Antique Royal Jewels (and a New Brooch!) for the Duchess of Gloucester

The always-elegant Duchess of Gloucester had a busy bejeweled week earlier this month, wearing classic brooches from her collection in Sheffield and London.

On October 2, the Duchess carried out a series of engagements in Sheffield, including a visit to the Crucible Theatre, where she saw a Music in the Round performance. The charity promotes international chamber music.

Afterward, Birgitte toured Ernest Wright, a company that has crafted scissors and shears in Sheffield since 1902. During her visit, she met with master craftsmen and women and learned more about the traditional methods they use.

For the day’s visit, the Duchess wore a herringbone tweed jacket with small diamond hoop earrings and her petite diamond and enamel heart brooch. During her visit to Ernest Wright, she received a special pin depicting a pair of shears cutting fabric. She was clearly extremely pleased with the gift, as she pinned it on her jacket before leaving the building.

We also saw Birgitte wearing some classic jewelry pieces from her collection during her visit to St. Paul’s Cathedral in London on October 7. She wore petite sapphire and diamond cluster earrings, and on her navy jacket, she pinned her rock crystal and diamond circle brooches. She also wore a string of silvery-black pearls from which she suspended an antique enamel and diamond pendant featuring Queen Victoria’s imperial cypher.

The two October appearances echoed the jewels she wore a few weeks earlier in London for the funeral of the Duchess of Kent. On that occasion, she pinned the enamel heart brooch to her hat and wore the circle brooches as “buttons” on her dress.

The Duchess’s gorgeous circle brooches are almost certainly pieces from the Art Deco era, but the enamel heart brooch appears to be an even older piece of jewelry. I’ve not yet been able to track down an exact match within the royal family’s larger collection, but in this photograph, Queen Alexandra wears a very similar example. Her diamond and enamel heart appears to be pierced with a small diamond arrow, while Birgitte’s brooch features a central diamond brilliant.

The Duchess has worn her heart brooch quite regularly over the past several years. We memorably saw her pin the brooch to her hat for an Armistice Day ceremony at the National Memorial Arboretum in 2022.

She has used the brooch often for engagements connected to mourning and remembrance, but we’ve also seen her wear it with black-and-white ensembles, as she did in Sheffield earlier this month. We also saw her wear the brooch with a black and white jacket in June for Trooping the Colour.

There are more similar brooches in other royal jewelry boxes, too. Queen Margrethe of Denmark often wears this enamel and diamond heart brooch for funerals and memorials. It’s a memorial pin that was made in 1917 in remembrance of her great-grandmother, the Duchess of Connaught.

And Queen Camilla has recently been spotted in a similar enamel heart brooch, which is decorated with diamonds and pearls. A pearl ringed with diamonds is set in the center of the piece, and more pearls are set along the jewel’s border.