All My Tiaras: The Duchess of Cambridge

Happy birthday to the Duchess of Cambridge! The former Kate Middleton has been royal for almost five years now, and she’s starting to wear pieces of important family jewelry. Here’s a look at the tiaras she’s donned during her royal tenure so far…

Kate officially began her royal life wearing this tiara, which was a wedding anniversary gift from King George VI to the Queen Mother. Made by Cartier in 1936, the tiara made of platinum and set with diamonds. In 1953, it attended another important event at Westminster Abbey, when Princess Margaret wore it to her sister’s coronation. Kate has only worn the tiara once so far, on her wedding day, but the fact that her new wedding earrings were made to coordinate with the tiara suggests that it may be a long-term loan.

Kate wore another of the Queen Mum’s tiaras for her first diplomatic reception at Buckingham Palace in 2013. The Lotus Flower (or Papyrus) Tiara was made by Garrard for the then-Duchess of York in 1923; the diamonds and pearls were harvested from a necklace given to Elizabeth by her husband as a wedding gift a few months earlier. This one was also a favorite of Princess Margaret; her daughter-in-law, Serena, even wore it as a wedding tiara. This one does appear to be a longer-term loan to Kate, who wore it again at the Chinese state banquet in 2015.

This diamond and pearl tiara was made in 1913 for Queen Mary, who wanted a tiara just like the lover’s knot diadem owned by her cousins, the Cambridge family. The Queen inherited it in 1953, but it became more famous as one of Princess Diana’s tiaras in the 1980s and early 1990s. The piece gathered dust in the vaults for more than two decades, but Kate unearthed it for 2015’s diplomatic reception at the palace, surprising many who had thought its connections with Diana had made it tiara non grata.