Royal Platinum Wedding: the look of love as the Queen and Prince Philip celebrate 70 years of marriage

Royal Platinum Wedding: the look of love as the Queen and Prince Philip celebrate 70 years of marriage

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He looks like he can't believe his luck and she looks like she's pretending to ignore him. It was probably the same seventy years ago when the first decided to get married. In a new set of photos to mark their 70th wedding anniversary, the Queen and Prince Philip look like any couple in love. Which is why their wedding anniversary and all it celebrates is just really rather marvellous all round.

The new pictures were taken by Matt Holyoak of Camera Press and they're a very modern take on a very traditional story. The Queen and Prince Philip have become masters of the completely at ease with one another and what are you looking at official portrait and they've given us another set to mark their special day.

This is a couple so happy with one another that the camera just can't lie. The portraits, taken at Windsor Castle, celebrate a marriage that began on November 20th 1947 and has broken every royal  record going. It was said that Elizabeth and Philip regard ''People Will Say We're in Love'' as their song. Well... these pictures certainly tell on them..... people will say they're in love.

Photo credit: Matt Holyoak/ Camera Press.

Royal Platinum Wedding: the Queen's engagement ring

Royal Platinum Wedding: the Queen's engagement ring

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On a platinum anniversary, you need a platinum ring. With just hours to go until the 70th wedding anniversary of the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh, it's time to look back to the piece of jewellery being worn by the bride on the eve of her wedding. Her engagement ring was filled with sentiment, history and sparkle and has proved a royal classic in its own right. As the anniversary approaches, here's a look back at the Queen's engagement ring....

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The then Princess Elizabeth and Philip Mountbatten announced their engagement on July 10th 1947 although it's understood they had been betrothed privately for some time ahead of that. The ring summed up their relationship in many ways. For while it was made to suit the very royal role that had become Elizabeth's, Philip's energy and imagination played a large part in its creation.  The result is a single three carat diamond with two settings of smaller diamonds on the shoulders of the ring. And the stones had a very special link to the groom.

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Philip might have been marrying into the House of Windsor but the engagement ring he gave to his queen in waiting had plenty of his own royal family history about it. The diamonds in this ring came from a tiara belonging to Philip's mother, Princess Alice - she herself had received the diadem as a wedding present almost forty five years earlier.

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This is a very 1940s ring, made by the jewellery firm Philip Antrobus, which had enough sparkle to sit on the finger of a future monarch without being completely over the top. Elizabeth and Philip got engaged just two years after the end of World War Two and the bride had to use clothing rations to get the material for her dress (the government stepped in with an extra 200 to help out). Anything too over the top in the sparkle stakes wouldn't have been a popular move.

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But the ring, like the royals in this relationship, got it just right. The sparkler was shown off in a very jolly and relaxed press conference while the Queen still wears this special piece of jewellery every day. Seventy years on, it's a piece of history all on its own. A platinum ring that deserves plenty of attention on this platinum anniversary.

Royal Platinum Wedding: the mother of the bride

Royal Platinum Wedding: the mother of the bride

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All eyes might be on the bride on her big day but there's one other person feeling the style pressure. The mother of the bride. Not only is she seeing her little girl begin a whole new chapter of her life, she's got to have a hat that could stop traffic or no one is going home truly happy. That was never going to be a problem at the Queen's wedding on November 20th 1947. We all know how her mum loved a hat. And on the day her dynasty made more history, this Queen Elizabeth was more than ready for her close up.


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The mother of the bride was, of course, another queen called Elizabeth - better known to us as the Queen Mother but at the time, Her Majesty The Queen. Consort to King George VI, she was about as well loved as a royal gets - her role in boosting wartime morale is now legendary and it had made her a truly popular figure. And she made every one love her just a little bit more by attending her daughter's wedding dressed like a dream.

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The task of dressing a queen for her daughter's marriage went to Norman Hartnell who was also crating the bride's gown. And the bridesmaids. And the frock for the bride's granny (more on that tomorrow). Hartnell had been dressing the Windsor women since the 1930s and had become a firm favourite of Queen Elizabeth just before World War Two started. Their bond had lasted ever since so it was no surprise that when the then Princess Elizabeth announced her engagement, her mother commissioned Hartnell to make the bride's gown and her own outfit.

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The result was a golden peachy pink full length gown with a fitted waist, slim skirt and half sleeves. It has a soft V shaped neck which isn't just flattering, it leaves plenty of room for all the diamonds that the mother of the bride brought out to play. All mothers of the bride need a hat and the one chosen for this historic wedding is ever so slightly fabulous. It's not only huge and has feathers, it's has an open crown to give it a proper gala feel.

Embed from Getty Images Seeing your first daughter marry is always going to be a major moment. When you are the Queen of England and hosting the biggest royal gathering in decades while overseeing a wedding that has become a beacon of hope for millions still recovering from war, it goes into a different realm. If anyone was going to rise to the challenge it was this queen called Elizabeth - a mother of the bride like no other with the outfit to match.