WEDDING FLOWERS: Necklaces
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Showing posts with label Necklaces. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Necklaces. Show all posts
Big Royal Hats of the Week: June 23

Big Royal Hats of the Week: June 23

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Ascot doesn't have a monopoly on the big hats, you know.

The Duchess of Cornwall took time out from Ascot to toss a mop on her head and head out with the Prince of Wales to continue the work they started in Belgium, leading the royal party at a St. Paul's Cathedral service to commemorate the bicentenary of the Battle of Waterloo. (Cams is wearing her Four Strand Pearl Choker with Small Diamond Clasp and a badge from the Rifles, by the way.)

A big group of royals and other dignitaries gathered in Belgium to do the same, including the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess of Luxembourg, the King and Queen of the Belgians, the King and Queen of the Netherlands, and the Duke of Kent.
'Twas a standard appearance for two of the Ms - Maria Teresa and Máxima, though I am a little concerned that Máx had an altercation with a road line painter on the way to Belgium - and a gorgeous appearance for their royal hostess.
This is the second time in a week I've looked at Mathilde and thought nothing more than she looks goooood. So let's keep that up.

I like to imagine that Queen Máxima realized she missed an opportunity for a big hat there, because she returned home and promptly donned this monster, to open the Design Derby Netherlands:
It takes a lot to overshadow a chapeau like this, but my attention was diverted by what I genuinely thought might be a lobster slung 'round her neck. (She would wear one too, you know she would.)
Honestly, I'm a little disappointed to find out that wasn't the case.

Photos: via Getty Images as indicated
Royal Garden Party of the Day: June 3

Royal Garden Party of the Day: June 3

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The Duchess of Cornwall hosted a garden party at Buckingham Palace yesterday in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Women's Institute. As is only fitting given the honored organization, Camilla was joined by a group of fellow royal ladies ready to brave a little wind and get their garden party on.
And as is only fitting since this quartet includes some of the loveliest Windsors that we don't talk about nearly enough, we shall take this opportunity to lavish some much-needed attention on them (and their gems!).

Navy and cream is a good combo on Cams, no? It's hard to go wrong with the classics. I love the larger of her two diamond and pearl chokers, I like her Diamond and Sapphire Butterfly Brooch (which is as far into the realm of bug jewelry as I am willing to go, MÁXIMA ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME) and I like that she also wore her Women's Institute Badge. And you know the hat's a good one when even Crown Princess Mary owns a similar model.

The Duchess of Gloucester wears this light blue ensemble a lot - in fact, she wore it to another garden party just a few days ago - but I can't say I blame her. It is simple yet flattering.
And most importantly, it's a good background for plenty of sapphires, diamonds, and pearls. Go Birgitte, go! She always seems to have something interesting going on the jewel department, and it's a crying shame that she ends up in the background at so many royal gatherings. Just think of all the sparkly fun we could be missing...

Princess Alexandra looks like a walking garden party, which is as it is always is and always should be.
No slouch in the gem department herself, we've got diamonds and pearls and a classic diamond flower brooch that has a sister in the collection of her cousin QEII.

And finally, the Countess of Wessex. I thought I stole this Emilia Wickstead horse print dress for myself, but I suppose as long as she keeps wearing it, we're good. LURVE.

P.S.: Later that evening, Cams got her tiara on! A surprise Tiara Watch is over at the Jewel Vault for your delight. Spoiler alert: Dame Joan Collins was involved.

Photos: WPA Pool via Getty Images

Royal Fashion Awards: Queen Margrethe's Birthday in Aarhus

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As you may know, I am just a TEENSY bit excited for Queen Margrethe's birthday festivities this month. Things got off to an official start today with celebrations in Aarhus, and naturally, I'm all over it. (I'm posting early and Tiara Thursday will be up on Friday, on account of my jumpy claps.)
Accompanied by Prince Henrik, Crown Prince Frederik, Crown Princess Mary, Prince Joachim, and Princess Marie, the birthday girl arrived in town for a luncheon and a little bit of balcony waving. The ladies were all brooched up and hatted up in classic fashion, as though Daisy had sent out a memo decreeing that their very best prim n' proper royal-ness should be turned up to 11 for the occasion.

Best in QUEEN
Queen Margrethe
Queen Margrethe also wore this white number for a luncheon for her jubilee in 2012, and it is just the thing for a day when one is the center of attention. (I mean, she's the QUEEN, and so she's always the star of the show, but for special spotlight days.) I can just picture her at her closet, "Ooh, get the white one. Yes! I look excellent in the white one." She does indeed.

