The Danish state visit to Sweden continued this evening with a sparkling state banquet at the Royal Palace in Stockholm, with antique jewels linked to the families’ shared royal heritage on display.
On Monday evening, King Frederik X and Queen Mary of Denmark were the guests of honor at a state banquet hosted by King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia of Sweden at the Royal Palace in Stockholm. Ahead of the gala event, both monarchs had made bestowed a few new honors and decorations. King Frederik has been a knight of Sweden’s Order of the Seraphim since 1993, but King Carl Gustaf upgraded him, giving him the order’s collar. Queen Mary was also given the Seraphim to coincide with the visit.
The most senior members of the Swedish royal family–King Carl Gustaf, Queen Silvia, and Crown Princess Victoria–are already knights of Denmark’s Order of the Elephant. In honor of the state visit, King Frederik also gave the Order of the Elephant to Prince Daniel.
Both Queen Mary and Queen Silvia chose suites of jewelry from the collection of Joséphine of Leuchtenberg for the banquet, paired with dresses from their wardrobes. Queen Silvia wore a green lace gown from her archives for the banquet, while Queen Mary debuted a new version of an existing dress. The champagne-colored gown has been in her collection for several years. Tonight, she wore it with a modern lace bodice overlay with a burgundy floral design. (It reminds me a lot of this famous gown from Queen Maxima’s collection.)
With the dress, Mary wore the tiara and jewels from the Danish Ruby Parure. Fittingly, the set’s first owner was Désirée Clary, who became Queen of Sweden through her marriage to Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, later King Carl XIV Johan. The suite of jewels was originally made for the coronation of Napoleon Bonaparte in Paris in 1804. Originally, the set didn’t have a separate tiara, but one was fashioned later by reimagining a set of hair ornaments from the suite.
The rubies came to Denmark in 1869 with Queen Lovisa, Désirée’s great-granddaughter. They were later worn by Queen Alexandrine and Queen Ingrid, who bequeathed them to her grandson, King Frederik, in her will in 2000. She hoped they’d be worn by his future wife–and they were. Queen Mary debuted them a few days before her royal wedding, 20 years ago next week, and she’s been wearing them ever since. For this banquet, she wore the tiara, plus smaller settings of the earrings, necklace, and brooch from the parure.
Mary also added a diamond tennis bracelet and a gold Cartier Love Bracelet on her left wrist. Her diamond and ruby engagement ring and a diamond eternity-style band are also visible on her left hand in this picture.
She added the gold, ruby, and diamond bangle from the parure, plus the diamond and ruby cluster ring, to her ensemble as well.
Queen Silvia sparkled in the Leuchtenberg Sapphires for the banquet, wearing the tiara, earrings, necklace, and brooch from the set. The jewels came to Sweden in the 1820s with Joséphine of Leuchtenberg, a granddaughter of Empress Joséphine of France. They’ve been worn by the royal ladies of the Bernadotte family ever since.
With a shimmering silver gown, Crown Princess Victoria also wore heirloom diamond pieces from the family vaults.
She selected the Connaught Diamond Tiara for the dinner. It was one of the wedding presents offered to her great-grandmother, Princess Margaret of Connaught, when she married the future King Gustaf VI Adolf of Sweden in 1905. (Margaret is, of course, also the great-grandmother of King Frederik X of Denmark.) Victoria’s diamond earrings have an even longer royal history: they’re part of the parure of jewels that coordinates with the Braganza Tiara, heirlooms from Empress Amélie of Brazil, sister of Joséphine of Leuchtenberg. Interestingly, Queen Mary’s also wearing a piece of Empress Amélie’s jewelry: the diamond frame that surrounds the miniature portrait of her husband, King Frederik X.
Princess Sofia of Sweden also reached for a gown from her archives, wearing the Ida Lanto gown that she wore for the Nobels in 2022.
She also repeated her diamond palmette tiara with the light blue topaz toppers that she wore for the 2022 Nobels. She also wore diamond earrings and a diamond and pearl brooch. The latter comes from the Swedish royal vaults.
Eagle-eyed readers will also have spotted King Carl Gustaf’s sister, Princess Christina, walking in with her husband behind Prince Carl Philip and Princess Sofia. She wore the family’s Four Button Tiara with diamonds and pearls for the banquet.
There was also a state banquet in Norway tonight, complete with a trio of tiaras. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to license photos of that event soon. Stay tuned here, hopefully for Norwegian tiaras and definitely for more jewels from the Swedish-Danish state visit later on tomorrow!
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