The Most Famous Tiara in Britain Is Secretly a Knock-Off.

The Cambridge Lover’s Knot, which was one of Princess Diana’s favourite tiaras, is actually a dupe. The breathtaking piece of jewellery that looks regal and priceless would make anyone assume it is a centuries-old untouchable heritage, right? It’s really not.

You see, when Queen Mary saw her grandmother’s tiara that would later inspire the copy, she fell in love with it instantly. Honestly, I expected Queen Mary to easily get her hands on the original one or perhaps exchange something of equal value for it. But for whatever reason, she couldn’t have it and had to go with her plan B.

She had the royal jeweller Garrard make her a duplicate in 1913. Queen Mary collected some pearls and diamonds from other tiaras in her collection and handed them to Garrard to make the tiara she wanted. 

And she may have collected one too many pearls and diamonds because the resulting tiara was heavy. So heavy that she eventually had to remove a whole row of pearls that stood upright along the top. What was left was the breathtaking nineteen diamond arches that each had a teardrop-shaped pearl suspended beneath.

The original tiara that inspired the Lover’s Knot tiara is now privately owned, and almost no one remembers it now, while the copy became one of Britain’s most famous tiaras and far more legendary.