Tiara of the Month: Queen Sirikit of Thailand’s Floral Ruby Bandeau
royals tiara of the month
Emma Samuel Natasha Leake Harriet Johnston Annabel Sampson Isaac Bickerstaff Chandler Tregaskes Charlie Fenton Condé Nast
Queen Sirikit wore the dazzling diadem on a Royal Tour in the 1960s
https://www.tatler.com/verso/static/tatler-international/assets/favicon.ico
Tatler
In 1960, Queen Sirikit of Thailand embarked on a global royal tour with a bespoke wardrobe made exclusively for her by Balmain. The tour included a visit to the Vatican to meet Pope John XXIII, celebrating the kinship of Buddhist and Roman Catholic traditions. For this, Queen Sirikit donned a white diamond and ruby bandeau known as the Floral Ruby Bandeau. She wore the glamorous diadem around a chic up-do and accompanying lace veil, along with a string of elegant pearls around her neck.

Read More

Andrew Parker Bowles wed Camilla Shand – now Queen Camilla – 51 years ago today in the ‘society wedding of the season’

Royals, military power-players and society swans were in attendance when Andrew Parker Bowles wed Camilla Shand in London

Featuring gems styled as individual flowers, each escalating in size and culminating in a prominent central ruby, the bandeau is a tiara which sits across the top of the head. According to The Court Jeweller, sources suggest that the central ruby stone at its centre is interchangeable.

Queen Sirikit also wore the tiara again in 1960 for a grand state banquet in Belgium, hosted by King Baudouin of Belgium at the Royal Palace of Brussels. During the visit, Queen Sirikit paired the tiara with diamond earrings and a glittering diamond necklace with a pendant. Draped across her was an elegant sash, secured with a diamond brooch. Only a month prior to this, the King of Belgium had announced his engagement to Spanish aristocrat Fabiola de Mora y Aragon, who became Queen Fabiola of Belgium.

Read More

Beatrice’s tiara moment: how the Princess wore her mother Sarah, Duchess of York’s glittering jewels at the Jordanian royal wedding

Princess Beatrice wore the York Tiara, which has not been seen in public for over two decades and was made for Sarah, Duchess of York’s wedding

Queen Sirikit was born in 1932, the eldest daughter of Prince Kitiyakara, the Thai Ambassador to the United Kingdom and later France. Whilst studying in Paris, 15-year-old Sirikit met King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand. He had been enthroned King Rama IX unexpectedly following the abdication of his childless uncle in 1935 and death of his eldest brother from an unexplained gunshot wound in 1946.

Read More

Inside the glamorous first wedding of Grace Kelly’s daughter, Princess Caroline of Monaco

Princess Caroline and her first husband, Philippe Junot, tied the knot 46 years ago this week

Sirikit visited the King regularly during his recuperation from a serious car accident and they married in 1950, just one week before his re-scheduled coronation. Their reign was popular and long, lasting 70 years and 126 days – the length of which has only been surpassed by King Louis XIV of France and Queen Elizabeth II. The King had 30 different prime ministers, survived numerous military coups, and managed a reported US$30 billion bank account. If true, this would make him the richest monarch. The Thai Crown Jewels include the 545-carat Golden Jubilee brown diamond, the largest cut diamond in the world.

Read More

King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand died in October 2016 and Queen Sirikit, now 90, has largely retreated from public duties. The crown passed to their son King Vajiralongkorn in 2016, known as Rama X. Lèse Majesté in Thailand forbids criticism of the monarch but Vajiralongkorn’s reign has been hailed as a less formal one by certain publications, citing his extravagant lifestyle and eccentric ways a distraction: he threw a four-day funeral for his beloved poodle known as ‘Air Chief Marshal Fufu’.