This Week in Royal Jewels: December 19-January 1

December 19, 2014 – January 1, 2015

Welcome to a super-sized version of our weekly jewel roundup! From Christmas baubles to New Year’s tiaras, we’ve got plenty of sparkle to help you ring in 2015. Enjoy!

10. Queen Elizabeth II was back at King’s Lynn for church on December 28, this time wearing the Frosted Sunflower Brooch with her usual daytime pearl necklace and earrings.

9. The Dutch royal family posed for pictures on December 22 during a Christmas visit to Queen Maxima’s native Argentina. She wore a stack of familiar bracelets…

… and, keeping with this year’s big trend, rather large orange earrings.

8. Queen Margrethe II of Denmark delivered her annual New Year’s speech on December 31. The Queen wore large purple earrings, gray-toned pearls, and a brooch. You can read more about the Queen’s address here.

7. Emperor Akihito of Japan celebrated his birthday on December 23, and the senior members of the royal family gathered with him for a balcony appearance. Empress Michiko departed just slightly from her usual minimalist jewels, wearing a gorgeous multi-stranded pearl necklace.

6. The rest of the ladies of the imperial family — Crown Princess Masako, Princess Kiko, and Princess Mako — all went with standard daytime pearls and brooches for the Emperor’s birthday celebrations.

5. The senior ranks of the imperial family in Japan grew by one on December 29, when Princess Kako, the younger daughter of Prince Fumihito and Princess Kiko, turned twenty. On their twentieth birthdays, imperial princesses officially come of age, and they’re given the Order of the Precious Crown and a set of jewels to wear at the imperial court. Kako wears her new order and her new mirrored set of jewels, which features a fleur-de-lys motif in diamonds, at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo, where she was officially presented to her grandparents.

(source)

4. On January 1, Emperor Akihito delivered his traditional new year greeting at the palace, and the ladies of the family appeared in full court dress. Masako doesn’t attend this event as a general rule (though sometimes we get pictures of her in the car arriving at the palace), and Michiko no longer wears a tiara at the event. But the other imperial princesses do. From left to right above: Princess Kiko wears her wedding tiara and mirrored necklace, and Princess Mako wears the mirrored jewel set she received on her twentieth birthday in 2011, and Princess Kako wears her new jewels. Princess Nobuko and Princess Akiko are also wearing the usual diamond mirrored jewels with delicate diamond drop earrings.

3. The traditional New Year’s Levée was held in Denmark on January 1. The members of the royal family attend in gala jewels and the regalia of the Order of the Elephant. Princess Marie wore a tiara we discussed here recently: Princess Dagmar’s Floral Tiara.

2. Queen Margrethe looked every inch a monarch at the New Year’s Court, wearing the emerald parure from the country’s crown jewels with her Elephant regalia.

1. She may be the second lady in Denmark, but Crown Princess Mary gets my vote for the jewel-wearer of the week. Her continued inventiveness with the heirloom ruby parure fascinates me — here she wears the tiara, the necklace without its pendant drops, and the stud version of the ruby earrings with an added pearl drop. Just lovely. (Plus: purple velvet cape!)