It's known as a luxurious flower and symbolises love so it's perhaps surprising that the orchid doesn't feature in every royal wedding bouquet. This exotic bloom isn't one of the most regular flowers used by royal brides but it's featured in some of the most famous bouquets of recent times. Among them, the bouquet that was carried at a wedding still making history today. Yes, the flowers chosen by the then Princess Elizabeth for her marriage on November 20th 1947 included orchids. As the Queen and Prince Philip prepare to celebrate their 70th wedding anniversary in just a few days time, here are five times royal brides have chosen orchids for their bouquets.
Queen Elizabeth II, November 20th 1947
The Queen's wedding bouquet was a spectacular sprawling sprig of flowers that featured orchids among its blooms. The then Princess Elizabeth went for three types of British orchids in the bouquet made by Martin Longman of Ludgate in London. She chose from five ideas submitted by the florist and ended up with a rather exotic looking royal bouquet that inspired many other brides in its day. It also went AWOL before the photos and another one was made while she honeymooned. Back at Buck House, the newlyweds posed for more pictures with the blooms on show. Well, when you've got three types of orchid (cattleya, odontoglossum and cypripedium) as well as a sprig of myrtle from the bush planted by Queen Victoria at Osborne then why not?
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Princess Margaret, May 6th 1960
Margaret Rose did like to make a point of how she had been born the younger sister and so wasn't really considered as important as Lillibet the Queen. You could read that into this bouquet which is a much smaller affair than that carried by her big sister and contains orchids in their miniature form. You have to peer pretty hard to see them among the stephanotis and lily of the valley that Margaret also chose. There was always an element of theatre with this princess.
