This is why the Queen made Princess Diana have two wedding bouquets
Princess Diana was a true trailblazer, from her iconic style moments to her determination to be human, even abandoning the royal protocol of wearing gloves so she could have direct contact with people that she met. She later went on to stop wearing hats, famously saying, ‘You can’t cuddle a child in a hat.’
Unafraid to break royal protocol, Princess Diana was a real pioneer, with news emerging that she changed the way that royals gave birth forever.
It has been revealed that Princess Diana not only changed the practice of royal childbirth, she also changed the way they get married.
That’s right. A key detail from her 1981 wedding to Prince Charles - a royal first - actually turned into a tradition for future generations, with even Meghan Markle said to have following suit on her big day.
The big change? Two bridal bouquets.
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Van Cleef & Arpels Vintage Alhambra gold and onyx necklace, £6,650, Selfridges
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Princess Diana had two identical bouquets at her St Paul’s wedding, featuring gardenias, stephanotis, odontolglossum orchid, lily of the valley, Earl Mountbatten roses, freesia, veronica, ivy, myrtle and trasdescantia.
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‘We made two bouquets,’ the chief florist on the day, David Longman, explained in ITV’s Invitation to the Royal Wedding. ‘The first one had to be delivered at 8 o’clock to Buckingham Palace. We had a police escort motorcyclist who took us all through the city to the Palace. Then we came back, and by that time they had finished the second bouquet and back we went again.’
While Princess Diana was the first to set the trend, it has emerged that the decision actually came from the Queen, who told Diana to have two rather than one - and it’s all about practicality, stemming from a mix up that happened at the Queen’s own wedding to Prince Philip.
‘If we go back to the Queen’s wedding in 1947, when you look at the state photographs of all the bridesmaids and royal guests – there’s the Queen without a bouquet,’ David Longman explained. ‘It got lost, so in the middle of their honeymoon, they had to get dressed up again in their wedding clothes and my father had to provide another bouquet for those photographs.’
‘Now, it’s the tradition to make two bouquets so that doesn’t happen again,’ with Princess Diana breaking the mould.
Jenny Proudfoot is an award-winning journalist, specialising in lifestyle, culture, entertainment, international development and politics. She has worked at Marie Claire UK for seven years, rising from intern to Features Editor and is now the most published Marie Claire writer of all time. She was made a 30 under 30 award-winner last year and named a rising star in journalism by the Professional Publishers Association.
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