Diana’s Missing Jewelry: Royal Pieces That Vanished After 1997 – HT
We often feel that we know the jewelry collection of Diana, Princess of Wales, by heart. We see the Sapphire engagement ring on the Princess of Wales today, or the butterfly earrings on the Duchess of Sussex, and assume the legacy has been neatly divided. However, there is a shadow archive—a collection of significant pieces that have vanished from the royal narrative.
Some returned to the Spencer family, others were sold at auction, while some of the most magnificent treasures are still waiting for their moment to return. Today, we are opening this “forgotten jewelry box” to consider whether we might ever see these treasures once again. Our first story takes us back to the very beginning, before the wedding in 1981.
Lady Diana Spencer sat for her official engagement portraits at Highgrove House, photographed by Lord Snowdon. In these images, she looks every inch a future queen, wearing a magnificent antique diamond necklace with matching diamond girandole earrings. The set came from Collingwood, a jewelry firm that had served the Spencer family since 1817.
It seemed a perfect union of her aristocratic heritage and her future role. Collingwood intended to present this diamond suite to Lady Diana as a wedding gift. It was a gesture of immense generosity and history. Yet, Buckingham Palace officials intervened. They deemed the gift “inappropriate.” The specific reasoning remains locked in palace archives—perhaps it was considered too ostentatious, or perhaps there were protocols regarding gifts from commercial firms that we can only guess at.
Consequently, the diamonds were returned. Collingwood presented her with a pair of diamond and pearl earrings instead, which she kept, but the grand diamond suite slipped away. There is a fascinating postscript to this rejection. Lady Diana did borrow the set one final time for a visit by King Khalid of Saudi Arabia in June 1981, but after that, it disappeared from her life.
Years later, the suite resurfaced in a scandal involving an Iranian jeweler in Düsseldorf. This dealer claimed the jewels were Spencer heirlooms, secretly sold to finance the royal wedding. To prove this fabrication, he displayed the official Lord Snowdon portraits of Lady Diana wearing them. The fraud was eventually uncovered, but it serves as a stark reminder of how early her image was used to manipulate the truth.
Our next story takes us to the very end of the timeline, to 1997. It concerns a suite that was destined to define Diana’s new life as an independent woman, but, like the Collingwood set, never fully became part of her permanent collection. In that final spring, Diana, Princess of Wales, began collaborating directly with Garrard, the Crown Jeweller.
She wasn’t borrowing from the vault; she was helping to create something new. The result was a necklace of platinum, set with over 200 diamonds and five magnificent South Sea pearls. On June 3, 1997, she wore it to a gala performance of Swan Lake at the Royal Albert Hall. It was a dazzling appearance—her ice-blue dress and the pearls captured the flashbulbs perfectly.
However, the public didn’t know that the suite was actually incomplete. The matching earrings were still on the workbench at Garrard, unfinished. After the ballet, the Princess returned the necklace to the jewelers so the set could be finalized. Tragically, she never saw the completed suite. Because these jewels were a work-in-progress and not yet fully purchased, they did not pass to Prince William or Prince Harry.
Instead, with the blessing of the Princess’s family, Garrard sold the now-completed “Swan Lake Suite” to raise money for her memorial fund. This decision launched the jewels on a rather chaotic journey through the open market. They passed from a British businessman to a Texas furniture tycoon known as “Mattress Mack,” who famously displayed this piece of royal history inside his furniture showroom for a decade.
Then, in 2010, the suite was sold again to a private developer. For years, the necklace seemed to be in limbo, drifting between owners and appearing with astronomical price tags that never quite resulted in a sale. The saga finally came to a head in June 2023. The suite was scheduled for a high-profile auction in New York, with estimates reaching up to $15 million.
But on the morning of the sale, the auction was abruptly canceled. The auction house announced that a deal had been struck via a private treaty: the Swan Lake Suite had been purchased by a “prominent museum.” While the name of the institution remains a mystery, it seems this wandering jewel has finally exited the commercial market.
After twenty-five years of being bought and sold, it has likely found a place where it will be preserved as history, rather than traded as an asset. While the “Swan Lake” necklace drifts through the uncertainty of auction houses, a significant portion of the Princess’s jewelry box found a much more stable, albeit private, destination.
These are the pieces that did not pass to Prince William or Prince Harry, and consequently, they are pieces we should not expect to see on Catherine, Princess of Wales, or the Duchess of Sussex. They have returned to the source: the Spencer family. The most iconic of these is, without question, the Spencer Tiara.
