Historic Swedish royal wedding dresses

　Within the historical collections of the Royal Armoury [Livrustkammeran] in Stockholm are preserved some astonishing examples of Swedish royal wedding dresses. Some are in the forms of fully preserved dresses, others sections from the same, such as trains or loosely attachable pieces of the robe de cour, such as the corset. Whilst many are within the collections but mostly not exhibited for conservation reasons, the fact that they have been preserved at all, is extraordinary.
　　In British terms, one of the oldest royal wedding dresses which has survived – albeit in adapted form – is that in the Royal Ceremonial Dress Collection which was worn by the Prince Regent’s daughter, Princess Charlotte on her marriage in 1816. Encountering these costumes enables the viewer to transcend time through textile somehow, giving the beholder also a unique sense of the historic wearer’s proportions, lending them a sense of their physical presence, something which portraiture does, in a different way. The Swedish royal examples are older and of exceptional quality.The ivory-coloured bridal gown worn by Sweden’s present Queen Silvia on her marriage to King Carl XVI Gustaf in 1976, has been preserved. It was created by Dior of Paris, when the Queen wore in for her wedding in Stockholm’s Storkyrkan, together with the historic cameo tiara with red gold and pearls, worn by Princesses Birgitta and Desiree of Sweden at their marriages, but originally worn by the wife of King Oscar I, Queen Josefina. The wedding outfits of Oscar I and Queen Josefina, survive in the Royal Armoury. The Queen’s long bridal train had been worn by Princesses Birgitta and Desiree respectively; it was so long that it took the newly-appointed pages some little time to fold it into the carriage, in which the Queen and King then drove through the streets of Stockholm. Her Majesty reflected in an interview given for a past exhibition of her dresses at Stockholm’s Royal Palace: “Dior had also made my wedding dress, it was only natural for me to ask them to make my first Nobel dress”.
　　This was repeated when in 2016-17, five royal wedding dresses were displayed at the Royal Palace, to mark the 40th wedding anniversary of the King and Queen of Sweden. The dresses worn by Queen Silvia, Crown Princess Victoria, Princess Madeleine, Princess Sofia and Princess Lilian of Sweden were on display.Read more at:black bridesmaid dresses | green bridesmaid dresses