Queen Elizabeth II and her hidden love affair with fashion

Queen Elizabeth II was renowned for her devotion to duty, her faith, her family, her horses and her Pembroke Welsh corgis. Fashion, in the popular imagination, was not her priority. This is a view rebutted by Caroline de Guitaut, who, in addition to her job as surveyor of the King’s works of art, is masterminding the most comprehensive exhibition ever staged of the late Queen’s clothing, in The King’s Gallery at Buckingham Palace.

Caroline tells HELLO! in this exclusive interview that visitors will see proof that Elizabeth II was both an admirer of fine couture and a trendsetter who influenced fashion houses including Gucci.

“One of the things that has been written about the Queen in the past is that she wasn’t interested in fashion,” Caroline says. “The media compared her with her younger sister [Princess Margaret], who went to Paris couturiers, whereas the Queen was supporting the best of British. [Her style] was elegant, restrained and appropriate but something she made recognisable. She absolutely followed fashion.”

The collection, which is kept together at the personal request of King Charles, begins with two little-known bridesmaid dresses that Elizabeth wore in the early Thirties, one with striking frills on the shoulders that gave the young Princess the air of an angel.

She wore it for the wedding of her uncle Prince George, Duke of Kent to Princess Marina of Greece and Denmark. 

Caroline says that the bridesmaid dresses are among her favourites because they are “so lovely and touching and so unknown”. Edward Molyneux’s designs, alongside those of fellow IncSoc founders Norman Hartnell and Hardy Amies, are vital to understanding Elizabeth’s style.

“They’re not really household names in the same way as Christian Dior or Coco Chanel,” she tells us. “It’s very telling, the way a bond was formed with the key figures in London couture.

“The other [bridesmaid dress] was her first Norman Hartnell dress – from 1935, from Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester’s marriage to Lady Alice Montagu-Douglas-Scott.” Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother took her daughter to Norman Hartnell’s workshop to see garments being made.

The late Queen’s most memorable fashion moment came on 20 November 1947, when the public got their first view of her Chinese-silk wedding dress with its 15ft star-patterned train. 

Anticipation had reached such a frenzy that Norman Hartnell whitewashed the windows at his salon in Bruton Street, Mayfair, lest someone glimpsed the gown. “He was so nervous that the embargo would be broken that he went to the Queen,” Caroline says. “He said that he and his team were on standby to create an alternative [dress].”

Although it is now commonplace for the public to imitate celebrity fashions, it was “really unusual” before the Queen’s ascendancy. “Every time she wore something, people would copy it,” Caroline says.

She cites Christopher Kane’s 2011 collection of neon-coloured pastiches of the Queen’s looks and Alessandro Michele’s 2017 Cruise show for Gucci as having been directly inspired by her “classic day look”, adding: “Sometimes they converted it into something else, but it was inspired by her.”

The Queen was involved in the minutiae of her clothing and could be intolerant of frippery. “When carrying out duties, she didn’t want to worry about her clothes, so extra pockets or bows or embellishments were just going to get in the way. Extra things had to be avoided at all costs.”

One example is her Bernard Weatherill houndstooth tweed hacking jacket. “Pockets are finished in different ways, depending on what she put in them. The cotton-lined ones were more durable; the silk-lined ones might have been for riding gloves. There was a hierarchy of pockets,” Caroline says.

She says that the Queen never wore anything by accident, especially when she planned events such as her first Commonwealth tour, which lasted almost six months. “They were planned months in advance. Wearing nothing by accident is a really interesting expression.” 

For the 1967 centenary of the confederation of Canada, she wore a blue and white dress embroidered with maple leaves on the hip line. On a state visit to Pakistan in 1961, she wore a green and white Norman Hartnell dress to a state banquet in Karachi, to match the colours of Pakistan’s flag.

If the monarch ever had regrets about her choices, she never mentioned it, even when her outfits caused a frisson.

“She wore a green neon ensemble for her 90th birthday, and it caused a sensation that a 90-year-old woman would wear such a vivid and contemporary colour,” Caroline recalls. But it was a carefully considered decision planned long in advance. “I don’t think it would get to the point of regret.”

Queen Elizabeth II: Her Life in Style is at The King’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace, from 10 April to 18 October; rct.uk

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