For many, this floral diamond scrollwork is synonymous with the Royal Wedding of 1981, but its history stretches back much further than that day at St. Paul’s. It is actually a fascinating puzzle of family heirlooms stitched together by history. The tiara as we know it today was assembled by Garrard in 1937 for Diana’s grandmother, Cynthia, Countess Spencer.
As a Lady of the Bedchamber to Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, Cynthia required a substantial jewelry wardrobe for her official duties. To create this piece, Garrard united several existing family treasures: the oldest elements at the ends are said to date back to 1875, having belonged to Viscountess Montagu, while the central heart-shaped motif was a wedding gift presented to Cynthia in 1919.
Unlike many royal brides who return their wedding tiaras to the vault after the big day, Diana continued to wear this piece frequently throughout her marriage. While she had access to the Queen’s collection, she often preferred the Spencer Tiara for state banquets and tours. It was a personal favorite, allowing her to champion her own lineage on the world stage.
However, it is crucial to clarify that this tiara was never Diana’s personal property. It was always a loan—first from her father, the 8th Earl Spencer, and later from her brother. Because it is tied to the Spencer title, it resides permanently at Althorp, not in the royal palaces. This explains why Catherine, Princess of Wales, has never worn it; it simply isn’t hers to borrow.
The tiara has crowned five Spencer brides over the decades, including Diana’s sisters, Lady Jane and Lady Sarah, her sister-in-law Victoria Lockwood, and most recently her niece, Celia McCorquodale, in 2018. As for the future, the tiara will eventually be inherited by Diana’s nephew, the current Viscount Althorp.
But before that day comes, we may well see it worn by another daughter of the house—Lady Charlotte Diana Spencer, the current Earl’s daughter—continuing a tradition that remains firmly, and exclusively, with the Spencers. Our next piece represents a history of formidable women and aristocratic rivalry that rivals any fiction.
This is the Spencer Diamond Rivière, a necklace composed of forty-two cushion-shaped diamonds. It is a piece of immense age and significance, dating back to the 18th century. The provenance of this necklace is extraordinary. It was originally a gift from Queen Anne to her favorite, Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough—one of the most powerful women in British history.
But the story gets even more interesting when we look at the components often worn with it. The necklace is frequently paired with diamond pendant earrings that carry a delicious backstory of vengeance. These earrings originally belonged to the Duchess of Shrewsbury, who was Sarah’s great rival at court. When the Duchess of Shrewsbury died, Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, promptly bought her rival’s diamonds—perhaps the ultimate posthumous power move.
Diana, Princess of Wales, wore this historic Rivière only once in public, for the Red Dragon Ball in 1983. Today, however, the necklace has not been forgotten. It is worn by the current Countess Spencer, who has been photographed wearing the Rivière and those “trophy” earrings at galas, keeping the history of the Duchess of Marlborough alive.
Finally, we turn to a pair of earrings that are far more personal than the grand Rivière, yet equally tied to the Spencer bloodline. These are the diamond wedding earrings. The earrings Lady Diana actually wore to walk down the aisle of St. Paul’s Cathedral were a loan from her mother, Frances Shand Kydd.
The design is timeless: a central pear-shaped diamond surrounded by a frame of fifty smaller diamonds. They are striking, yet classic. After the wedding, Diana returned them to her mother. Frances Shand Kydd wore them frequently throughout her life—you can spot them in photographs from Prince Harry’s christening in 1984, and later at the wedding of her son, the current Earl Spencer, in 1989.
They were a signature part of her own collection. Following the death of Frances Shand Kydd in 2004, the earrings were inherited by her eldest daughter, Lady Sarah McCorquodale. For many years, the diamonds were part of a traveling exhibition, but in 2011, Lady Sarah withdrew them for a specific reason. She wore the earrings to the wedding gala of her nephew, Prince William, at Buckingham Palace.
It was a subtle way to bring a piece of Spencer family history to the private evening celebrations. Having explored the grand heirlooms that returned to the Spencer estate, we now turn to a different kind of treasure. These are the pieces that belonged personally to Diana, Princess of Wales—items that were not loans from the Crown, nor ancient family relics, but gifts marking her own life’s milestones.
