Even in the woke era, designers can’t resist a royal muse
Royals don’t have to be well known to fulfil their fashion destiny
20 February 2021 • 6:00am
Lady Kitty Spencer for Dolce and Gabbana
Dolce & Gabbana have just made it official: Lady Kitty Spencer, Diana’s niece, daughter of a model, fiancée of a man 31 years her senior and ambassador for Centrepoint, the homeless charity, has been appointed an official ambassador of their brand.
The only surprising aspect is that it took so long. Lady Kitty has been a decorative presence at their shows – both on the catwalk and in the front row – for the past four years.
Danielle Magness-Wellmann/Getty Images
Royal-fashion bloggers report on the styles of the likes of Meghan Markle and Kate Middleton.
While the pandemic presented challenges, it s pushed them to continue diversifying their content and offerings.
Amanda Dishaw, editor-in-chief of Meghan s Mirror, said it started as a hobby but became a six-figure business.
For Danielle Magness-Wellmann, 41, dressing like members of the British royal family isn t just a pipe dream it s an expensive and time-consuming hobby.
Wellmann, whose Instagram account has over 5,000 followers, estimated that she s spent about $30,000 over eight years buying regal outfits identical or similar to those of royals like Meghan Markle, Kate Middleton, and Queen Letizia of Spain.
“
Oh! This was the happiest day of my life!”
With these words, Queen Victoria described her wedding day in her diary – 10 February 1840, writing up the event for the day’s entry from Windsor Castle. It marked the beginning of her marriage to her cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. The opposite date of this ecstatic exhortation of joy on behalf of the Queen was unquestionably 14 December 1861; the day of the death of the Prince Consort at Windsor Castle, after which there was a hiatus of two weeks, before the grief-stricken Queen could even bring herself to record the event of the previous fortnight in a journal entry. Twenty-one years had preceded this date, during which the Queen had given birth to nine children, five daughters and four sons.
10th February 2021
Queen Victoria’s wedding dress is a powerful symbol of what she would refer to in her journal as the ‘
happiest day of my life’. Most probably, it represents more than any other item of clothing or object, the Queen’s identity as a royal bride. Certainly, she chose to wear it again in 1847, when she was painted in her wedding attire by the fashionable portraitist Franz Xaver Winterhalter, as a gift for Prince Albert on their seventh wedding anniversary. The simplicity of the dress could not be mistaken. Queen Victoria was appearing as a woman, dressed as she was on the day she became a royal wife.