{Coronation Gowns / Excerpt No. 2}

With the beginning of Season Two of Victoria on PBS, I'll continue sharing excerpts from one of my guest-speaker presentations, “SOMETHING MOST ROYAL: Recreating Crowns & Gowns for Victoria & Elizabeth,” featuring costume design stories from both Victoria and The Crown on Netflix. Below is the second in the series (first one posted on November 18, 2017) about Queen Victoria's ornate coronation garments.

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Queen Victoria kept a detailed Journal during her lifetime and wrote a long description of her coronation day, a unique record of the event. When she arrived at Westminster Abbey, the heavy red velvet and ermine mantle of her Parliament robe, with its eight-foot-long train, was added for the procession down the nave to the prepared ‘theatre’ in the Abbey.  (The robe is made up of a kirtle and mantle: the kirtle fits over the gown or uniform like a tunic/weskit; the mantle is an over-garment with a train, worn over the kirtle.)

 

According to historian Kay Staniland in In Royal Fashion, “following the formal rituals of the recognition and oath,” the Queen, in the privacy of St Edward’s Chapel (which is hidden behind a stone wall behind the high altar) “was divested of the Parliament robe…. Normally a king was disrobed in full view of the congregation; however, from motives of delicacy, anointing on the breast was omitted at Victoria’s coronation and she therefore re-entered the ‘theatre’ already wearing the cloth of gold supertunica over her colobium sindonis.” 

The linen colobium sindonis is a plain linen garment, with sacred ritual associations—“a simple, humble gown which contrasts with the regal splendour of the robes.“ This is tied or sashed over the queen’s satin gown…kind of like a full-size bib to cover and protect the formal gown. Then this richly woven gold supertunica is worn over it all and “is the second robe used in the ceremony”; there will be others! 

“Seated on St Edward’s chair, beneath a cloth of gold canopy held by four knights of the Garter, Victoria was anointed, on her forehead only, by the Archbishop of Canterbury. This is the most solemn part of the coronation ceremony.” Moving from the sacred chair, “the Queen was then robed in her dalmatica and returned to St Edward’s Chair for the crowning and investiture with regalia.” 

(The dalmatica for Victoria—another “cloth of gold” but this one has a train—was "crafted in a resplendent gold tissue cloth embellished with British emblems in an ornate print: purple thistles, pink roses with green leaves, golden eagles and green shamrocks"…. ) 

“When the homage and remainder of the service were completed, the Queen retired to the privacy of St Edward’s Chapel to be divested of her cloth of gold robes” (there were two by now!), “which by tradition were left at Westminster.” 

Now arrayed in a purple velvet robe (ie, kirtle and mantle)—not the red velvet Parliamentary robe she wore in—and “wearing the Imperial State Crown…” (and, indeed, a special crown had to be made to fit Victoria’s petite head!) “…and carrying her scepter and orb, she processed back down the nave and out the Abbey to the state coach, which took her back, in a long impressive procession along a crowded route [of cheering subjects], to Buckingham Palace.” Back home at last!!

The marvelous costume designer for the first season of “Victoria” on PBS, Rosalind Ebbutt, had to either faithfully recreate all of this coronation finery—gowns and robes and tunics and more—or “hire” pieces from the various well-stocked-up-on regalia costume houses in London! ~

[Images above are slides from my "Something Most Royal" presentation.]

{Coronation Gowns / excerpt No. 1}

Here's an excerpt from one of my presentations, “SOMETHING MOST ROYAL: Recreating Crowns & Gowns for Victoria & Elizabeth,” featuring costume design stories from PBS’ Victoria and Netflix’ The Crown about recreating the royal wedding gowns and ornate coronation garments. (Since you can read about Victoria and Elizabeth's wedding gowns in my latest book, I thought I'd share information about their coronations here!)

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Sometime between Victoria’s accession to the throne and her coronation in 1838, just over a year in time—“the Mistress of the Robes received an enquiry from the Treasury about the cost of the robes the Queen would require…this would need to be included in the overall coronation expenses to be presented to Parliament for official approval.”

For the garments alone, there were hundreds of busy fingers! Not just dressmakers, robe-makers, shoe and stocking makers, as well as crown-makers to engage and instruct, but decisions, like:

Was there time to custom-weave silk satins, silk velvets and cloths of gold…or would these precious fabrics have to be bought—Heaven Forbid!!—“off the shelf”? And what about the regal wear for the Queen’s Maids of Honor?

Would a new crown have to be made for the monarch’s tiny head? Would her tiny feet reach the floor once seated in the sacred 500-year-old St Edward’s Chair?

So many dilemmas, so little time!!

Nonetheless, at 10 on the morning of 28 June 1838, the Queen sets off from Buckingham Palace “wearing the kirtle of her Parliament robe over her dress of gold-brocaded white satin,” according to official records. 

“In paintings of Victoria’s coronation her dress is consistently obscured by her robes and only recently has it become possible to gain an idea of this rich silk dress, when a page was deciphered from the ledgers of the Office of Robes as relating to the coronation.” (So this is how Rosalind Ebbutt, the costume designer, knew how to recreate Victoria’s gown in a more authentic design.) The original fabric, probably of Spitalfields manufacture, is “a design of cartouches and flowers worked in sliver-gilt strip on a white satin ground”—probably “off the shelf” instead of custom woven, and probably made by QV’s “long-serving dressmaker, Mary Bettans.”

Jenna Coleman from "Victoria" on PBS

Victoria was also wearing the silver, gold and “diamond circlet of George IV, one of the most familiar pieces of royal jewelry. (We’ll see it later with Queen Elizabeth.) Victoria had it reset with diamonds and pearls from the royal collection” (in fact, it is “set with 1,333 diamonds, including a 4 carat pale yellow brilliant in the centre of the front cross”)… “and Victoria wore it constantly until the death of her husband Prince Albert.”

Although made for George IV’s extravagant coronation in 1821, “the diadem has been regularly worn (and slightly modified) by queens regnant and consort from Queen Adelaide onwards. This feminine association belies its origin….”

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[to be continued....]