Logic suggests these items should currently reside in the collection shared by Prince William and Prince Harry, yet they remain unseen. One of the most charming of these “lost” pieces is the Spencer Pearl Choker. This was a coming-of-age token presented to Lady Diana by her parents for her 18th birthday. It was a family tradition; her two older sisters received similar necklaces upon reaching their majority.
In its original form, this three-row pearl choker featured a turquoise accent in the clasp—a bright, youthful pop of color that she wore during her time as a royal fiancée, notably at her first Trooping the Colour and at Royal Ascot in 1981. However, the Princess was a woman who edited her jewelry to suit her evolving style.
Sometime in the mid-1980s, the turquoise element was removed and replaced with pearls, creating an all-white, monochromatic look. She wore this modified version frequently during the early years of her marriage, often while pregnant or on tours of Australia and New Zealand. But as the 1980s drew to a close, this sentimental piece fell out of rotation.
Its last recorded public appearance was at a banquet at Claridge’s Hotel in 1987. Since then, silence. It is a piece of modest scale compared to the grand royal parures, which makes it particularly intriguing for the future. It is difficult to imagine a more perfect “starter” heirloom for a young royal lady.
One cannot help but wonder if this choker is sitting in a vault, waiting for Princess Charlotte to come of age. A very personal addition to the collection was the Heart-Shaped Diamond Necklace. It was a gift from the Prince of Wales in 1982 to mark the birth of Prince William, and she famously debuted it for his christening in the White Drawing Room of Buckingham Palace.
In those official photographs, the pendant is visible against her bright floral dress. For a brief period, this diamond heart was a staple. She wore it to the funeral of Princess Grace of Monaco and during the 1983 tour of Australia. However, its presence in her rotation was short-lived. The last time it was photographed was during a visit to Fiji in late 1983.
As the marriage began to fracture, the Princess stopped wearing the sentimental gifts she had received from her husband. The heart simply vanished. Given its provenance, this necklace carries a profound weight for the Prince of Wales today. It was a gift given to celebrate his birth. If it remains in his possession, it is arguably one of the most poignant items in his private archive.
It would be a powerful gesture to see this symbol of love and motherhood worn by Catherine, Princess of Wales, or perhaps saved for his own daughter. Finally, we must mention a set that underscores just how young Lady Diana was when she stepped onto the world stage: her floral pendant earrings. Before she had access to the vaults of queens and empresses, she relied on these clever, versatile pieces.
Described by jewelry historian Leslie Field, these were tiny diamond flower-shaped studs that could suspend different drops—rubies, sapphires, emeralds, or diamonds. She wore them to the wedding of Nicholas Soames just a month before her own wedding, and they were a constant companion during her honeymoon on the Royal Yacht Britannia.
Interestingly, these earrings blurred the line between fine jewelry and costume pieces, a common practice for young women of her era. As her collection filled with serious gemstones, these youthful “mix-and-match” earrings were retired, last seen around 1984. They are likely not the most valuable items in the inheritance, but they are a touching reminder of the girl who existed before the icon.
From the intimate tokens of early marriage, we now ascend to the true heavy artillery of the royal collection. These are the “power pieces”—grand, imposing, and undeniably regal. They are the kinds of jewels that define a Queen, yet they have been absent from public view for nearly three decades. The undisputed centerpiece of this category is the Seven-Strand Sapphire and Pearl Choker.
While the world knows it as the accessory to the “Revenge Dress,” its origins are far more traditional and steeped in dynastic history. The centerpiece is a colossal oval sapphire surrounded by two borders of diamonds. It began its life in the royal collection as a brooch, presented to Lady Diana as a wedding gift by the Queen Mother.
There is a compelling theory among jewelry historians regarding this sapphire’s deeper lineage. Some experts suggest it may be a lost Romanov treasure, specifically “Item No. 44” from the inventory of Empress Marie Feodorovna—a large oval sapphire brooch that disappeared after 1929. The setting, featuring a distinctive inner frame of smaller diamonds, closely mirrors the Russian imperial style, lending weight to the idea that this gem witnessed the fall of one empire before becoming an icon of another.
In the early years, the Princess of Wales wore it as a brooch, notably pinning it to the orange sash of the Order of the Crown during a state visit to the Netherlands in 1982. But soon, she demonstrated her flair for reinvention, mounting the sapphire as the clasp of a magnificent seven-strand pearl choker.
It became her signature. She wore it to dance with John Travolta at the White House in 1985, and she famously wore it in 1994 on the night the Prince of Wales admitted to adultery on national television. But we must look past the “Revenge” narrative. At its heart, this is a sapphire of incredible “duck-egg” size and royal quality.
