VICTORIA'S CHOICE
If you know
one thing about wedding gown history, I would wager that it has something to do
with Queen Victoria beginning the fashion for brides wearing white. (And now,
thanks to her, it has been a tradition of sorts for 175 years.) But I would
also wager that most people don’t know the real reason the 20-year-old monarch
broke the precedent set by earlier royal brides—“dressed in their usual cloths
of silver or gold”—and chose the color white for her wedding gown. Victoria even chose a crown of fanciful, yet wax orange blossoms instead of one of
her dazzling diamond diadems!
Her choices
have been regarded as representing simplicity, modesty and purity—and indeed
the young queen was sentimental with
an “uncluttered fashion preference,” according to costume historian Kay
Staniland. However, Victoria was deeply in love, and this became her guiding inspiration for her wedding attire.
Therefore, with much consideration—taking into account her duty, her position
and her subjects—“the queen decided to make her marriage vows to her ‘precious
Angel’ as his future wife rather than as the monarch,” wrote V & A museum
curator Edwina Ehrman. So Victoria not only opted against wearing the ornate
silver and gold of royalty, but also her regal “crimson velvet robe of state”
feeling “it would only emphasize her seniority, and overshadow the role of her
future husband,” Staniland added.
Victoria’s all-white bridal costume may have been without
the usual glittering royal accoutrements, but it “was actually exquisite and of
great value,” explained Maria McBride-Mellinger, author of The Wedding Dress. Underscoring “patriotic spending,” the queen
commissioned her country’s renowned textile artisans. The rich silk satin for
the gown and its 18-foot court train was woven in Spitalfields and the
beautiful, lyrically-patterned lace for her veil and gown embellishments was
hand made by two hundred women in a Devon village employed for eight months.
The only color Victoria wore was near her heart: a large, brilliant blue
sapphire brooch which had been Prince Albert’s wedding gift to her.
On the day of
the wedding, Victoria’s adoring subjects happily received their queen’s
choices, cheering her carriage on its way to the Chapel Royal at St. James’s
Palace. Dressed in these creamy shades of white and tufts of orange
blossom, I doubt that Victoria had a sense of the remarkably romantic lineage
she was about to inaugurate. Nor could she ever know that her queenly exemplar: “Keep your
relationship top priority,” would make fine advice for today’s busy
wedding-planning brides.
It seems for
this young bride (who just happened to be ruler of an empire), that it came
down to choosing the feelings of her future husband over her own ego.
Victoria’s heart-centered choice changed bridal history and, in turn,
illuminated the supreme sovereignty of a woman in love. ~
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