Kate Middleton wore an unexpected accessory to the latest royal garden party — her hat from Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s royal wedding.
On May 20, the Princess of Wales, 43, attended her first garden party in two years after reducing her duties in 2024 while undergoing treatment for cancer. The palace party fell one day after the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s seventh wedding anniversary and Kate surprised by wearing the same floral yellow Philip Treacy hat that she first sported to the couple’s nuptials in May 2018.
It was a bold choice for Princess Kate to reach for the hat the day after Harry and Meghan’s anniversary — but not without precedent. The Princess of Wales is known for rewearing pieces from her royal wardrobe, and she’s stepped out in the floral headpiece before. Still, the timing of this particular rewear didn’t go unnoticed by royal watchers.
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Princess Charlotte and Kate Middleton leave Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s wedding ceremony at St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Caslte on May 19, 2018.
The style choice also comes just days after renewed headlines about Kate and Meghan’s much-discussed bridesmaid dress dispute at the 2018 royal wedding — resurfaced by royal author Tom Quinn’s new book, Yes, Ma’am: The Secret Life of Royal Servants.
A royal staff member told the author that both Kate and Meghan “were crying their eyes out” over the incident.
Just a few weeks after giving birth to Prince Louis, now 7, Kate debuted the yellow floral headtopper and wore it with an off-white bespoke Alexander McQueen coat dress for Prince Harry and Meghan’s royal wedding at St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle.
A year later, she brought the floral hat back for Trooping the Colour in June 2019, this time pairing it with a pale yellow Alexander McQueen ensemble—the same design house behind her 2011 wedding gown. The look added an extra dose of sunshine to the celebratory occasion.
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Prince William, Prince Louis and Kate Middleton at Trooping the Colour on June 8, 2019.
Princess Kate notably wore the Philip Treacy hat for the May 20 garden party, pairing it with a yellow Emilia Wickstead dress already in her wardrobe and a meaningful touch — her royal wedding earrings.
Commissioned by her parents, Carole and Michael Middleton, for her 2011 wedding to Prince William, the Robinson Pelham sparklers have made only a handful of appearances over the years.
Their return offered a romantic nod at the Buckingham Palace event, just weeks after the Prince and Princess of Wales celebrated their 14th wedding anniversary on April 29.
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Prince William and Kate Middleton at the Buckingham Palace garden party on May 20, 2025.
King Charles’ sons and their wives were last photographed together at Windsor Castle as they greeted mourners following the death of Queen Elizabeth in September 2022, in an idea that came from Princess Kate.
According to Kensington Palace, Prince William invited his brother and sister-in-law to join them, but it was Kate who came up with the idea.
“She didn’t want her or William to have any regrets,” a friend of Kate’s told PEOPLE at the time.
The rift between the Prince and Princess of Wales and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex has been publicly documented since at least 2019, when Harry and Meghan split their royal office from William and Kate.
In 2019, Prince Harry acknowledged in an ITV documentary that he and William were “on different paths,” confirming speculations of a strained relationship. The situation further escalated in January 2020 when Harry and Meghan announced their decision to step back from royal duties.
The rift deepened following the couple’s interview with Oprah Winfrey in March 2021. Prince Harry’s memoir, Spare, released in January 2023, further detailed personal conflicts, including an alleged physical altercation between the brothers in 2019.
As of May 2025, the relationship between the two couples remains distant, with no public signs of reconciliation.
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Kate Middleton, Prince William, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle arrive to view flowers and tributes to Queen Elizabeth on Sept. 10, 2022 in Windsor, England.
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In a bombshell interview with the BBC that aired on May 2 after he lost his appeal to restore his automatic police protection in the U.K., Prince Harry shared his wish to reconcile with his family.
“I would love reconciliation with my family. There’s no point in continuing to fight anymore,” the Duke of Sussex said then.
Harry has maintained that as head of state, his father the King could help intervene to restore his security — a principle that the palace denies.
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