Why Harriet Sperling Made History by Wearing a Tiara at Her Royal Wedding to Peter Phillips

The bride bucked tradition when she married Queen Elizabeth’s grandson

Peter Phillips and Harriet Sperling depart All Saints’ Church following their wedding on June 6, 2026 in Kemble, England.Credit : 

Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty

Harriet Sperling’s bridal style as she married Peter Phillips came with a surprise.

Queen Elizabeth’s grandson married the NHS nurse on Saturday, June 6, in an intimate celebration, where Harriet dazzled in the Pragnell Tiara.

It was the second marriage for both Harriet, 45, and Peter, 48, and in the past, royal family brides have skipped tiaras when they remarried.

The groom’s mother, Princess Anne, 75, eschewed a tiara and wore flowers in her hair when she wed her second husband, Vice Admiral Sir Timothy Laurence, in 1992.

Harriet Sperling departs All Saints’ Church following her and Peter Phillips’ wedding on June 6, 2026 in Kemble, England.Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty

While Queen Camilla has sported plenty of tiaras, she also went without a royal headpiece when she married the future King Charles in 2005. Instead, Camilla sported a white hat for their civil ceremony at Windsor Guildhall, then she accessorized with a gold-feathered headpiece for their religious blessing at St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle.

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Harriet brought the fairytale glamour by making her tiara debut in the diamond and pearl Pragnell Tiara on her royal wedding day, and fan blog The Court Jeweller reported that she borrowed it from the jewelry house.

Harriet Sperling arrives for her royal wedding to Peter Phillips followed by her bridesmaids Georgina Sperling and Isla Phillips at All Saints Church on June 06, 2026 in Kemble, England.Samir Hussein/WireImage

The bride completed the suite with diamond and pearl drop earrings by Pragnell, the brand behind her engagement ring from Peter. The ring is sentimentally connected to his late grandmother, Queen Elizabeth, whose engagement ring was designed by a jeweler that Pragnell later acquired and because of its similar round design.

According to the family-run British jewelry house, the Pragnell Tiara unusually incorporates design elements typical of both the Edwardian and Deco periods, which is rare in jewelry.

The Pragnell Tiara.Pragnell

“Diamonds highlight a festoon of glittering laurel leaves and articulated floral motifs, bearing great resemblance to the tiara owned by The Princess Royal, in the official photograph celebrating her fiftieth birthday in 2000,” a summary said, referring to the Greek Meander Tiara that Anne sported for a portrait then. Peter’s sister, Zara Tindall, also wore the Greek Meander Tiara when she tied the knot in 2011.

“Favored as a bridal headpiece and owned by the Pragnell family, this delicate tiara has been worn by generations of Pragnell family members and was present at the coronation of both King George VI and Queen Elizabeth II,” the jeweler continued, highlighting the headtopper’s unique link to the crowning ceremonies of the late Queen in 1953 and her father in 1937.

Harriet shimmered in the headpiece for her royal wedding at All Saints Church in Kemble, wearing the tiara with her hair swept back into a chignon.

Peter Phillips and Harriet Sperling smile in an official wedding portrait, June 6, 2026.Mark Nicholson

She arrived with her veil over her face, and the train of her Emilia Wickstead wedding dress was carried by her daughter, Georgina, 13, plus Peter’s daughters, Savannah, 15, and Isla, 14, who served as bridesmaids on the big day.

The groom shares his daughters with his first wife, Autumn Kelly, while Harriet was previously married to fitness instructor Antonio St. John Sperling.

The couple announced their engagement in August 2025, a little more than a year after they were first romantically linked, and their marriage blends their families in a modern-day Brady Bunch.

CRE: https://people.com/why-harriet-sperling-made-history-tiara-royal-wedding-peter-phillips-11992906