Best in Sapphire Buildup, Part 1
Crown Princess Mary
With her basic coat, dress, and pill box hat, Mary wore one of her best brooches, an heirloom piece with a large sapphire, diamonds, and pearls. It came from Margrethe's grandmother, Princess Margaret of Connaught, and has been worn by Queen Ingrid and Queen Margrethe. It was given to Mary after Prince Christian was born, and it is stunning. (See it in detail here.) I'm actually pretty bored by the rest of this outfit, but anything to showcase that brooch is fine by me.

Best in Sapphire Buildup, Part 2
Princess Marie
Marie wore another heirloom brooch, one that belonged to Queen Alexandrine. It is also sapphire, diamond, and pearl, so her navy accents went right along with the show. The princesses were building up to the big show that night, apparently...

Best in Sapphire Show
Queen Margrethe
Because at the evening's gala performance, Queen Margrethe wore the biggest sapphires in her collection. This is a flexible demi-parure that comes from Queen Alexandrine, and is said to have had a Russian past before that. Her navy dress was super simple with a bit of lace at the top, really just a background for those gobstopper stones (as it should be).
She was also sporting a new birthday gift from Aarhus on her dress, given to her earlier in the day. The gold brooch is designed in the form of the railings that surround trees in the town, and it is studded with stones to represent her eight grandchildren. Just the thing for a modern jewelry-lovin' monarch. (Read more and see a picture here, or see a video here - all in Danish, of course.)

Best in Intrigue
Crown Princess Mary
Continuing the jewel festival: MARY! She and Frederik were joined by Prince Christian and Princess Isabella, and Mary wore a repeated midnight velvet Prada gown which has been altered since the last time we saw it. (Actually, it's been altered more than once, and we'll be looking at its evolution in the near future.) The newly square neckline is 1) so flattering, 2) the first thing I've really loved about this gown, and 3) the perfect thing to display a new necklace!
I'm told the commentators on Danish television said this was a tiara worn as a necklace, but I don't know if that is fact or an educated guess - it is quite similar to her wedding tiara, which can be worn as a necklace. It's new to Mary (and the earrings look like they might be new too), and all the question marks are up as to whether it is borrowed for the evening or a permanent addition to her collection, and whether it can indeed be worn as a tiara. But for now, JUMPY CLAPS!

Best in...Something Else
Princess Marie
Oh, poor Princess Marie. I always seem to use up my jumpy claps before I get to her. {Shrug.} But she's lovely anyway! Her hair was fantastic and this was a good show for her. And she gets points for her dapper dates, Princes Joachim, Nikolai, and Felix.

Best Guest List Addition
Countess Alexandra of Frederiksborg
Bless the Danes for keeping it classy and still welcoming Prince Joachim's first wife into the fold. Alexandra, with her husband in tow, was lovely as ever in a gray lavender gown, and a welcome addition to the guest list.

We're off and running to a great start, don't you think? My excitement for next week is officially off the charts.

Who makes your best dressed list for the beginning of the birthday celebrations?

Photos: via Getty Images as indicated, TV2 video
Royal Fashion Awards: Easter 2015

Royal Fashion Awards: Easter 2015

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Easter has delivered many goodies for us: 1) chocolate, if you're doing it right, and 2) some fashion awards fun for our Monday. The royal families of Britain and Spain were out and about for Easter services, and we have sartorial matters to discuss...

Best in Queens, Part 1
Queen Sofia
Here are the Spains, doing their thing, business as usual. So I always end up giving the recognition to Queen Sofia, who reliably wears her Easter egg necklace for the occasion. And so it shall be yet again!
It's kitschy and also possibly something of great value (Fabergé does make pendants like these, I don't know if that's the precise make of her pendants - and good grief, she has an awful lot of them), which is sort of the best possible combination.

Best in Queens, Part 2
Queen Elizabeth II
And here's QEII, also doing her thing, also business as usual. She departed from her usual favorite brooches, though, so she gets her own best category for that. (It's the Sapphire Chrysanthemum Brooch, one of the early members of her collection, and you can read about that the Jewel Vault.)

Best of the Best
The Princess Royal
Is Anne truly the best dressed of the day, or is this just a knee jerk reaction caused by seeing her in something that appears to have been made in the current century? Discuss.

Best of the Rest
The Countess of Wessex, Autumn Phillips, Princess Beatrice
I'm also loving: Autumn's cape thing and floral skirt, Beatrice's whole silhouette, and Sophie's swing coat. All the things minus the dead animal on Sophie's head.

