Princess Kate wears Diana's favourite tiara, yellow Elie Saab gown at Oman banquet

Princess Kate, the Princess of Wales, wore the Lover's Knot tiara, often described as Princess Diana's favourite tiara, to the Windsor Castle banquet held on Tuesday, October 20, 2026, for Sultan Haitham bin Tarik of Oman. She paired it with a butter-yellow chiffon cape gown by the Lebanese designer Elie Saab, taken from his Spring/Summer 2025 collection. The banquet marked the first evening of the Sultan's three-day state visit to the United Kingdom, hosted by King Charles and Queen Camilla, and the Princess was seated next to the guest of honour.

State banquets are among the few occasions when the British royal family appears in full evening dress with tiaras, orders and family jewels, and every choice is read as a message. Royal dressing at such events is sometimes called diplomatic dressing: clothes, colours and designers chosen to honour a visiting country or to signal a relationship. Choosing a designer from the Arab world for a dinner honouring the ruler of a Gulf state was widely noted in fashion coverage of the evening, although the palace does not explain such choices.

The Lover's Knot tiara is one of the most recognised jewels in the royal collection. It was made by Garrard in 1913 for Queen Mary, and it became closely linked with Diana, Princess of Wales, who wore it often in her public life. Its return at a state banquet is therefore both a link to Diana's memory and a sign of continuity in the family. One royal commentator called it the Princess of Wales's "old faithful", a sign of how often she chooses it for formal evenings.

The gown also shows that a royal look need not be a new, one-off creation. The Elie Saab dress came from a collection shown in 2025, more than a year before the banquet. For the fashion industry, this matters because royal appearances can lift interest in a label and its past designs long after they first reach the catwalk.

For readers in India, where heirloom jewellery is passed down through generations and worn at weddings and family occasions, the story of the tiara will feel familiar. Royal jewels in Britain are handed from one generation to the next and re-worn at important events, much as families keep and re-wear a grandmother's necklace or bangles. The tiara's journey from Queen Mary to Diana and now to the Princess of Wales is a clear example of jewellery carrying family memory.

Short-term: The tiara became a Google trending search after the banquet, and fashion coverage across Britain, the United States and the Middle East focused on the look and its links to Diana.

Long-term: The Princess's repeated choice of the Lover's Knot tiara reinforces its place as her signature jewel for formal occasions, and her choice of an earlier-season gown keeps attention on how long a designer piece can stay relevant.

Who is affected: Elie Saab and other designers who dress the royal family; jewellery historians and collectors; fashion retailers and readers who follow royal style; and the hosts and guests of the Oman state visit, whose diplomatic programme drew wide attention through the banquet.

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