Do posh wedding guests have any more clue than we do?

[MontyDonsBlueSuit]

Looking at the coverage of Peter Phillips’ wedding I’m amazed by some of the outfits. Clearly a lot of these people have money but it really doesn’t show - some of the choices look very unstylish to me. Creased dresses, raffia wedges, mismatched accessories. I appreciate it was a rubbish day weather-wise so may have needed a few last minute rethinks but what hope is there for the rest of us when even those with access to the best designers and a presumably healthy budget look pretty average at best.

She’s a beautiful young woman. She looked happy. Her shoes and headpiece were fabulous. But her dress was all crumpled and her top, which didn’t remotely go with the dress, and was also crumpled, looked like a weird pussybow anorak.

It was a floral dress with a matching jacket and hat. It's about the most standard and appropriate wedding guest outfit in existence.

@SisterTeatime, Maybe it did in real life.

This.

Eh? The bride DID wear a tiara. She borrowed one from a shop.

Was it from Claire's?

That's where Meghan's practice one came from wasn't it?

For a normal person, so would I. But you have to consider the context. Anne is a royal princess and has endless resources. And the dress wasn't just old as in a former wear, it was actually old, as in decades old. The RF is very skilled in using clothing to communicate how they really feel. She didn't wear a decades-old dress for her son's wedding, and she lent the first bride one of her tiaras. She also didn't turn up in a sartorial mish-mash. I think we can reasonably deduce what she thought of this wedding. She should have worn something new, looked put-together, and she should have lent her Greek key tiara to Harriet, to signal acceptance. I see that the tiara Harriet borrowed from a shop also had a Greek key design, so she must like it.

But that's all a matter of opinion. It doesn't look like a mishmash to me. It all looks perfectly well matching.

And we only know it's an old dress because she wore it publicly at another family moment. So it's just as likely that the message she wanted to send (if she did at all, which I doubt) is one of welcoming her new DIL into the family with a dress that has family occasion meaning.

🤣 No, but it was small and a mish-mash of designs. Festoons and bows next to Greek key. So loops and curves next to geometric. And you could hardly see it next to her veil, as it was small. Kate's tiara at her wedding was also too small - it got lost against her veil.

Imo Anne should have lent Harriet her Greek key tiara to signal acceptance into the family, much-needed as a second wife. It would have been a really kind thing to do.

Edit to reply to your edit: Apparently it was Kate who practiced with a Claire's one, and that was the suggestion put to Meghan when she wanted to practice with the real one.

Yes, of course it's a matter of opinion. We can't know. And imo, Anne treated Harriet's entry into the family in quite a cavalier fashion.

One man's cavalier is another's relaxed and welcoming!

She is beautiful, but her outfit was awful. And that Jesus crown-of-thorns headpiece she was wearing made her look as if she was on her way to be nailed to the cross! 🤣

Yes, very true!

But also, I think it was mean of Anne not to lend Harriet one of her tiaras when she did for Autumn.

It's all adding up...Anne does not approve!!

@NameChangeMay2026 it clearly is for you! Anne didn't wear a tiara to her own 2nd wedding. Maybe she thinks you shouldn't? Who the fuck knows? Certainly not any of us.

How do you know she didn't? You've taken 2+2 to equal at least 11.

It’s interesting that the two best dressed are the POW and Isabelle de la Bruyere. Both are tall, rail thin and beautiful - feeds into the whole, are they skinny or are they stylish narrative.

Being a beautiful clothes horse is an advantage.

I find this an interesting read on the situation; perhaps she doesn’t approve, but I can well imagine her not wanting to lend a tiara for a second wedding. She might be of the opinion that Harriet already had her “white wedding” and her second one should be more subdued. I really don’t know.

It’s a very good point - I love Isabella’s dress but on me it would look like an overstretched dressing gown as I’m short and booby 🤦🏻‍♀️

Sarah Chatto’s outfit made me smile, I asked in here a while back about wearing black skirt and white top to a wedding and was told I’d be mistaken for the waiting staff. I think I’d have looked smarter than her though! Normally I like her style but the shirt was like school uniform.

Also what are these strange padded headbands all about? I’ve got one I got free in a bath set at Xmas that looks very similar, I use it when I’m washing my face - perhaps I should pair it with my black skirt and white top after all 🤣

This post feels so strange to me 😅 you know they’re literally just people right? Some will be stylish, some not, some will love fashion and spend a lot of time getting it ‘right’, some will simply not care and there’ll be lots in between… just like anyone else!

I remember the story as Harry throwing a wobbler about needing to take the priceless tiara away for Meg’s practice attempts at hair, makeup and sparkly bonce.

The formidable Angela Kelly CVO (Personal Assistant, Adviser and Curator to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II - she was much more than the ‘dresser’ that Harry and others have snobbishly made her out to be) pointed out that there were actual security protocols for such things with very high insurance values. They couldn’t just be taken walkabout.

And that Catherine (aka Kate) had used one from a shop to practice with?

And then Harry shouted and everyone stood up and cried.

Agree @Jimmycooper being slim does lend itself to contemporary views on looking stylish. However, there weren't many porkers in evidence and most of the women in the photos were fairly slim.

I just don't think we Brits do style like some other countries. We find it a bit embarrassing to be really chic and stylish and prefer to be in jeans and a top. My French friends' mothers taught them things like what underwear works best with what clothes, what fabrics sit nicely, what length of skirt / trouser suits their body shape best and what shoe works best with trousers / skirt / dress etc. It is like they come out of the womb and start absorbing style, whereas it isn't something most Brits are taught. When I lived in France, I found French women's frank appraisal of my own style affronting and rude, but as I've got older I realised they were actually trying to be helpful.

lol @MontyDonsBlueSuit I thought exactly the waitress thing about Lady Sarah's white blouse and black skirt!

Sarah Chatto’s outfit made me smile, I asked in here a while back about wearing black skirt and white top to a wedding and was told I’d be mistaken for the waiting staff. I think I’d have looked smarter than her though! Normally I like her style but the shirt was like school uniform.
She normally dresses very nicely but I'm not a fan of 'the crisp white shirt'.

I'm intrigued now, must have a look at the photos. There was a thread once where a poster was going out with a fairly posh man, who had invited her to his engagement party. She had asked S&B for advice, who had formulated the perfect outfit (dress, bag + shoes) and of course everyone was an expert of the fashion sense of the upper set. She came back to the thread to say she had been absolutely mortified as she turned up to the barn, which was literally a barn and everyone was wearing their every day riding clothes and mucking out boots. No one had dressed for the occasion and her long dress, heels, matching bag and freshly done hair was completely out of place. Still makes me laugh now thinking about it.

his friend's engagement party. Her posh boyfriend was not getting engaged.

I loved Anne's outfit. The flamenco dancer meets Eastern European peasant woman is so her. Can't believe someone said it was disrespectful with the "blanket over her shoulders" 🤣