How Kate Middleton’s Royal jeweller transcended the gem industry,
Kiki has been with Kate since the beginning, even before the now Princess of Wales became a member of the British Royal Family. But it was in fact the previous Princess of Wales, Diana, who was the first royal to put Kiki McDonough on the map – wearing a pair of iconic earrings, and at The White House no less!
Kiki McDonough has royal clientèle in her blood; her father, Robin Axford, was a director at Harvey & Gore, an antique jeweller based in the Burlington Arcade, to whom Queen Mary, perhaps the Royal Family’s most prolific purchaser of jewels, frequented.
It is four decades since Kiki, having previously worked at Vogue for 18 months as a fashion assistant and in the warehouse of a leather goods company, started designing for jeweller Nigel Milne on Grafton Street.
Not long after the launch of her first collection as a partner of Nigel Milne, Sarah Ferguson wore a pair of Kiki’s heart earrings for an official engagement photo with Prince Andrew.
A few months later as the Duchess of York, she arrived in Bordeaux wearing a pair of onyx heart and bow earrings and a pearl and onyx heart necklace – it was the summer of 1986 and the duchess was still glowing from her royal wedding only weeks earlier.
Indeed Sarah Ferguson had gone to Kiki for jewellery not long after her engagement to Prince Andrew, as she was thrown into official engagements from the get-go, and was not yet able to be leant jewels from the Queen’s collection.
Sarah was to become the first of many British royals to wear Kiki McDonough’s colourful jewels on both private and public occasions – culminating in the most regal of all – the Coronation of King Charles III.
In her recently published biographical coffee table book, celebrating forty fabulous years as a jeweller and businesswoman, we discover that Kiki was one of the first fine jewellers to branch away from the traditional cardinal gemstones of diamonds, emeralds, rubies, and sapphires.
From the beginning she ingeniously embraced amethysts and aquamarines, tanzanites and tourmalines – and for Diana, the then Princess of Wales, this may have been another step in paving her own path through the rigours of royal life.
Always known for breaking the boundaries of the traditional princess protocol – with off-the-shoulder and one-shoulder dresses, hemlines above the knee; she also shook-up royal jewels by wearing Queen Mary’s emerald choker as a bandeau, as well as her own Saudi sapphire choker.
So it is not surprising that she found Kiki’s colourful designs a breath of fresh air and in 1990 on a State Visit to the USA, she wore a pair of pearl and amethyst earrings to the White House. A photo from this engagement was on the cover of Hello magazine, amongst many other publications – and the earrings subsequently sold out!
Indeed the story of the former Princess of Wales waiting outside the jeweller’s first standalone store, on Elizabeth Street in Belgravia, is legendary: Kiki was making a cup of coffee and thought that a builder was joking when he told her that the princess was about to take the handle off the door – she seemed so keen to enter! He wasn’t, joking that is!
But it is Kate, the current Princess of Wales, who has been her most successful royal patron with (according to several sources) at least 20 pieces in a rainbow array of colours.
As Kate Middleton – it was on her first royal engagement in February 2011 that we saw the future queen wear Kiki McDonough earrings to a lifeboat naming ceremony in Anglesey, Wales.
In her book, A Life of Colour, the jeweller admits that Kate, has been “a great help in the evolution of the brand”.
Indeed I think she might well have a pair of earrings to match every single outfit in her wardrobe in every colourway possible!
In recent years we have also seen Queen Camilla wearing pendant jewels from her daughter in law’s favourite jeweller.
Perhaps Kiki McDonough’s most official royal commission however was from Buckingham Palace in early 2023: the creation of a cypher brooch for Her Majesty Queen Camilla and her Companions, to be worn at the Coronation on May 6th 2023.
The jewel is created in 18 carat white gold and set with diamonds, designed in the form of the Queen’s cypher – with C (Camilla) and R (Regina) intertwined, with a crown above.
Of course, Kiki is more than just a jeweller to royals, my son has a pair of exquisite enamel and gold cufflinks that were given to him by his godmother. She is also a brilliant businesswoman – who inspires new generations of jewellers every day.
Kiki McDonough: A Life of Colour: 40 Years of Gemstone Jewellery available on Amazon at £49.99
