She’s best known for her no-nonsense approach to life, as well as her love of the outdoors and equestrian sports, but despite her go-to style comprising Barbour jackets and Dubarry boots, Princess Anne has been known to wear a tiara when the occasion calls for it. Her go-to diadem is the Meander Tiara, one that she inherited via her father, the late Duke of Edinburgh. The full diamond bandeau, which features a Greek key pattern and honeysuckle motifs, belonged to her paternal grandmother, Princess Alice of Battenberg, who was given it as a wedding present upon her marriage to Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark.
Supremely elegant, there is a large brilliant-cut diamond encircled within a pavé laurel wreath at the centre of the piece. When her son married the then Princess Elizabeth in 1947, Princess Alice gave the Meander Tiara to her daughter-in-law as a gift. Whilst Queen Elizabeth has not been seen wearing the tiara herself, the precious legacy was bequeathed to their only daughter, Princess Anne in the late 1960s.
Anne has worn the tiara many times since, including to the State Opening of Parliament in 1970 and the 1988 Guildhall Banquet. As a touching tribute to her grandfather, Zara Phillips paired her mother’s Meander Tiara with a Stewart Parvin dress for her 2011 wedding to English Rugby player Mike Tindall..