I'm in two minds about the Liechtenstein wedding dress - I'm never a fan of the net curtain look, but the tiered embroidery is pretty and adds interest. There's only so much you can do to make a traditional wedding dress distinctive, but I thought I'd have a look at some of the other royal wedding dresses to see if I could find some personal favourites amongst the variations on the formula. Apologies for a long post with links instead of actual pictures, but if @Maireas or anyone else wants to upload the pics I'd be delighted. I just had fun looking at all the dresses and wanted to share.
I have a soft spot for Princess Diana’s fairytale concoction: I like the ivory colour, I like that it's so obviously a royal dress: so extravagant in every sense - so unabashedly flouncy, wonderfully detailed decoration, so big - it looks like something out of fantasy. In some ways it's a curious choice for Diana, until you realise how young she was, because it's a dress to hide in (very different from the Versace outfits!). It's also old-fashioned, in the sense that later royal wedding dresses have all been more ordinary, more like something any sufficiently wealthy woman might wear, which is a bit of a pity.
I really like Victoria’s dress too. She took the opposite approach and went for something very simple, so all the focus is on her and Daniel and the marriage ceremony. He looks great too, apart from the outsized bow tie - similar aesthetic - think the pinking on the honour at his waist is a nice touch.
Beatrice also looks lovely. I'm tempted to say her puffed sleeves must have been quite fashion forward, but I reckon she just liked them. I like the square neckline and the bodice shows off her figure yet isn't blatantly sexy. Of course I like the story of the dress - she's got ‘something old, something new, something borrowed’ covered straight away! I wonder what she had as her ‘something blue’? Like Princess Diana’s, hers is a very romantic dress, but belonging to a quite different era.
Of the rest, I think Claire of Luxembourg's is the best lacy look. It looks pretty in some photos and a bit net curtain in others, so I'm going to assume she had good judgement and that in the flesh it looked amazing.
Because we often admire their outfits on here I looked at Mary, Maxima and Letizia's dresses. I don't like Leti's, but from a fashion standpoint it's good that it's distinctive enough for me to dislike it and the collar I dislike presumably wows others. The shaping of the skirts of Mary's is attractive and makes it a bit special. Maxima’s dress is surprisingly ordinary. I really like the contrast pleating, but it's a very subtle contrast between plain and embroidered white.
My favourite of the lot is Camilla’s though. I think it's a stunning outfit. The soft blue-grey is lovely and the floor-length, gold-embroidered coat is regal and so elegant. The gold decorations, combined with her hat (barley-like decoration), say late summer to me, which seems very happy symbolism as well as being beautiful.