Best in Suits
The Gentlemen
The men were there. They wore suits. (Also: Heeeyyy Lady Sarah Chatto, lurking back there in gray and black.)

Who made your Easter best dressed list?

Photos: via Getty Images as indicated

Royal Outfit Grab Bag of the Day: March 11

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Hello and welcome to another edition of "Hmm, What Else is Going On?" I will be your host, and this is my random selection of outfits for chitchat:

Here's Queen Mathilde, with King Philippe, paying a visit to the Vatican and Pope Francis on Monday and exercising her privilège du blanc for the first time. Queen Robocop used a combination of crutches and a wheelchair to get around due to her knee injury, as she has been doing of late, but still managed to look incredibly elegant. Respect. I'm such a sucker for simple designs in white.
I love that she chose a veil - because when don't I love a veil? - but this one was rather in your face. And I mean that literally, because it was obstructing one side of her face in several photos. Maybe she's just really getting into her Robocop groove, and can only show one side of her face at a time.

Here's Queen Máxima kicking off the Week of Money for schools on Monday. She really likes this swing coat, and I really like it when it's open, at least. Anyway, the beige base left space for her statement jewelry:
Which is...alive? Possibly? That necklace clearly has ulterior motives. I'm scared. Moving on...

Here's Mary opening Grønningen's 100th anniversary exhibition this weekend, and her skirt is also alive, amoeba-style. Actually it's a paisley pattern, and it's from Joseph.
.
I mean, what can you say? Typically elegant. Totally Mary.

Photos: via Getty Images as indicated, Farfetch
Royal Event of the Day: March 10

Royal Event of the Day: March 10

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Yesterday was Commonwealth Day, and three Windsor couples came out to mark the day at the annual observance service at Westminster Abbey.
Leading the pack in beige tweed, the Queen repeated a Karl Ludwig coat and Angela Kelly hat. Her brooch coordination was excellent here, with the Gold Filigree Brooch (a relatively new bauble that first appeared in 2012) picking up the flecks of gold in the fabric. You can read about the brooch and the rest of Her Maj's jewels for the day (she also attended an evening reception) over at the Vault. She was accompanied by the Duke of Edinburgh. He wore a suit.
My best dressed for the event, believe it or not, was the Duchess of Cornwall. This blue Bruce Oldfield ensemble is quite flattering for Cams, with just a touch of richness from the velvet trim. And I'd say that even without the threat of an attack from her pet snake, wrapped in velvet and curled up around her Philip Treacy hat.
She accessorized with her favorite pair of pearl earrings and one of her famous pearl and diamond chokers (the larger of the two with all diamond clasps that she regularly wears). She was accompanied by the Prince of Wales. He wore a suit.
And finally, the Duchess of Cambridge, who arrived awash in pale pink. Her Jane Taylor hat was new (honestly, though, she has such a collection of these percher hats in beige and pinky beige and light pink that they all started blending together quite some time ago) and her bespoke McQueen coat was a repeat from her last pregnancy. The highlight of the appearance for me? A new pair of earrings from Kiki McDonough, morganite drops on small diamond hoops. More pink jewels always, please and thank you.
Oh, and she was accompanied by the Duke of Cambridge. He wore a suit.

Your turn: Your best dressed for the day?

Photos: via Getty Images as indicated.
Royal Bling of the Day: February 18

Royal Bling of the Day: February 18

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Cams, you saucy minx.
The Duchess of Cornwall, along with the Prince of Wales, attended the Royal Film Performance of The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel last night.
Here I thought she might be done with mega ruby breastplates necklaces, seeing as the last one she wore caused a bit of a fuss. But nooooope, she's got another up her sleeve. Here's the necklace worn previously:
Worn in Philadelphia, 2007.
The 2007 appearance featured a necklace that was among three sets of jewels picked up by Camilla during a tour of Saudi Arabia in 2005 (from various members of the vast and super rich ruling family; necklaces previously covered here or here). From afar, you might wonder if the necklace from last night was a remodel of the earlier version, but since the stones are different shapes and sizes, they are two different pieces. Talk about building a jewelry vault for yourself, my oh my.
Now we're back to last night.
Last night's was a suite of pear-shaped rubies in tiers with garlands of diamonds, a necklace accompanied by matching long earrings and also a ruby and diamond bracelet, which you can just see peeking out from the sleeve of her rich velvet gown. The whole set looks like another Middle Eastern gift to me; Camilla's official gift list for 2013 included a parure (no further details, alas) from King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, and I wondered if this might be the one, worn as a tribute to the recently deceased king. But that's just speculation on my part. Whatever its origins, I'm so glad they gave it to Cams. I mean, who else could pull this off?
Shout out to Chaz's getup last night, too. Takes a dapper man to make a simple tux worthy of notice in the face of such gem power, but there he is with his fancy cuffs and his checked pocket square, and I can't help but take notice. Nicely done as always.

