This week, we’re devoting our Sparkling Spotlight posts to daily flashbacks of jewelry worn by the late Queen Elizabeth II over the years. Today, we’re traveling back to October 24, 2008, when the Queen wore a dazzling winter ensemble during a diplomatic visit to Slovakia.
On Friday, October 24, 2008, the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh embarked on the second day of their state visit to Slovakia. The day’s engagements included a tour of the picturesque Hrebienok Ski Resort. The occasion was reportedly the royal couple’s first ski resort visit.
I find this picture from the day particularly amusing: the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh riding with President Ivan Gasparovic of Slovakia aboard a funicular railway as they travel to the ski resort.
The royals also attended a hockey game in Bratislava between Slovakia’s Aquacity ŠKP Poprad and England’s Guildford Flames.
The Queen wore a smashing winter ensemble featuring tweed, sequins, feathers, and fur. (At this point, the Queen was still wearing real fur, but the palace later made the decision to use only faux fur in her clothing, and existing real fur pieces were replaced.) This was also a rare occasion when we saw the Queen wear a pair of tall winter boots with her outfit—very appropriate for seasonal engagements related to hockey and skiing!
The Queen wore gold, diamonds, and pearls with the outfit, picking up both the cool and warm tones in the ensemble.
She wore her favorite daytime pearl and diamond button earrings for the day’s events. The earrings, which the Queen wore for nearly all daytime appearances in her later years, were inherited from her grandmother, Queen Mary.
You’ll also spot one of the Queen’s signature three-row pearl necklaces hidden just beneath the neckline of her dress and coat. She had several of these necklaces, in various lengths, in her jewelry collection. I believe this is the one that the Queen commissioned herself at the start of her reign using a collection of existing family pearls. Like the earrings, that necklace was the late monarch’s almost constant companion during daytime engagements.
This might have been an engagement where the Queen could have decided to go without a brooch, given the design of the coat’s collar, but leave it to HM to bring one along anyway. In various photographs from the day, you’ll be able to spot the Golden Dahlia Brooch peeking out from her coat. The brooch was pinned at the center of the neckline of the dress worn beneath the coat on this occasion. The gold and diamond jewel was made for the Queen by Garrard in the early 1970s.
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