The story behind the Queen's wedding day tiara- and what happened when it snapped hours before the ceremony
As any bride will attest, the wedding-day morning is a jittery time. Inevitably there’s a last-minute panic or some unforeseen hiccup that, while inconsequential in hindsight, sets nerves on edge.
The feeling must be magnified several times over when you’re heir to the throne and the wedding is set to be broadcast on BBC radio to 200 million people across the globe; as was the case for then-Princess Elizabeth and Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten when they tied the knot 70 years ago today. So you can imagine the panic when, just as the bride was about to leave for Westminster Abbey, her diamond tiara snapped.
In fairness, the tiara was older than the bride herself, having been made in 1919 for Elizabeth’s grandmother, Queen Mary. Mary had worn a similar fringe-style tiara that she had inherited for several years. A pared-back interpretation of a Russian kokoshnik, the style was very popular in the late 19th and early 20th century, fashionable amongst the imperial Romanovs before the Russian revolution.
Queen Mary regularly dismantled her jewellery to make new pieces, and the new fringe tiara was fashioned from diamonds taken from a transformable tiara-necklace that her mother-in-law, Queen Victoria, had given her as a wedding present in 1893. Mary entrusted the diamonds to royal jeweller Garrard, who set them in gold and silver in a formation of 47 diamond bars separated by smaller diamond spikes.
The tiara was passed down to Mary’s daughter Elizabeth (who would become the Queen Mother) in 1936, and it was Elizabeth who lent it to her own daughter, the current Queen, as her “something borrowed” for the royal wedding in 1947. As convention dictated that only married women could wear tiaras, it was the first time the Princess would wear such a piece.
The Queen's most spectacular jewellery
On the morning of the wedding, as the hairdresser was securing Elizabeth’s veil with the tiara, the antique metal frame snapped. According to Garrard, the Queen Mother consoled her daughter by saying “we have two hours and there are other tiaras,” but Elizabeth was intent on wearing that particular piece.
How the tiara came back into style
Fortunately, a court jeweller was on standby in the event of any such mishap and took the tiara via police escort to the Garrard workshop to be repaired. After emergency welding the tiara was returned to the bride, with just a slight noticeable gap between the central fringe and the spike to its right.
After the wedding the tiara was returned to the Queen Mother, who kept it for the rest of her life, although it was rarely seen in public. She did however lend it for another royal wedding: that of Princess Anne, her granddaughter, and Mark Phillip, in 1973.
Queen Elizabeth II inherited the tiara, known as Queen Mary’s fringe tiara, after her mother’s death in 2002, and while she doesn’t wear it regularly - preferring one of the other diamond tiaras in her extensive collection - it surely carries great sentimental value; a precious reminder of the rollercoaster of emotions she felt on that wedding-day morning.