Coronation Round Up
Were the Waleses late? Final verdict on Harry and Meghan. Was Kate wearing a cape?
Despite the rain, I thought the Coronation last weekend was a magnificent success.
The primary question we had been wondering for many weeks was finally answered. To my delight, the senior royal women did go with the formal coronation attire rather than joining the rest of the attendees in day dress and hats.
The rumor the week before had been that Kate was going to wear flowers in her hair, rather than a tiara. I thought that sounded very suspect—a little like the false rumor Kate would wear flowers for her wedding. Instead of coming in like a flower child, Kate matched the other senior royal women by wearing an intricate, silver stitched headpiece in a woodsy motif. These headpieces were tantamount tiaras. People described the Jess Collett x Alexander McQueen headpiece as “silver bullion, crystal and silver thread work three-dimensional leaf embroidery.”
A lot of people wondered why the royals opted for these custom pieces rather than wearing tiaras. We know that Charles wanted to project a more modern and scaled back event, so it is possible these pieces were viewed as less ostentatious than a medley of glittering tiaras. They also could have been chosen to appear more avant garde and modern. Finally, the senior ladies all coordinated their ensembles and all wore some variation of a cream/silver headpiece, which looked wonderful at the Abbey and especially good in the formal coronation pictures. Would tiaras have also looked great? Yes. I am not saying I think the headpieces were better than tiaras, but I think the headpieces looked very nice. Kate, in particular, found a way to make her headpiece as close to a tiara as possible, which was appropriate for the Princess of Wales and future queen.
Of course, another focus of the Coronation was Harry and how he and the BRF would interact on the big day. As you likely saw, Prince Harry arrived by bus with his minor royal cousins. Dressed in a custom morning suit by Dior, he walked at the back of the pack up the main aisle of Westminster Abbey as the group made its way to their seats. To me, it was sad to see the once popular royal take that walk. It was impossible not to think of Spare and all the wild accusations and embarrassing escapades revealed in the tome. Some guests smiled and nodded at Harry while others looked down or away.
I hadn’t thought it before, but watching Harry walk up the aisle, it struck me that, in addition to a tactical choice on her part, Meghan’s failure to show was also an act of cowardice. She precipitated Harry’s rift with his family and has encouraged his bizarre and inappropriate revelations that have made the gulf even wider. Then she left Harry to face the Abbey alone.
Speaking of Meghan, I think that the Coronation confirmed all our suspicions about why she skipped the big day. Seeing the senior women in their finery paired with Harry’s strikingly demoted status made clear to me why Meghan declined to come. As suspected, the disparity between the senior royals—William and Kate specifically—and Harry and Meghan would have been striking, and indeed was clear as between the Waleses and Harry. Both the significant difference in their dress codes, which would have highlighted Kate as a princess and left Meghan in the ambiguous dress of both minor royals and commoners, and Harry’s less than prestigious seating—three rows back —underscored more than any other event to-date Harry’s self-propelled demotion.
Harry went straight from the Abbey to the airport where he boarded a commercial flight home to California. Some people noted that he was, therefore, left out of the formal Coronation pictures, but I am inclined to think he would have been excluded regardless. Perhaps his hasty departure was to avoid the sting of this omission, too.
One question that has been debated post-Coronation is whether the Wales family was or was not late.
A number of royal watchers noted that the Order of Service (the program for those of you in the States) listed William, Kate, and children arriving and being seated ahead of the King and Queen:
Members of The Royal Family arrive at the Great West Door and are conducted to their seats in the Lantern. All remain seated.
Their Royal Highnesses The Prince and Princess of Wales, Princess Charlotte of Wales and Prince Louis of Wales arrive at the Great West Door and are conducted to their seats in the Lantern. All remain seated.
Their Majesties The King and The Queen arrive at the West Gate. A fanfare is sounded. All stand.
Instead, they arrived behind the monarch and processed in behind him. One news outlet explained that the Waleses were not late, rather the King was early, which explained the family’s arrival time after the King. Even if they were late, they could have easily been escorted to their seats before Charles and Camilla. Instead, they lined up behind the King and Queen and very formally processed in behind them. Sometimes changes are made after the Order of Service is printed, and I have to assume that whether the Waleses were or were not late, their position processing in was a deliberate change made after the Order of Service went to print.
The final mystery that has been heavily debated is whether Kate had a cape on under her robes or whether she had a second dress. It was clear that under her robes Kate was sporting a circle neckline with embroidery. But when the formal Coronation photos were released, lo and behold, Kate’s neckline was a v-neck.
I wondered immediately if she was wearing a cape/bib under her robes, but after looking at pictures, I could not find any evidence that Kate was wearing a cape—the bottom of the cape was not visible anywhere. There are enough photos that you can piece together a pretty thorough look at most of the front of Kate’s dress under the robes, and I just don’t see a break anywhere. I had dismissed the possibility, but then Alistair Bruce claimed that Kate indeed had a cape on to protect the dress from the ropes and clasps of the robes. Someone on Twitter also claimed that Chris Jackson said in an interview somewhere that there was no time to change between the balcony appearance and the formal photos.
This does remain a mystery. I still cannot see any evidence of a cape. There does appear to be a seam (which you can see on the dress). Perhaps the cape was not a cape but a very form fitting over-jacket and that is the visible seam? That’s the only explanation that would work. Otherwise, I am left to assume that Kate did have two dresses and did change. @ Emma4Royal on Twitter has a number of threads with photos showing that you cannot see the base of a cape, as well as debunking other theories.
In the days after the Coronation, the Waleses undertook a number of engagements and Meghan made a “candid” appearance hiking in Montecito. More on Meghan in a bit.
I am sorry this post took so long to get up. I thought I would have lots of quiet hours to write while taking care of my new baby, but I didn’t consider that newborns like to be held and that takes both arms. :) I will try to get the Meghan post up by the end of the coming week.