chassis warranty, and Silver Cross honours it.
What the Balmoral is not
This is where honesty matters. The Balmoral is a pram, not a travel system. It is built for the first months, the carrycot stage, birth to around six months, after which most families move to a lightweight stroller. It is heavy, it is large, and it will not drop into a hatchback boot the way a Dune will. It is not the pram you take to nip round a supermarket; it is the pram you take through a park. Buy it understanding you will likely own a second, lighter buggy too, and it makes complete sense. Buy it expecting it to do everything, and it will not.
Does it pay for itself?
This is the genuinely interesting part. Coach-built prams hold their value in a way almost nothing else in the nursery does. A well-kept three-year-old Balmoral resells for roughly £800 to £1,200, which puts the true cost of ownership nearer £400 to £500 a year, before you factor in a second or third child using it, or handing it down. Against a £900 travel system replaced every couple of years and worth little second-hand, the maths quietly inverts: the expensive pram becomes the cheaper one. That is the “pays for itself” claim, and on the Balmoral specifically, it holds.
The verdict
For the practical Dune and Reef, save your money for something that earns the premium; they are fine, not exceptional. For the Balmoral, the premium is real and the resale pays it back. If you want a pram that outlasts the child, holds its value, and is genuinely an heirloom rather than a marketing word, it is one of the very few at this price that delivers.
Score: 8.1/10 for the Balmoral, 7.2/10 for the Wave, 6.5/10 for the Dune 2 / Reef 2 (a competent mid-market travel system that does not need the heritage premium). How we score.
Where to buy
- Silver Cross (direct), full range and fitting appointments.
- John Lewis, often 10 to 20% off in sale events, plus a 2-year guarantee.
- Independent nursery specialists, for in-person demos of the coach-built line.
- Nearly-new (used), 40 to 60% off a Balmoral; check the suspension and the chassis chrome.