Princess Diana’s Butterfly Suite

Today marls the 1st Anniversary of the start of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s visit to Australia, and a jewellery discovery of mine that went around the world. To mark the day, we’re featuring Princess Diana’s Butterfly Suite.

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Featuring gold butterflies pave-set with diamond and sapphires, two earrings and a larger butterfly on a solid gold necklace. Of unknown provenance, though in a distinct 1980s style, the Butterfly Suite was acquired by the Princess of Wales sometime in the mid-1980s. The suite was first worn, with the earrings affixed on the necklace for a Dinner at the Goldsmith’s Hall in 1985, and worn as a suite on the Royal Tour of Canada in 1986. After the Princess’ death, the suite was inherited by her sons.

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On the eve of the start of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s highly anticipated Visit to Australia, Fiji, Tonga, and New Zealand, the couple announced her pregnancy, and it focused the world’s attention on their first appearance. With her stunning Karen Gee sheath dress, the Duchess was wearing a pair of gold butterfly earrings and a gold cuff. I was in class when the first pictures of the day started to appear on social media, and no one could identify the earrings. I had done a feature on Princess Diana’s Top 20 Jewels the year before, going through thousands of pictures, and the earrings looked familiar to a picture I’d seen, though I was sure someone would find them soon. However, when I checked twitter again after a few hours, it appeared that the jewellery was still a mystery. Going to the picture I had in mind, I found the earrings to be a match to the ones worn by Princess Diana, posting it on my social media, after which it totally blew up, with me being mentioned by all the Royal Bloggers and Reporters as well as quite a few international media agencies. It also turned out the bracelet worn by the Duchess was also a piece from her late mother-in-law.

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The Duchess of Sussex wore the Butterfly Earrings on the memorable first Day of the two week tour in Sydney, and also wore them for a Reception at Admiralty House in Sydney. Princess Diana’s Butterfly Earrings were also worn a few weeks ago, when the Duchess launched her Smartworks Collection, and there is no doubt we’ll continue to see them for years to come.

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