Princess Kate Channels Her Inner Audrey Hepburn at Garden Party with William [Photos]

Royal fashion often invokes old-school Hollywood glamor. Such was the case with Princess Kate's choice of apparel at a recent royal engagement. As she and Prince William hosted the season’s second royal garden party, her monochrome attire drew immediate attention over its striking parallel to Audrey Hepburn’s iconic style in the film, My Fair Lady.

Kate’s elegant look was built around a new self-portrait dress, worn with a polka-dotted skirt and a sharp, tailored blazer with a floral appliqué detail in it. She further accessorized with a matching wide-brim hat, which looked a lot like Hepburn’s notable look as Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady. Kate has been known to increasingly wear ‘two in line’ self-portrait designs in recent years, most recently during Easter Sunday celebrations.

Kate added a sentimental touch to her look with the jewelry pieces she decided to wear. She was spotted in the Bahrain Pearl Drop earrings, previously belonging to Queen Elizabeth. The earrings were a gift for the late Queen on her wedding in 1947 from the Hakim of Bahrain. They feature round diamond studs and Art Deco coded pearl and diamond drops. Throughout the monarch’s reign, it became one of her most recognized pieces of royal jewelry.

It is said that the late Queen personally took it upon herself to pass the earrings on to Kate in 2016. She then debuted them on Remembrance Sunday and continued to do so every year for the same occasion. She has also worn it for Trooping the Color in 2019, Prince Philip’s funeral in 2021, and Queen Elizabeth’s funeral in 2022. She paired the earrings with a Japanese pearl choker to pay tribute to the monarch on the grim day.

The Buckingham Palace garden party included several noted members of the royal family, like Zara Tindall, the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh, and so on. But it was Middleton’s graceful Hepburn-inspired style moment, along with royal heirloom accessories, that stole the spotlight.