A bride upstaged by fancy hats, a prince's tight pants,
and a hole that had the Queen fuming. The Royal Family may look put together at all times,
but these wedding wardrobe malfunctions prove they're not immune from fashion faux pas.
While some may worry about the possibility of rain occurring during an October wedding,
Princess Eugenie and guests found themselves fighting off serious winds on her big day.
The princess was married on October 12, 2018, which was right in the middle of Storm Callum's
sweep over the UK. Wind gusts as high as 86 miles per hour reached parts of Wales,
while heavy rains caused flooding on the coasts. Luckily, Princess Eugenie and Jack
Brooksbank's nuptials weren't affected by any rain, but the high winds stemmed
over into the outskirts of London — right where the wedding was taking place at Windsor Castle.
"Princess Charlotte and Prince George hamming it up for the cameras in
England - little windy there — til a giant gust of wind takes down their whole crew."
The winds caused quite a few wardrobe malfunctions for guests entering the chapel. English model and
singer Pixie Geldof , for example, had to hold on tightly to her yellow fascinator as her pink
frock blew about. Demi Moore, Naomi Campbell, and Tyra Banks all had similar issues and were
photographed clutching their fascinators while holding their dresses in place.
However, it wasn't only the celebrity guests who found themselves grappling with the
elements. Catherine, Princess of Wales, was also spotted having what looked to be a very Marilyn
Monroe-esque moment as the winds whisked up her skirt. Quick to avoid any potential exposure,
Catherine held her skirt down. Now, we do know that Catherine makes a point
of having weights sewn into the hems of her dresses and skirts to keep garments
from flying up. Perhaps she needed heavier weights on this particularly blustery day.
At Prince William and Princess Catherine's 2011 wedding, Queen Elizabeth II had a team
of stylists to make sure she was looking her very best for the occasion. However,
Her Majesty reportedly left the ceremony angry over the fact that there was a gaping hole in her
right glove — a situation that would later become nicknamed "Holegate" within the palace walls.
Stylist Bernard Connolly, who worked for the queen when the malfunction happened, explained to the
Daily Mail how seriously the queen's designers and stylists took what happened, saying -
"You don't do that, you wouldn't do it in a fashion show, or in a photo shoot,
and you certainly wouldn't do it to a monarch. It was not just any engagement,
but the future King getting married."
It was reported that from then on, the queen would always carry a spare
pair of gloves in her purse to prevent any mishaps like this one from happening again.
No matter which country you hail from, one international bridal rule that will forever
remain is to not upstage the bride. After all, it is her special day, and it would be rude to
pull focus. So, while making sure to look your best is usually the right move for the occasion,
drawing excessive attention to yourself via your outfit might be a warrant for
some unwanted backlash — backlash that Princess Eugenie and Princess Beatrice
came to know all too well thanks to some hats that were a bit too fancy.
For Prince William and Princess Catherine's wedding, the royal sisters each opted to
don dramatic, over-the-top Philip Treacy fascinators. Eugenie chose a bright blue
shade adorned with an arrangement of dark purple flowers and a burst of white feathers sticking
out from the top. Beatrice went with a neutral blush-colored dress and a matching fascinator
shaped like a giant bow, which was pinned to the front of her voluminous hairstyle.
The sisters went on to face a great deal of scrutiny from the public, mainly for choosing
such flashy headpieces at an event where the focus was supposed to be on Princess Catherine.
When Prince William proposed to Princess Catherine in Kenya with a 12-carat
blue sapphire surrounded by 14 solitaire diamonds that belonged to his late mother,
Princess Diana, filing a complaint about the piece was certainly at the bottom of
the bride-to-be's priority list. That even goes for the ring's size, which actually was too big
for her finger. Though one source reported to The Sun that Catherine loved the ring,
straight away she found that it was simply too large, with the source saying -
"A bride's worst nightmare is looking down and seeing her ring has fallen off. One can
only imagine how this is magnified when you are marrying the future King of England."
"Well I just hope I look after it."
"If she loses it she's in big trouble."
"But it's very — it's very, very special."
Therefore, Catherine opted to have the ring resized to better fit her finger,
and naturally, the Princess of Wales had to ensure that the same issue wouldn't happen
with her wedding band. An anonymous source told the Daily Mail that she
requested the ring be adjusted to be a size smaller to prevent it from slipping off.
