Royal Jewel Rewind: Queen Elizabeth II’s Wedding Jewelry
Sixty-seven years ago today, Princess Elizabeth of the United Kingdom married Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten at Westminster Abbey in London. Nearly seven decades, four children, eight grandchildren, and four (and a half) great-grandchildren later, the couple are still married and still serving their country as they have for more than half a century. To mark their anniversary, let’s look back at the jewelry that the future queen wore on her wedding day, shall we?
Elizabeth debuts her engagement ring and her fiancé, 10 Jul 1947
Elizabeth’s engagement ring was made by the jewelry firm of Philip Antrobus in 1947. The platinum ring features a round three-carat brilliant stone flanked by smaller pavé-set diamonds. Elizabeth’s future husband was born Prince Philippos of Greece and Denmark, though he had renounced his Greek titles before their wedding. All of the diamonds in the ring were taken from a tiara that had belonged to his mother, Princess Alice of Battenberg.
Alice wears the tiara used to make the engagement ring, ca. 1908
The diamonds from Alice’s dismantled tiara were also used to make Philip’s wedding present to his bride: an elaborate diamond and platinum bracelet, also made by the jewelers at Philip Antrobus.
Close-up of the Queen’s engagement and wedding rings, 1998
The wedding ring given by Philip to Elizabeth is made of Welsh gold. It’s become tradition for British royal brides to wear Welsh gold wedding rings. In 1923, the Windsors were given a nugget of gold mined at the Clogau St. David’s mine in Bontddu. The gold from that nugget made Elizabeth’s ring, as well as the wedding rings worn by the Queen Mother, Princess Margaret, Princess Anne, and Princess Diana. Subsequent rings, including those worn by the Duchess of York, the Countess of Wessex, the Duchess of Cornwall, and the Duchess of Cambridge, have also been made from other pieces of Welsh gold.
The Queen’s wedding dress and jewelry on display, 2007
Elizabeth wore an heirloom tiara on her wedding day: the diamond fringe tiara that had been made for her grandmother, Queen Mary, in 1919, using stones from a Collingwood tiara/necklace that was given to her as a wedding present by Queen Victoria. Queen Mary wore the original tiara on her wedding day in 1893. The new tiara was made by Garrard.
Mary had given the fringe tiara to her daughter-in-law, Queen Elizabeth (the Queen Mother), in 1936. The Queen Mum is the one who loaned the tiara to Princess Elizabeth for her wedding in 1947. (Queen Elizabeth II didn’t inherit the tiara until her mother’s death in 2002; the Queen Mother also loaned it to Princess Anne for her first wedding in 1973.) There was a bit of an infamous mishap with the tiara on the wedding day: as the princess was getting ready, the tiara frame suddenly snapped. Garrard was able to repair it, but you can see a gap in the tiara from the quick fix in the portraits from the wedding.
Pearls are a staple in Queen Elizabeth II’s jewelry wardrobe today, so it’s no surprise that she wore a two-stranded pearl necklace on her wedding day. These pearls, though, are particularly special. They’re actually two separate pearl necklaces, always worn together, that have been in the family for generations. If family tradition is correct, they’re among the oldest pieces of British royal jewelry still worn by the Queen. The smaller strand, made of 46 pearls, is said to have been worn by Queen Anne, the last Stuart monarch. The longer strand, which includes 50 pearls, is attributed to Caroline of Ansbach, the queen consort of George II. The Royal Collection confirms that Queen Victoria’s jewel inventory of 1896, made by Garrard, notes the pearl necklaces and is the first recorded statement of their Stuart/Hanoverian provenance.
But as with the diamond tiara, there was a bit of a mishap with the pearls on the wedding day, too. They had been exhibited with Elizabeth and Philip’s other wedding presents at St. James’s Palace, but no one had gone to retrieve them before the wedding. (The display of the bejeweled presents, including the pearls, is above — surely you see some familiar baubles there!) With the clock ticking, Elizabeth’s private secretary, Jock Colville, headed out of Buckingham Palace to fetch the pearls. Those of you who know your London geography are aware that there’s not a huge distance between the two palaces — but add in the crowds gathered on the morning of a future queen’s wedding, and you’ve got a bit of an obstacle.
