The fashion tips that turned Queen Elizabeth into a global style icon

The fashion tips that turned Queen Elizabeth into a global style icon,

Queen Elizabeth II was a style icon with a signature look instantly recognisable around the globe.  

And on the latest episode of the Daily Mail’s Palace Confidential, host Jo Elvin and a panel of royal fashion experts reveal the secrets of Her Majesty’s inimitable fashion sense.

Known for her bold monochromatic looks, Elizabeth’s distinctive style was something forged over time with the help of a handful of trusted advisers.

As a young girl the Queen was often dressed in the same clothes as her sister Princess Margaret, giving her, as Jo points out, a very ‘cute look’ that made her ‘appear younger than her years’.

As a teenager images of her during her mechanics outfit in WW2 again suggested a practical, no-nonsense monarch.

‘She could strip an engine in that suit,’ the Daily Mail’s royals assistant editor Claire Ciscotti said. ‘I think she always had this kind of frugal nature when it came to fashion.

‘I don’t think she cared that much about fashion, in a sense, but I do think she dressed for a purpose. If she was in the country, it was tweed and tartan, and if it was seeing the people, it was bright colors. I just think that fashion wasn’t in the forefront. 

Host Jo Elvin added: ‘She didn’t sit around dreaming about outfits, not like her sister, desperate to get to Prada, but she understood the iconography of the Queen and what she had to wear exactly.’ 

Three of Queen Elizabeth’s iconic block colour outfits, featuring Her Majesty in (l-r) bright pink (2007), sky blue (2017) and lime green (2017)

Queen Elizabeth (then Princess Elizabeth) in her iconic wedding dress, along her husband Prince Philip Mountbatten on November 20, 1947

Elizabeth’s wedding dress is the star of a new exhibition, Queen Elizabeth II: Her Life in Style, at the King’s Gallery in Buckingham Palace 

Perhaps Elizabeth’s first moment of fashion immortality was her stunning wedding dress, which she wore to wed Prince Philip Mountbatten on November 20, 1947.

As the Mail’s royal editor Rebecca English recounts, the gown was embellished with 10,000 seed pearls that one of designer Norman Hartnell’s team had gone out to the States to acquire.

Rebecca explains: ‘Apparently she used her war coupons to buy the silk. A lot of brides around the country tried to gift her their vouchers, their coupons, so that she could have more a more extravagant dress. 

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‘That was illegal, so they had to go back, and the dress itself was made out of this exquisite silk. It was woven in Britain from Chinese silkworms, not Japanese or Italian, because they were our enemies during the war.’ 

But what Elizabeth really became known for was her use of colour, which became more pronounced with the appointment of Angela Kelly as her dresser in 1994. 

Rebecca English said: ‘I think it’s very fair to say Angela was very, very hands on with the Queen in terms of turning the dial on her fashion. 

‘People say to me, ‘You should have seen them together.’ They actually had real fun with it as well. It was not very often that the Queen could cut loose in a way. And Angela once said, without slipping over boundaries, they felt like sisters as well, she instinctively knew what worked for her. 

‘And that’s the thing with Queen Elizabeth. She had very few people in her life she could trust. But once she trusted you, she trusted you implicitly.

‘Someone once said to me that Angela would try to push her a little bit, you know. The Queen used to stick to a cut of a coat or the shape of a hat, but Angela would often try to just turn things up a little bit.’ 

Preferring classic pieces that could be re-worn time and time again, the Queen’s style didn’t change much over the course of her adult life as she continued to step out in her favourite designers from the 1950s until her death – though her choice of colours got bolder over time

The Mail’s royal editor Rebecca English revealed that the Queen was fond of the colour lilac

However, Her Majesty reportedly did not like the colour purple – despite it being historically considered a regal hue

But despite being known for her bold colour palette, Rebecca English reveals that Her Majesty was not fond of purple – generally considered the most regal of hues.  

Rebecca said: ‘I spoke to someone this week who’d dressed the queen for many years, and I said, ‘Oh, did she have any favorite colors?’ And they said to me, blue, pink, lilac. 

‘But she didn’t massively like purple, because she thought it was a mourning colour. She did wear purple, but she preferred lilac, she was less keen on a strong purple. But Blue was absolutely a favorite.’

While bold shades made it easier for the public to spot her, away from her royal duties the monarch was fond of much more muted colours like beige.

Host Jo Elvin explained: ‘During walkabout, she once said, ‘If I wore beige, no one would know who I was.’ 

‘The plain color made up just one per cent of the Queen’s wardrobe in 2012 but there was still a time and a place for beige, namely when the Queen wanted to go incognito in the grounds of Windsor all Balmoral.’ 

And as the panel explain, Catherine, Princess of Wales, appears to have taken a leaf out of the Queen’s style guide by employing the technique of ‘colour drenching’. 

Fashion designer Amanda Wakeley OBE said: ‘I think actually our current Princess of Wales is doing it even better, because she goes one step further and the shoes are the same color as the coat or the dress and the hat.

‘It’s really eye catching. Melania Trump does it quite well too, but I think Catherine is doing it sensationally.

‘What I loved about the Queen was, you know, she’d do this block colour, the hat, the coat, the dress, and then it was always the black shoes and the black lounger bag.

‘But then, if it was raining, she’d have the Fulton umbrella, the see through umbrella trimmed with the color of the dress and the hat. And I thought that was very a beautiful touch.’

To hear more of the royal family’s best kept fashion secrets, subscribe to Palace Confidential on YouTube now.