Photos: via Getty Images as indicated
Royal Necklaces of the Day: February 5

Royal Necklaces of the Day: February 5

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Queen Máxima loves her jewelry, this we know, and she's not picky about the difference between heirloom pieces worn to impress and modern pieces worn for a fashion statement. I like big stones (and I cannot lie), but Máxima tests my love with some of the hardware she hangs around her neck, and some of her recent selections deserve a closer look.

Attending a symposium yesterday
Take yesterday's outfit, for example. Love the idea of a patterned jacket with a statement necklace; do not love the use of leftover Christmas tree decorations as said necklace.


At an event in Utrecht, January 15
This one looks like something made of rocks found by the kids down by the river. But in a world where the rivers are lined with gold, like Willy Wonka's factory for magpies.


At a financial inclusion conference in London, January 19
This one is also a riverbank finder's paradise. This is the same outfit worn when Felipe and Letizia visited the Netherlands, and at that time, Máx paired it with another mega necklace/possible display of medieval weaponry. So either the plain neckline is proving irresistible to the larger side of Máx's jewelry box, or maybe she got a makeup stain on the neck and ugh those things are hard to get out. (Maybe that's always the case. If so, Máx, I retract my entry and I'm with you 100%.)

Photos: via Getty Images as indicated
Royal Visit of the Day: October 16

Royal Visit of the Day: October 16

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Sometimes people dream up some pretty intricate scenarios of coordination between royal ladies before a joint event, all for the purposes of coordinating their outfits. And sometimes it's nice to have confirmation that that isn't necessarily the case. Because when the Spanish visited the Dutch yesterday for an introductory visit, we ended up with two royal ladies doing exactly what they would normally do, without special accommodations for each other. Letizia doesn't usually do hats and gloves (foreign royal weddings being one exception) - it's not the royal norm in Spain, and she has not made special exception for any of her other introductory visits - and Máxima does. And that's what we have here.
King Felipe, King Willem-Alexander, Queen Letizia, and Queen Máxima
The thing is, sticking to what they each do best doesn't leave me with much to root for here. Letizia is in her best color, but the added casual detail of the collar and trim brings this Felipe Varela dress down several notches. Máxima, in a Natan ensemble and necklace, is at it once again with the too matchy-matchy stuff (if she doesn't already have an entire closet devoted to all her different colors of gloves, she's going to need one soon). Also, I think her necklace is trying to murder us.
That leaves me not on Team Máx or Team Leti, but on Team Earring. Nice big diamonds from the Dutch, diamonds and rubies from the Spanish - Letizia's one concession to visiting Máxima's home territory. On that front, they were in perfect harmony.

Photos: Mark Cuthbert/UK Press via Getty Images

Royal Parliament Opening of (Last) Week: October 7

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'Tis the season for royal parliament business, and Norway took their turn last week. The King opened parliament with the Queen and the Crown Prince in attendance. This is the standard group for this event, by the way; this is one that Mette-Marit does not attend.
Queen Sonja often favors colors that go with the surroundings, and this year's red peplum jacket, black skirt, and black hat with cut outs on the brim were no exception. She did wave her Norwegian fashion flag in an outfit from Peter Dundas, who is the current designer for Emilio Pucci, and jewelry from Gine Sommerfelt (per Kjell Arne Totland). I'm not particularly fond of that close-fitting hat style, but Sonja sure seems to like it.

As for the gentlemen, they both wore the collar of the Royal Norwegian Order of St. Olav together with the blue riband of the Royal Norwegian Order of Merit. 
Norway falls somewhere in the middle on the spectrum of fanciness in these royal parliament openings: not as sparkly as Britain's crowned affair and without the carriages and court dress of the Dutch Prinsjesdag, but still with a throne and uniforms. (The Danish version happens today, and we'll hopefully be covering that on its own later.) I think it's a happy medium. I don't always cover the Norwegian event here, but sometimes a little bit of pomp just hits the spot.

If you'd like to see this event on video, click here.

Photos: Sverre Chr. Jarild/Stortinget and Terje Heiestad/Stortinget, Bilder fra Stortinget via Flickr/Creative Commons

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