Royal Style: Elizabeth may be gone, but her diamonds are forever

[Maireas]

Evening Royal style and beauty fans.
Into the Carolean era, with more bling we hope! Also more state banquets?

I read that she pursued him in the way that a lady of the day could. His interests were more exotic. She dodged a bullet there. There was the whiff of depravity about him from his youth.

My mother's family had some very distant link with the Bowes Lyon family, and my Grandmother always said that Elizabeth had her heart set on being Queen, but the PoW wasn't interested in her, being more keen on having married women as his mistresses.

So Elizabeth settled for Bertie as second best. But with a twist of fate, and some help from Stanley Baldwin she did become Queen.

There is more than a slight resemblance between QM and Eugenie I think - from that side profile picture of QM that paradyning posted.

I'm afraid when I think of the QM I sometimes think of David and Wallis's alleged and rather unkind nickname for her: Cookie.

That's interesting, Ada!

@MotherofPearl Yes, chic the QM was not. Whereas Wallis was not lacking in that quality, though no doubt she was in others!

Nearly ready for a new thread.
Title suggestions, please?

Chic, Mustique and Royal Mystique

(chic references our discussion here regarding what is and isn’t, Mustique because Princess Margaret loved it there and we’ve talked about her a fair bit this last week, and Royal Mystique because without it we might as well just elect our HoS so there’d better be some pomp, circumstance and suitable bling on show going forward, Your Majesty!!)

I feel sorry for the QM in many ways - for most of her youth she obviously followed the fashion of the times she was living in, but that meant she spent her 20s in the slim, drop-waisted , shapeless fashions of the 1920s that did not flatter her figure at all. She did far better in the 1930s - and before, when she was a teenage during WWI. She was certainly capable of looking stylish, even if chic was not really in her wheelhouse.

I am always taken aback at how similar to the QM Eugenie is. And Bea is similar to Victoria. Are there any other doppelgängers? With photos preferably 😂

These are lovely photos of QM thank you for posting. I love the one with the parasol I’m presuming this was when she was very young.

The parasol photo was 1938 - she was photographed in the grounds of Buckingham Palace wearing dress she had made for her trip to Paris earlier that year. So she was 38 then.

Ah ok it was an evening gown I thought it was an Edwardian type day dress. She looks very stylish in all of those photos. I have to say I don’t think Wallis Simpson was a pretty woman at all but apparently she had something about her that made her attractive.

That Cecil Beaton photograph with the parasol shows part of the QM's famous White Wardrobe made for her 1938 visit to Paris, which was one time when she was a style icon and trendsetter.

Just days before the QM's departure for Paris, her mother died, so the visit was postponed for a couple of weeks. The colourful wardrobe Norman Hartnell had created for her had to be abandoned, and he suggested that she wore white for mourning.

This proved to be a sensation in Paris, with the exquisite dresses Hartnell created, inspired by the famous Winterhalter paintings in the Royal Collection, sealing his position as a leading designer.

Although we laugh about Kate and her diplomatic dressing, the QM's White Wardrobe and the enthusiasm and delight it caused in France, helped to seal an Entente Cordiale with France, which helped to hold the two countries together as allies during World War II.

Wow that’s really interesting thank you. I know that white was the colour of royal mourning in France as Mary Queen of Scots wore this after her first husband the Dauphin died.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/style_and_beauty/4651721-royal-style-on-with-the-chic-and-the-royal-mystique
New thread....

Please join us on the new thread!