Sir Jock Colville, 1955
First, Colville borrowed King Haakon VII of Norway’s limousine to try to fight his way through the crowds, but the car wasn’t able to get him there quickly enough. Ditching the royal limo, he ran the rest of the way on foot. He made it back to Buck House with the pearls in the nick of time. Colville was knighted for his various services to crown and country in 1974, and surely his rescue of the wedding pearls had to have been among the valiant acts that qualified him for the honor!
Like the rest of the jewels worn by Princess Elizabeth on her wedding day, her diamond and pearl cluster earrings were also family heirlooms. The earrings date to the first half of the nineteenth century; they were originally owned by Princess Mary, Duchess of Gloucester, one of the daughters of King George III. She bequeathed them to her niece, Princess Mary, Duchess of Teck in 1857; in turn, the Duchess of Teck bequeathed them to her daughter, Queen Mary, in 1897. The earrings originally included detachable diamond and pearl pendants, but those were made into a separate pair of earrings by Queen Mary. The cluster earrings were relatively new to Princess Elizabeth’s collection. Mary had given them to her granddaughter less than a year earlier, in January 1947, on the day that the royal family left for their tour of South Africa.
Swedish Royal Wedding News
Prince Carl Philip and Sofia Hellqvist (Photo copyright Erika Gerdemark/kungahuset.se) |
Last week, the Swedish royal court released new details about the upcoming wedding of Prince Carl Philip, the only son of King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia, and Sofia Hellqvist, including the wedding date and venue.
Prince Carl Philip (Photo copyright Erika Gerdemark/kungahuset.se) |
Carl Philip, who will turn 36 in May, will wed the former model on 13 June 2015. (The day will be a busy one for royal watchers; Trooping the Colour, the official celebration of Queen Elizabeth II’s birthday, will be held in London on the same Saturday.) The wedding will be held almost a year after the couple’s engagement, which was made official on June 27. The Bernadottes nearly always marry in June. The King and Queen were married on 19 June 1976, and Crown Princess Victoria and Prince Daniel wed on the same day in 2010. Princess Madeleine’s wedding anniversary is June 8. Three of the king’s sisters, Princess Margaretha, Princess Désirée, and Princess Christina, were also married in June.
Princess Christina’s wedding in the Royal Chapel, 1974
The wedding will be held in the Royal Chapel at the Royal Palace in Stockholm. It’s the same place where Princess Madeleine married Christopher O’Neill in 2013. And because the same person who coordinated Madeleine’s wedding, Major Gen. Håkan Pettersson, is also in charge of Carl Philip’s big day, I think we can expect to see many similarities between the two events — including similar white-tie dress codes, with major jewels!
Princess Madeleine’s wedding in the Royal Chapel, 2013
Which royals can we expect to attend? The guest list won’t be released until much closer to the wedding day, but as with both Victoria’s and Madeleine’s weddings, we should see the entire Swedish royal family, including the king’s sisters. Prince Carl Philip has three living royal godparents — his aunt, Princess Birgitta, Prince Leopold of Bavaria, and Queen Margrethe II of Denmark — and all of them will surely be present. The royal guest list will probably resemble that of Madeleine’s wedding overall. As far as the Windsors go, I imagine we’ll see the Wessexes in attendance, with the rest of the senior royals remaining in London for the Queen’s birthday parade.
Sofia Hellqvist (Photo copyright Erika Gerdemark/kungahuset.se) |
Carl Philip recently gave an interview to on Swedish television where he discussed his struggles with dyslexia and the couple’s relationship. Sofia’s past occupation — that of glamor model and reality TV star — has caused a bit of an uproar in the Swedish press during the couple’s relationship. Carl Philip angrily noted that Sofia “was hung out to dry in a bullying type of way” by the press, and he countered claims that the royal family disapproved of her initially, explaining that his family “were curious about her, open, and welcomed her with a big hug.” The couple met in 2009 and have been living together for three years. After the wedding, Sofia, who turns 30 in December, will be styled HRH Princess Sofia of Sweden, Duchess of Värmland.
Prince Carl Philip and Sofia Hellqvist (Photo copyright Erika Gerdemark/kungahuset.se) |
The couple released a statement through the royal court about their wedding plans: “We are looking forward to a summer wedding in the middle of June, when
Sweden is extremely beautiful. This will be a big day for us, and we are absolutely
delighted.” This will be the last royal wedding in Sweden — and indeed in Scandinavia — for a generation. Which royal jewels would you like to see worn at this glittering event?
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