What tiara did Olivia Henson wear to marry the Duke of Westminster ...
Westminster wedding fans rejoice! We finally know what tiara Olivia Henson is wearing as she ties the knot with Hugh Grosvenor, Duke of Westminster, at Chester Cathedral this afternoon.
And what does the bride of the country’s richest man under 40 wear as she marries into the Grosvenor family, a dynasty that dates back almost half a millennium? A piece of family history: the Fabergé Myrtle Leaf Tiara.
The gorgeous piece, says The Court Jeweller, was commissioned in 1906 for the wedding of Lord Hugh Grosvenor and Lady Mabel Circhton. According to the Royal Watcher, the diamond-set tiara is ‘composed of two sprays of myrtle leaves and berries, with stalks of engraved red gold, and leaves in a rubbed-over silver setting.’ A gesture to the Greek tradition of myrtle leaves being sacred to Aphrodite, goddess of beauty, the Fabergé tiara is a fitting choice for the bride-to-be.
Lord Hugh and Lady Mabel’s daughter-in-law, Sally Perry, wore the Myrtle Leaf tiara when she married the 4th Duke of Westminster on 11 April 1945, and the piece was donned by her successor, Viola Lyttelton during her wedding to Robert Grosvenor the next year. Over 80 years later, her grandson, Hugh Grosvenor, 7th Duke of Westminster will watch on as his bride, Olivia, wears the family’s favourite tiara down the aisle.
More recently, the Myrtle Leaf Tiara was worn by Lady Tamara Grosvenor, the Duke of Westminster’s older sister, when she married Edward van Cutsem in 2004. The late Queen Elizabeth saw Lady Tamara wearing the Fabergé treasure of the Grosvenor vault as she walked down the aisle at Chester Cathedral 20 years ago.