Our survey of tiaras given to Scandinavian princesses as 18th-birthday presents continues today with a particularly petite jewel: Crown Princess Victoria’s Diamond and Sapphire Tiara.
Crown Princess Victoria, eldest child of King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia of Sweden, celebrated her 18th birthday at the Royal Palace in Stockholm on July 14, 1995. Among her birthday gifts was a small tiara with a modified festoon design. The jewel features small diamonds and sapphires set at the tip of each festoon motif. The piece recalls the design and size of two other Bernadotte tiaras: the now-lost diamond and pearl tiara that belonged to Princess Christina, and the modern gemstone tiara worn by Countess Bettina Bernadotte.
Victoria made a pair of appearances in her new tiara at a royal wedding celebration later the same year. For the pre-wedding ball in honor of Prince Joachim of Denmark and Alexandra Manley, held on November 17, 1995, Victoria wore the tiara with a dark blue gown with gold embellishments.
The following day, Victoria wore the tiara with a yellow gown and a dark wrap for the royal wedding, held at Frederiksborg Palace Church. For both wedding events, Victoria wore the tiara with a double-stranded pearl necklace.
For her debut appearance at the annual Nobel Prize ceremony and banquet in Stockholm on December 10, 1995, Victoria wore the tiara and the necklace with a red evening gown. This photograph from the prize ceremony offers an excellent look at the tiara’s design, including the double diamonds set at the center of the piece.
She also wore pearl earrings and a pearl bracelet. She used a diamond brooch to secure the sash of the Order of the Seraphim.
Crown Princess Victoria also wore the tiara for more than one important milestone birthday celebration. On April 30, 1996, she wore the tiara with a blue and gold evening gown to celebrate her father’s 50th birthday.
And on April 15, 2000, she wore the tiara with diamonds and a strapless blue gown in Copenhagen for the 60th birthday celebrations for Queen Margrethe II of Denmark.
Over the next several years, Victoria made occasional appearances in the tiara, although she quickly began wearing other, larger tiaras from the family collection (notably, the Baden Fringe Tiara, the Four Button Tiara, and the Napoleonic Amethyst Tiara). Victoria’s last prominent appearances in the jewel came during a pair of representative dinners in Stockholm: one in 2005 (pictured above, where she also wore the drop necklace setting of the Connaught Diamond Tiara), and another in 2007. Since then, the tiara has been hidden away in her jewelry box, perhaps waiting for the day that her daughter, Princess Estelle, makes her own tiara debut.
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