It was one of the few major jewels Diana continued to wear after her divorce, including at the Met Gala in New York in 1996. It became a symbol of her independence—a shield of sapphire and pearl. This raises a tantalizing question for the future: Will we see it on Catherine, Princess of Wales? She has a proven ability to wear historic heirlooms with dignity, separating the object from the noise of the past.
A sapphire of this magnitude deserves to be worn, and one could argue that only a future Queen has the presence to give it a second life. Our next piece is a masterpiece of sheer scale: the Eleven-Strand Pearl Choker. This is perhaps the most mysterious grand jewel in the Princess’s archive. Its provenance is unknown; it does not appear on public lists of wedding gifts, and its creator remains unidentified.
The choker consists of over 900 pearls arranged in eleven tight rows, spaced by vertical columns of diamonds and rubies. It is a wide, complex piece that functions almost like a jeweled collar. The Princess of Wales favored this necklace for high-glamour events, often wearing it to film and theatre premieres where the goal was to shine under flashbulbs.
She notably paired it with her amethyst earrings in Chicago in 1996. Since 1997, this necklace has vanished entirely. It is a challenging piece to wear; it requires a long neck and a confident posture to avoid looking overwhelmed by the sheer volume of pearls. It is, in my view, a piece that is perfectly suited to the current Princess of Wales.
It is a “statement piece” in the truest sense, waiting for an occasion grand enough to justify its return. There is a tendency among royal watchers to dismiss the jewelry of the 1980s as merely a product of its time—too bold, too geometric, or perhaps just too “dated” for the sleek aesthetics of the 21st century.
But when we look closely at the suites lying dormant in the vaults, I believe this criticism misses the mark. Some of these pieces are not just relics of an era; they are dormant design classics waiting for a revival. A perfect example is the Oman Sapphire Suite. This striking set—comprising a necklace, earrings, and bracelet—was a gift to the Princess of Wales from the Sultan of Oman during her tour of the Gulf States in 1986.
It is undeniably modern, featuring a distinct, structured diamond setting that frames the sapphires. The Princess debuted the suite at a banquet in Bonn during a tour of Germany in 1987, famously pairing its contemporary lines with the antique scrollwork of the Spencer Tiara. The contrast was electric. Critics often label this suite an “outdated relic,” suggesting its rigid shape makes it unwearable today.
I politely disagree. The clean lines and deep blue stones have a timeless authority. It is somewhat of a mystery why Catherine, Princess of Wales, has yet to take this set out of the dark. It is not “too much”—it is precise and elegant. Perhaps it isn’t being ignored, but rather saved. One can easily picture it paired with a midnight blue velvet gown, offering a sharper, more modern alternative to the traditional fringed necklaces we often see.
While the sapphires were a diplomatic gift, the story of the Emerald Earrings is far more personal and tinged with irony. The Prince of Wales gave these pear-shaped emeralds to his wife for her 22nd birthday in 1983, along with an Art Deco emerald bracelet. The intention was thoughtful; they were meant to coordinate with Queen Mary’s Art Deco Emerald Choker, which the Queen had loaned to Diana.
There was just one problem. As the fashion editor Suzy Menkes famously noted, “Like so much Prince Charles didn’t know about his young wife, he didn’t know she didn’t like emeralds.” Despite her personal distaste for the green stone, the Princess wore them out of duty—pairing them with the Queen Mary choker in Australia and at film premieres.
Here is the fascinating detail: despite the separation and her supposed dislike of the gems, Diana kept them. In fact, she wore these very earrings, along with the bracelet and the choker, to her 36th birthday party at the Tate Gallery in London—her final birthday celebration. It raises a poignant question: did she eventually grow fond of them, or did they simply become armor she was used to wearing? It will be interesting to see if these “unloved” stones find a warmer reception with the new generation of royal women.
Sharing space in this colorful section of the vault is the Amethyst Suite. The provenance of this demi-parure remains unclear, though it is likely another gift from the Prince of Wales. When the Princess first began wearing the amethysts in late 1985, she used the cabochon amethyst elements as clasps for pearl necklaces and bracelets.
It was only later, in 1987, that the set was reworked into the bead choker and matching bracelet we recognize today. One of the most memorable appearances for the suite occurred toward the end of her life. In June 1996, during a visit to Chicago, she wore the amethyst earrings and bracelet with a vibrant purple Versace gown.
