WEDDING FLOWERS: Prada
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Showing posts with label Prada. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Prada. Show all posts

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 Wedding Flashback of the Week, Part 2: April 8

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In honor of the 10th wedding anniversary of the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall, we've got part 2 of our celebration on tap for today. As I mentioned yesterday, we've touched on Camilla's wedding outfits in the past, but since I've added her jewels to my coverage at the Jewel Vault blog, you can find a feature on the jewelry she wore for the big day over there.

Video: The blessing service
Over here, we have more guests! Part two of our hat-filled extravaganza features the main members of the Windsor family, starting with the boss lady herself:

The Queen
She's dosed in butter and cream, and this is a gorgeous ensemble for Her Maj. Throw in one of her larger day brooches (the Australian Wattle Brooch), and you're set to go. (You can just see Prince Philip on the side there, who was of course with her. He wore a morning suit.)

A whole bunch of people
(Okay: Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie with Prince William and Prince Harry and Peter Phillips in the front, and the Duke of Gloucester, Duke of York, Prince Michael of Kent, Duke of Kent, the Princess Royal and more behind)
Here are the other men! They also wore morning suits. Also, we've got a pair of York sisters in...not their best coat-to-dress match ups.
Princess Eugenie
But call me crazy, I have always had a soft spot for this hat. Am I crazy?? It's okay, you can tell me.

The Earl and Countess of Wessex
Speaking of crazy hats. Remember when Sophie was in the throes of her love affair with super tall, scarcely brimmed hats? I'm glad that's (mostly) passed, but the rest of this outfit is still a winner.

The Princess Royal and Tim Laurence
On the other hand, Anne and her veiled pill boxes are a love affair that will never die. She's cute here, though, having a proper adventure on the bus like the common people do. Note her Grima earrings and her classic brooch, please.
Zara Phillips
And note her daughter, gallantly stepping up to ensure that no British royal wedding goes without a true head scratcher of an outfit for the scrapbooks. She's a hero for the ages, this one. 

Who are you crowning Best Dressed Guest at this wedding?

Photos: via Getty Images as indicated

State Visit and Tiara Watch of the Day: March 18

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HELLOOOOOO! We're heeeere!
With a flurry of kisses and other assorted warm greetings, the Dutch state visit to Denmark is off and running, and it's giving me such warm fuzzies, I'm throwing Wednesday's post up for a late Tuesday treat. This is a long one, might take you to Wednesday to read it anyway.
Queen Margrethe, looking jaunty with a feather in her cap, brought the whole fam damily out to greet her godson at the airport: Prince Henrik, the Crown Prince and Crown Princess, Prince Joachim and Princess Marie, and Princess Benedikte and Prince Richard. The gentlemen wore suits...but wait, we even have some additional comments on that, looks like some of the Danish party opted for orange ties to greet their Orange visitors and King Willem-Alexander went for light blue, the color of Denmark's Order of the Elephant. Points for all that.
Máxima opted for a spacious coat in bedazzled gray with a split sleeve that I thought Empress Michiko had trademarked. It won't go down as a personal favorite for me, but it is clever in one respect: it's a design by Claes Iversen, a Danish-born designer operating out of the Netherlands. Points for that, I say again.
Obviously, the other stand out for me from the arrivals was the purple touches - a bit in Marie's hat, but primarily on Mary. A repeated pill box hat and purple gloves, a tribute to the queen of coordinated colored gloves. POINTS FOR PURPLE.
Meanwhile, back in Máx land, underneath her big coat she was wearing a sapphire and diamond brooch (plus sapphire and diamond earrings). Which was pretty much just one big preview for the day's main event, the state banquet. TIARA TIME! Ignore the bored looks in this screencap, this stuff is exciting, dang it.
Our two queens were a pleasant inverse of each other, a light blue gown for Margrethe with her darker blue Order of the Netherlands Lion sash, and a darker blue gown (a very familiar one) for Máxima with her newly-awarded light blue Order of the Elephant. Each queen brought something special to this special state visit in her own way. (Pro tip before I dig in here: If we've covered the tiara in depth in the past - and we have, with all of these - the name will be linked, always!)
Queen Margrethe repeats gowns so often, a new one (which this is) is a rare treat. And of course she wore her Pearl Poire Tiara, because it was King Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia's wedding gift to his daughter Louise, who was marrying Prince Frederik of the Netherlands.
A Dutch connection on one of her most important jewel options was certainly a predictable choice, but no less significant. (Important note, after several questions about this: No, she is not missing any pearls in her tiara. The pearls are pendants within the arches and they move a fair amount as Queen Margrethe does. Some of them are just swinging slightly behind the framework in any given photo.)
Queen Máxima wore the Jan Taminiau gown that she wore underneath a cape for her husband's inauguration, which is really a treat as I thought that magnificent ensemble might be retired for good (you know, because of history and mic dropping and whatnot).
I love it just as much now as I did then, and her sapphire and diamond accessories are still the perfect touch.
Interestingly, while she had the Dutch Sapphire Tiara slightly altered for the inauguration to lower the center section for a more even top line, it's now reverted to the taller top. Flexibility! Glorious.
In the face of all that specialness, you'll have to forgive me for being a wee bit let down by Mary's choices. This is the gown we just saw at the New Year's Court gala, and she's used only her wedding tiara (and not even with its pearls) with her aquamarine girandole earrings.  
My unattainable standards aside, this is another gown I'm glad to see without its cape, and I'm glad to see both her and Frederik in the Order of the Netherlands Lion.
In another New Year's Court repeated gown (this one from 2014), we have Princess Marie in her diamond floral tiara, because what else?
Both she and Joachim were given a lower Dutch order (a house order), the Order of the Crown, as were Princess Benedikte and Prince Richard.
This is only a fleeting glance of the couple (better look in this gallery), but you can see Ben's a girl after my own heart, coordinating her orange with a lavender gown and sporting her own big gun tiara, the Sayn-Wittgenstein-Berleburg Fringe Tiara.

Well, that's me off to delight in my tiara coma with a sigh and oh so many jumpy claps. Stay tuned as the state visit rolls on...

Photos: Julian Parker/UK Press via Getty Images, Billed-Bladet video, TV2 video, Michael Stub - Her Og Nu via Getty

Royal Closet Raid of the Day: January 23

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As promised, one last thing before we stop celebrating the Countess of Wessex's 50th birthday: her closet raid! This is our time-honored tradition (eh, well, it's been around for a few months) of taking a look through a royal wardrobe and seeing which pieces we like so much we wish we had them for our very own. Praise with a dash of selfishness thrown in, just the way I like it.

When it comes to the Countess, I knew precisely the outfit I was after:
Emilia Wickstead is a favorite of Sophie's, and with good reason. This dress, debuted at the Luxembourg royal wedding in 2012, is a good example of Sophie's style on the whole: basically classic, but with a bit of quirky fun too. It also happens to be my personal favorite, because full skirts, belts, square neckline, three-quarter sleeves, and fun prints that aren't too cartoonish are just a few of my many favorite things.

A few more of my favorite Sophie things, for good measure:
A fun floral dress in a flattering cut, yes please.
Purple Prada coats, YES please.
And cute clutches, ohhhhh yes. Now, your turn:

What do you covet from Sophie's wardrobe?

Photos: Pascal Le Segretain, Max Mumby/Indigo, Ian Blakeman via Getty Images, and Emilia Wickstead

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