Meghan Markle dazzled in an array of luxury jewellery as she joined her husband Prince Harry in Dusseldorf for an Invictus Games event today. Dressed in a £245 cream knitted vest from LA-based designer Anine Bing, the Duchess of Sussex, 41, added a touch of glitz to her ensemble with her late mother-in-law Princess Diana’s £17,800 gold Cartier Tank watch. She also sported her £5,000 Cartier Love bangle, that she’s owned since at least 2017, as well as her £271,000 engagement ring – which she is thought to have teamed with a $3,000 mini gold tennis bracelet designed by Jennifer Meyer.
Mother-of-two Meghan completed her look – which included a pair of £1,040 beige wide-leg wool blend trousers from Brandon Maxwell – with dainty golden stud earrings. She attended today’s event with the Duke of Sussex, 37, to mark the one-year countdown to the 2023 Invictus Games, which were delayed due to the pandemic. The Tank watch, once owned by Diana and thought to be gifted to Meghan by Harry, was priced at £17,800 at the time but is now likely worth a lot more given its history, and is one of the pieces sported by Meghan today. The elegant timepiece was worn by Diana at a number of occasions, including a 1997 visit to London’s Shri Swaminarayan Mandir Hindu Temple and an engagement at the British Lung Foundation that same year.
Meghan is known to be a fan of the Tank watch and splurged on her own two-tone version back in 2015 when ‘Suits’ was picked up for a third season. At the time, she told Hello Magazine, ‘I’ve always coveted the Cartier French Tank watch. When I found out Suits had been picked up for our third season—which, at the time, felt like such a milestone—I totally splurged and bought the two-tone version ‘I had it engraved on the back, “To M.M. From M.M.” and I plan to give it to my daughter one day. That’s what makes pieces special, the connection you have to them.’ Meghan has been gifted several items from Diana’s collection. They include Diana’s butterfly earrings and gold bracelet which she wore on their Australian tour in 2018.
Yet the watch is a favourite and she has been spotted wearing it often. Meghan has always been known to favour more conspicuous jewellery stacks, while members of the royal family typically prefer to keep their accessories to a bare minimum, and her choice of bling for her latest appearance was no different. Alongside the Cartier watch, the mother-of-two stacked a £5,000 Cartier Love bracelet. It’s a design that she has worn many times in the past, and which is also thought to have been a gift from Prince Harry in the early days of their romance. The oval Cartier band is made of two C-shaped halves screwed together and the only way to remove it is with a screwdriver, like the 18-carat one supplied – a feature said to be inspired by medieval chastity belts.
The Duke of Windsor and Wallis Simpson each had earlier versions of the Cartier Love Bracelet as well. Meghan also sported her £271,000 engagement ring, which was originally designed by Prince Harry and court jewellers Cleave and Company using one stone from Botswana and two smaller stones from Diana’s collection. Harry proposed to Meghan in November 2017 with the glittering ring comprising a solid yellow gold band – however in 2019, images revealed that the design had been changed in order to incorporate a thinner band that was set with several pave diamonds all around it. Shortly after their engagement, Prince Harry spoke out about the design process behind the ring, explaining that he had chosen each element in order to ensure that it fit his future bride’s tastes perfectly.
‘The ring is obviously yellow gold because that’s [Meghan’s] favourite and the main stone itself I sourced from Botswana and the little diamonds either side are from my mother’s jewellery collection, to make sure that she’s with us on this crazy journey together,’ he said. Meghan called it ‘incredible’, explaining:
‘Everything about Harry’s thoughtfulness and the inclusion of [Princess Diana’s stones] and obviously not being able to meet his mum, it’s so important to me to know that she’s a part of this with us. Dressed in a £245 cream knitted vest from LA-based designer Anine Bing, the Duchess of Sussex, 41, added a touch of glitz to her ensemble with her late mother-in-law Princess Diana’s £17,800 gold Cartier Tank watch
