In nearly two months time on May 19th, the wedding we have all been waiting for will be happening! The wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle at Windsor Castle, is set to be the most anticipated wedding of 2018, and I for one cannot wait for the big day! I think the public opinion of the Royal Family fluctuates, and unless you are a staunch royalist… they royals definitely go up and down in the eyes of the British public. Price Harry has got to be everyone’s favourite Royal, and despite the two being huge figures in the public eye, their love story seems to be a normal kind of relationship of two people falling in love. Both having long term previous partners, Meghan being married before, it is far more representative of relationships in Britain nowadays. I mean the whole proposal story while cooking a roast dinner, you cannot get more normal than that… despite the absolute whopper of a diamond ring, which is not so everyday I’ll admit that!
To celebrate the upcoming wedding I wanted to look back at some of the most important royal wedding flowers, what were the trends and what did we all think of that all important bouquet?! I have my own hopes for Meghan’s flowers and I just know they are going to be as super stylish as she is. I will be setting up a wedding on the morning of the 19th so will miss the all important build up… can you watch a Royal Wedding on catch up?!
I have to begin with the Queen, after recently watching both series of The Crown I have a new found respect for the Queen. She was thrown into the most important role at such a young age, trying to assess her authority over men who had been doing their jobs for years, remain calm and neutral, while trying to retain a sense of family life and raise her children. Of course she has help in all of these aspects, but I really admire her strength of character as a woman and her longevity in her role, rarely slipping up.
Her wedding to Prince Phillip on 20th November 1947 in Westminster Abbey. The Queen’s bouquet was a trailing wired, bouquet and British grown ivory orchids and featured a sprig of myrtle, created by Constance Spry. The myrtle was plucked from the bush grown from the myrtle in Queen Victoria’s wedding bouquet, over 100 years earlier, what a historic sentiment! The following day, it was placed on the grave of the unknown soldier in Westminster Abbey.
Princess Margaret carried a smaller wired bouquet of ivory orchids, this design is very similar to Kate Middleton’s bouquet, and fitted perfectly with her fitted, less traditional wedding dress.
When Diana married Charles, she carried an enormous cascading bouquet of ivory seasonal flowers and foliage, a bouquet totally worthy of that incredible dress! When are mega puffed sleeves making a come back?! Filled with orchids, stephanotis, freesia, lily of the valley and ivy… it is lovely to see that touch of yellow, that complements the ivory nature of her dress. A real show stopper bouquet, and so 80s, and a great contrast to the more subtle and understated bouquets of previous princesses.
Before Meghan stepped onto the scene Kate Middleton was the newest face of the Royals, definitely a more conservative, classic dresser her wedding dress was beautiful, but it held no surprises, and as a future Queen you cannot really expect anything else. Kate carried an exquisite wired bouquet by Shane Connelly, filled with almost all lily of the valley with foliage with floral meaning such as myrtle, which means “hope and love’. All of the flowers were British, and Westminster Abbey was filled with a avenue of British trees, my absolute favourite part of the wedding flowers!
Meghan, a UN women’s advocate, is well known for her powerful speeches on gender equality, and I couldn’t love this quote anymore! “I’ve never wanted to be a lady who lunches, more a woman who works” I love her style and she always looks so great without a nude court shoe in sight (sorry K Mid!) her fashion sense is modern and she has broken traditional Royal rules by wearing trousers ( I know, trousers God forbid!!) to public engagements. So I really hope her dress will be something more modern and less traditional, although she will still have to adhere to a level of formality and tradition marrying into the Royal Family.
(Photo Credit: David Jenkins)
I have high hopes for her wedding flowers, I know they are going to be so beautiful and super stylish. Flower wise, I would love to see a touch of colour added into the flowers, traditionally royal weddings focus on all ivory flowers, which are beautiful… but to us florists it would be groundbreaking if she added in splashes of colour! May is the perfect month for peonies so I will be highly surprised if the wedding flowers are not filled with these blowsy beauties, other seasonal flowers are lily of the valley, scented lilac and blowsy roses which I am sure will feature highly alongside British foliage, if Kate and Will’s wedding is anything to go by.