While the choker from this set might indeed feel a bit heavy for modern tastes, the earrings are wonderfully neutral. They are ripe for a reappearance, yet they have remained unseen since the Princess wore them in Chicago in June 1996. You may recognize this sapphire piece from several of the Princess’s gala appearances, most notably from a state dinner in Tokyo in 1986, where she famously wore it across her forehead as a striking bandeau.
While it appeared to be a bespoke piece of jewelry, it was actually a testament to her ingenuity and her habit of reworking her collection. This piece began its life not as a necklace, but as a ‘Lady Kalla’ watch by Vacheron Constantin, which had been a gift from a Sheikha of the United Arab Emirates. Diana, Princess of Wales, chose to repurpose the diamond watch components, mounting them first on a simple velvet band to be worn as a choker or a headband.
By the mid-1990s, she had evolved the design yet again, replacing the velvet with rows of delicate sapphire beads and using a sapphire from a ring—part of her Saudi wedding suite—as a new centerpiece. As far as I know, we have yet to see this bandeau reappear in its complete form, nor have any of its individual components been spotted on the current Princess of Wales or the Duchess of Sussex.
Alongside these repurposed pieces, there is another mystery in the pearl collection: the Qatar Pearl Earrings. These were a wedding gift from the Emir of Qatar, featuring a modern diamond floral cluster with pear-shaped pearls suspended from a fine diamond chain. They were a constant in her jewelry box during the 1980s and early 90s, traveling with her to Australia, Canada, and Hungary.
We have seen Catherine, Princess of Wales, frequently wear the Collingwood pearls and the intricate horseshoe and laurel wreath studs with their pearl drops. Yet, these floral Qatar pearls have remained entirely in the shadows. Diana continued to wear them right until her final summer, including a poignant appearance at a private viewing of her dresses at Christie’s in June 1997.
Since then, they have fallen into total silence. As we consider the distribution of these treasures, our gaze inevitably turns across the Atlantic. While much of the collection remains in the United Kingdom, we know that Prince Harry inherited significant personal pieces from his mother. The most famous evidence of this was seen on the hand of the Duchess of Sussex on her wedding evening: spectacular emerald-cut aquamarine cocktail ring.
But there is a missing counterpart to that ring, a pair of jewels that matched its icy blue intensity. In 1987, the Princess of Wales attended the Cannes Film Festival. She walked the red carpet in a pale blue chiffon dress by Catherine Walker, looking every bit the movie star. But the true features of the outfit were her earrings: large, luscious aquamarines suspended from elegant diamond clusters.
These were favorite travel companions for the Princess. She took them to Munich later that year, wore them for a reception in Rio de Janeiro in 1991, and they were last photographed during a visit to Italy in 1996. Given that the aquamarine ring is already in the possession of the Duchess of Sussex, it would follow a certain logic if these earrings were also part of the inheritance passed to Prince Harry.
We have yet to see them reappear, but these are substantial, gala-level jewels, not everyday accessories. It is very possible they are simply resting in a jewelry box in California, waiting for a moment grand enough to match that unforgettable night in Cannes. Returning to our initial thought: just because these jewels are currently silent, resting in the dark, does not mean they have been forgotten.
Sometimes, that silence is a form of respect—a quiet homage to memory. Sometimes, it is simply a pause, waiting for the right moment, as fashion is inevitably cyclical. And other times, it represents an honest conclusion to the story, as we saw with the heirlooms that returned to the Spencer family. Personally, it is heartwarming to see how both Catherine and Meghan have breathed new life into Diana’s well-known pieces.
But I must admit, I am waiting with bated breath for the day when the other compartments of this jewelry box are finally unlocked. I would dearly love to see the majestic Sapphire Choker on Catherine, Princess of Wales. I am certain she could give it a new, regal resonance—one stripped of the drama of the past, allowing the gem to shine on its own merit.
And, of course, the Eleven-Strand Pearl Choker; that is a piece with the gravity and presence befitting a future Queen. As for the delicate choker with pearls? To me, that seems like the perfect heirloom for a young Princess Charlotte—a tender symbol of connection to the grandmother she never knew. But now I turn the question to you.
Which of these “hidden” treasures would you most like to see emerge from the vault, and who should wear it? Please let me know in the comments; I am truly interested to read your thoughts. If you found this journey into the archives fascinating, please do support this story with a like and a subscription.