1970s Style Icon: Princess Anne

Royal Style Icons are numerous in the British Royal Family. Princess Margaret, Princess Marina, Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle have all set trends and been renowned for their elegance and taste. Diana, Princess of Wales was not just a royal style icon, but was possibly the most admired women of her time, a cover girl who could sell more magazines than any model or actress. But Princess Anne a style icon…surely not.

If you said surely not too, you really need to think again, because Anne’s style, particularly the fashion choices of her late 60s/early 1970s youth is certainly gaining a reappraisal from both designers who are using her for inspiration, and from the glossy fashion magazines. Her love of bright, vibrant colour, short skirt lengths, quirky hats and no nonsense casual wear show that her style choices were not always frumpy in the way that she was somewhat unfairly viewed when compared to the glamorous Diana in the 1980’s. Anne was glamorous and pretty and a trendsetter in her own right, and she certainly wore yellow in the most perfect of ways.

Anne was later seen to have a no nonsense view towards fashion, and it is true that she was one of the first royal ladies to recycle her looks, no matter how well known they were (I’m thinking of the floral wrap dress she wore for Charles and Diana’s wedding, which she then wore again and again.) But her 1970’s choices are great, chic but with a real fun element, gorgeous 1970’s looks that embraced the prints, the chiffon, the wide collars and trouser suit ensembles of the decade. It is also certainly true that her Maureen Baker designed wedding dress from the house of Susan Small has stood the test of time far better than those worn by Princess Diana and Sarah Ferguson.

Anne’s style reappraisal is also due in no small part to The Crown, and Erin Doherty’s elegant portrayal of the Princess. Erin’s success in the role has shown the world that, before Diana, there was another beautiful blonde Princess already in the royal family, one that competed in the Olympic Games and was the voted BBC’s Sport Personality of the Year in 1971.