When one thinks of Princess Diana’s wedding to Prince Charles on July 29, 1981, naturally, thoughts gravitate toward her iconic wedding gown—an ivory silk taffeta and antique lace creation designed by the husband-and-wife team of Elizabeth and David Emanuel. Complete with its 25-foot train and a tulle veil measuring 153 yards, the dress firmly (and correctly) holds its place in fashion history—but Diana’s wedding look isn’t complete without the Spencer Tiara, which she wore atop her head at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London on that summer day.
Though the glittering Spencer Tiara came to public consciousness just 43 years ago, its origins date back to 1919, when Lady Diana Spencer’s grandmother was given the sparkler as a gift—but more on the tiara’s history in a moment. “The tiara has been in royal circles for decades, because it was also worn by Diana’s grandmother when she was a lady-in-waiting to the Queen Mother,” Lauren Kiehna of The Court Jeweller told Marie Claire exclusively. She added that “Diana and her sisters all wore it for their weddings, and so far, that family bridal tradition has also been carried on by one member of the next generation of Spencer women. Diana’s niece, Celia McCorquodale, wore the tiara on her wedding day in 2018.”
Kate Middleton, who married Diana’s eldest son Prince William in 2011, and Meghan Markle, who married Diana’s youngest son Prince Harry in 2018, didn’t wear the fabled tiara because “it was never a royal tiara, which is why royal brides like the Princess of Wales and the Duchess of Sussex didn’t wear it for their weddings,” Kiehna said.
Sotheby’s describes the Spencer Tiara as being “designed in the garland style as a central heart flanked by continuous running scrolls, interspersed with star- and trumpet-shaped flowers,” it reads. It’s further described as being “Set throughout with circular- and rose-cut, cushion- and pear-shaped diamonds, mounted in gold”; it was given to Lady Cynthia Hamilton in 1919 on the occasion of her marriage to Albert, Viscount Althorp, by Lady Sarah Spencer. Diana’s use of her familial tiara made it “one of the most famous diadems in modern history,” Sotheby’s writes, and, though its link to Diana begins 105 years ago, it is reported to have been created as far back as 1767 and remodeled by Garrard in the 1930s, resulting in the design we see today. In the mid-1970s Diana’s father John Spencer, the 8th Earl Spencer, inherited the tiara, and “It was subsequently worn by all three of his daughters at their wedding: Lady Jane in 1978; Lady Sarah in 1980; and finally Lady Diana the following year, in 1981,” according to Sotheby's.
The tiara remains in the possession of the Spencer family, as “the Spencer Tiara has always belonged to the Spencer family,” Kiehna said. Diana wasn’t given the Spencer Tiara, and it was merely loaned to her by her father and later her brother, who were happy to let her borrow the family heirloom. “While she was Princess of Wales, Diana often borrowed the tiara from her father and her brother [Charles Spencer, the 9th Earl Spencer], who still owns it now," Kiehna said. "Eventually, it will be passed along with the rest of the family estate to Earl Spencer’s son, Viscount Althorp.”
Though The Court Jeweller reports that during her royal life, Diana often wore the Queen Mary’s Lover’s Knot Tiara—part of the royal collection—“it was reportedly much less comfortable to wear, and Diana said that it gave her headaches,” Kieha wrote. “The Spencer Tiara, by comparison, must have been lighter and easier to manage.” Diana continued to borrow her birth family tiara regularly, including in 1983 for her royal tour of Australia, during a visit to Germany in 1987, and for a royal tour of Canada in 1991.
Two of Charles Spencer’s five daughters have married—Lady Kitty Spencer married in 2021, and Lady Amelia Spencer married last year—but neither opted to wear the Spencer Tiara; Lady Eliza Spencer, Amelia’s twin sister, could choose to do so, as could Spencer’s two younger daughters when it’s their time to marry. (They were born in 2006 and 2012, so it will likely be a while before those weddings take place.) Though Spencer’s eldest daughters have heretofore eschewed wearing the tiara, their mother, Victoria Lockwood, wore it for her wedding to Spencer in 1989. Spencer has been married two times since, and both Caroline Freud and Karen Gordon (his current wife, whom he has been married to since 2011) declined wearing the piece, as did, by the way, Spencer’s mother, Frances, when she married into the Spencer family in 1954.
Rumors that the Spencer Tiara will one day be inherited by Diana’s eldest granddaughter, Princess Charlotte, are untrue, Kiehna wrote on The Court Jeweller. Incorrect media reports have even used the tiara to concoct “a competition between young Charlotte and her baby cousin, [Princess] Lilibet,” Kiehna continued.
As previously mentioned, none of Diana’s grandchildren will inherit the tiara, nor will her sons; it will eventually pass to Diana’s nephew, the present Viscount Althorp, and not to any of Diana’s royal descendants.
After Diana’s death in 1997, her brother put the tiara she made so famous on display, shown as part of Diana: A Celebration, the exhibition devoted to Diana’s life that ran for years and traveled around the world, Kiehna wrote. The Spencer Honeysuckle Tiara, which Diana never wore in public, was also displayed in the exhibition, she wrote. More recently, Spencer allowed Sotheby’s to include his family heirloom tiara in its special Platinum Jubilee tiara exhibition, where the public was allowed “to see the gorgeous tiara in truly remarkable detail,” Kiehna wrote on The Court Jeweller, adding of the Spencer Tiara that “It’s such an iconic, aristocratic jewel.”