However, that ring ended up being too small, so Prince William had a bit of a struggle
while placing it on her finger at the ceremony. Viewers and guests likely figured nerves were to
blame for the awkward ring exchange, but the couple reportedly did not sweat it too much,
as a source claims that William and Catherine were amused by the moment.
Not all royal wedding mishaps are monstrously embarrassing situations; in fact, some of these
mistakes are moments the royals look back on rather fondly — at least according to Camilla,
Queen Consort, who recalled an incident on her wedding day in a 2022 BBC One program -
"For some unknown reason, I put on a pair of shoes and one had an inch heel
and one had a two-inch heel. I mean, talk about hop-a-long. And there was nothing I could do."
While some royals might've melted down over such a mishap, the monarch all but shrugged
it off. As Camilla noted in the special, Queen Elizabeth was amused by the gaffe, recalling -
"I was half way down in the car before I realized and, you know, she could
see and laughed about it and said, 'Look, I'm terribly sorry.' She had a good sense of humor."
There is no denying that Princess Diana's wedding dress was, and is to this day,
one of the most recognizable dresses in history. Designed and crafted by Welsh
couple Elizabeth and David Emanuel, the construction was left entirely up to them.
"It was so romantic, it was creative, and it was fairy tale,
so I think it's definitely a dress of its time."
On the wedding day, viewers around the globe gushed over the fairytale dress, while others
were quick to notice one major detail: The dress appeared to be rather rumpled as Diana stepped out
of the carriage. As Elizabeth recalled on ITV's 2018 special "Invitation to a Royal Wedding" -
"We did know it would crease a bit but when I saw her arrive at St. Paul's and we saw the creasing
I actually felt faint. [...] It was quite a lot of creasing. It was a lot more than we thought."
Though there was a rehearsal, the Emanuels had not factored in that Diana would be
riding in the carriage with her father on the day of the wedding,
meaning there was less space for the dress. In the end, the Emanuels felt
that the imperfections added to the romance of the day, enhancing Diana's beauty even more.
If you look closely at photographs of King Charles III and Princess Diana's wedding,
you'll see Diana holding up her dress so that she wouldn't trip on it. While that might have been
part of the reason why she was carrying her dress in such a way, there was more to the story. Years
later, it came out that she had actually spilled perfume on the dress, and clutching the area was
her attempt to cover up the spot. Diana's makeup artist reported that while the princess was simply
trying to apply the perfume she accidentally spilled some right in the center of the gown.
Diana did her best to hide the area in photographs, as neither she nor her team
wanted a perfume spot to steal focus at such a historic and regal occasion.
Fortunately for the royal, she succeeded in concealing the stain throughout the day.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's wedding was mostly smooth sailing for everyone, minus a
minor malfunction in the trouser department on Prince William's end. As thousands of onlookers
gathered outside Windsor and millions tuned in on the TV to catch a glimpse of the royal wedding,
lip reading expert Terry Ruane was watching and later stated in the Daily Mail that
William seemingly said "my trousers are too tight" as he walked with Prince Harry towards
St. George's Chapel. But William decided to endure for the sake of his brother.
Lest anyone think this was a situation where William grabbed a pair of slacks
off the rack and hoped for the best, his and Harry's military uniforms were
hand-crafted by Savile Row's Dege & Skinner. Alas, it was also reported
that Harry himself was also complaining of the trousers being too snug for his liking.
It really is not uncommon for a bride to wake up on her wedding day feeling a mix of excitement,
joy, and anxiety. But for Queen Elizabeth II, all of these feelings must have been
amplified ten times over as she prepared to exchange broadcasted vows with an estimated
200 million listeners worldwide. Everything started off well until the moment came to
attach Queen Elizabeth's wedding tiara to her veil. As the hairdresser began to arrange
the fringe tiara in place, it completely split into two seemingly out of nowhere.
The fringe tiara was originally crafted for Queen Mary,
Elizabeth's grandmother. The diamonds came from another headpiece that doubled as a necklace,
which was given to Queen Mary on her 1893 wedding day. Mary passed the tiara down to
Queen Elizabeth's mother, who then lent it to Queen Elizabeth on her wedding day
for her "something borrowed." Alas, it also was her "something broken."
Fortunately for the then-princess, royal jeweler Gerrard was on standby in case any
issues like this arose. Understandably, this was an all hands on deck situation:
The tiara was sent to the jewelry workshop via police escort and was welded back together at
the last minute, allowing Elizabeth to wear the tiara as planned on her wedding day.