Princess Diana went from a 27-inch waist to a 23-inch waist for her wedding, to fit into a gown designed partly by Prince Charles!
Princess Diana, like many a bride-to-be, wanted to look the absolute best on her wedding day and wanted to fit perfectly into her wedding dress. The 19-year-old who was gearing up to tie the knot with Prince Charles reportedly wanted to shed off as much weight as possible before her royal wedding.
According to designer Elizabeth Emanuel, who was the person behind Diana's gorgeous wedding dress for her wedding which took place on July 29, 1981, told People Magazine that the People's Princess was quite eager to shed her “puppy fat” before she walked down the aisle. “Most brides do lose weight,” Emanuel told the magazine. “So we weren’t that worried when she did. She was looking fantastic. She ended up with a 23-inch waist from a 26-to 27-inch."
"She just walked more confidently. She just was suddenly growing up, you know? But I think she felt very good about how she looked.” Emanuel also went on to recall how her husband, and then partner, helped her design the royal bride-to-be's wedding dress in total secrecy.
“She was just lovely, really kind of easygoing,” said Emanuel about the future Princess Diana. “We never had any special instructions about how to make the wedding dress. That added a bit to the fun of it all, made it a bit of an adventure.” She also mentioned how the duo collectively decided to make Diana's bridal train as long as possible because “St. Paul’s Cathedral is a really big area to fill.”
According to Emanuel, on the day of her royal wedding, Lady Diana casually strutted around in jeans and watched TV while having her beautiful jewel-encrusted tiara added to her hair. “She was incredibly together and wasn’t panicking,” recalled Emanuel. “But I was really worried about all things that could possibly go wrong. We’d taken smelling salts, glucose tablets — what if she feels faint? What if she passes out? Spills something down her skirt?"
"I had this kind of horror that maybe the train would drop off. We sewed her into things, we pinned her into things.” However, when the time came, the dress easily cascaded out of the royal carriage while Diana walked gracefully beside her father John, the 8th Earl Spencer.
As per reports by Town&Country magazine, Princess Diana's wedding dress was carefully embroidered with sequins, frilled lace and close to 10,000 pearls. According to the publication, the wedding dress designers attached an 18-carat gold trinket, which was studded with white diamonds as well. She also had a 25-feet long veil, and her silk shoes reportedly were covered in 542 sequins and 132 pearls.
Emanuel revealed during her interview that she has also created a special umbrella for Diana, which was basically an umbrella with matching pearls if ever there was a weather condition for rain to occur. And even though the bride-to-be managed to spill some Quelques Fleurs perfume on the dress, she still successfully hid the stain during the ceremony.
“It’s always been about a butterfly emerging from a chrysalis,” said Emanuel. “And that is her story, really. She was emerging into a new world, a new life’s adventure.”
However, this isn't the first instance where Diana has proven how carefree and easy-going she was in her daily life. Quite recently, it was reported that Prince William had experienced a very embarrassing or rather an unusual birthday 23 years ago when he was 13 and it was all thanks to his late mother Princess Diana.
Princess Diana was known to have a fun side to her but little did people know that she would turn Prince William's 13th birthday into something that people would find very hard to forget. As it turns out, the young princess wanted her son to feel extra special and enjoy his birthday in a way he wouldn't have imagined. As reported by Daily Star, Princess’s former chef, Darren McGrady, recalled how Diana had picked out a very peculiar looking birthday cake for William.
“I came into work that morning and went down to the refrigerator, opened the door and I was just confronted with the biggest pair of boobs I’ve ever seen in my life," he recalled. “The Princess had ordered a boobs cake for William’s 13th birthday. I wish I’d taken a photograph of it! I didn’t know anything about it. I just thought, 'Oh my gosh'." While Prince William turned red looking at the cake, Prince Harry insisted that he wanted a similar birthday cake on his birthday.
While Darren was surprised to see the cake, he could not wrap his head around on who could have possibly ordered it. "I asked the butler, 'What on earth is this?' and he said the Princess had ordered it for William’s birthday," he recalled. However, this wasn't the only surprise Princess Diana had in store for her loving son. To make things more interesting, she had invited some top supermodels to the event as well.
“I remember that day really well because the Princess said they were coming," he said. "I was super excited and I wanted to meet them too but I didn’t get the chance. It was Claudia Schiffer, Christy Turlington, and Naomi Campbell.”