In 2023, Catherine, Princess of Wales made a couple of headlines for wearing a form-fitting, polka-dot Alessandra Rich dress, paired with Princess Diana’s Collingwood pearl drop earrings to the Order of the Garter – an outfit some people compared to Eliza Doolittle’s black-and-white gown in My Fair Lady: the tale of a young woman’s transformation into upper echelons of aristocracy. (Hmm… sounds familiar…)

Fast forward two years, and the Princess – slash Queen of Rewears, as British Vogue’s Emily Chan put it – sported the exact same combination for a service marking the 80th anniversary of VE Day this afternoon. Led by King Charles, Queen Camilla and Prince William, Kate entered today’s Service of Thanksgiving at Westminster Abbey in a solemn take on what was a previously jubilant outfit, including a funereal fascinator by the Shrewsbury-based milliner Juliette Botterill with Ralph Lauren pumps and DeMellier London’s The Nano Montreal handbag in a coordinating shade of toffee.

Much like her beloved skinny jeans, Kate’s enduring relationship with polka dots has been rehabilitated on recent runways. “While the polka dot print was once the preserve of Holland Park mums on the school run,” wrote this magazine’s Olivia Allen back in April, “lately it has been shaking off its sloaney associations to emerge as something fresh, and altogether more fashion-friendly.” To wit: Conner Ives presented sheer slips appliquéd with large tonal spots for autumn/winter 2025 and Valentino scattered them on ‘80s-inspired cocktail dresses, while Moschino blew them up to Mickey Mouse-sized proportions on power-shouldered blazers that same season.

But back to the earrings: gifted to Diana from Collingwood jewellers, these pearl drop jewels – which hang from two round diamonds at the top and three rows of smaller diamonds underneath – were famously worn by the then-Princess of Wales as part of her going away outfit, following her wedding to Prince Charles in 1981, and later as part of that infamous “revenge dress” ensemble. Kate has worn the earrings in tribute to Diana on multiple occasions since having been bestowed them some time around 2017. If the royals have long recycled old, heirloom pieces, the Princess of Wales seems committed to continuing the same tradition with her own personal archive of rewears.