Today was the much anticipated Ladies’ Day at Royal Ascot. The absolute highlight of the day was when Queen Elizabeth’s horse Estimate unexpectedly won Ascot’s prestigious Gold Cup. The four-year-old dark bay thoroughbred filly was the 7-2 favourite and won by a length – much to the Queen’s delight, who became the first reigning monarch ever to win the trophy. She was undisputedly THE Lady of honor on this Ladies’ Day! Katie Vale of Katie Vale Designs graciously joins us again today for a review of today’s Royal Ascot hats.
Queen Elizabeth in an Angela Kelly design
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Katie Vale: I much prefer this to yesterday’s! And it’s unusual in the sense that the crown is straight but the brim is asymmetrical, this allowing for the flowers to be both above and under the brim. Very pretty flowers. Thumbs up 🙂
Royal Hats Blog: With her amazing win of the Gold Cup today, the Queen could have worn anything and it would not have mattered! Readers here know that I am not usually a fan of Angela Kelly’s hats but I must admit that this one has a sweet charm. I also like the shape and the tilted brim and Her Majesty looks lovely in this shade of purple. I am afraid, however, that the stark royal blue satin bow loops take away from the softness of this hat and the flowers under the brim make this a little cutesy but what can I say? The Queen realized her longtime dream of winning at Ascot! That eclipsed any quirks related to her hat.
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Princess Anne
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Katie Vale: The crown is too big & the brim is too small. This is two different hats, somehow joined together and not successfully. I do like the pleat of the crown though.
Royal Hats Blog: I think this is much improved from Day 1 earlier this week. I really like the upturned brim on Anne and while I would love to see her in more colour, this pale blue is a good hue for her. It’s not the most exciting hat I’ve ever seen but it’s lovely. I just wish she would have borrowed one of Zara’s signature hats and shocked us all…!
Autumn Phillips in a Gina Foster design (the ‘Primula’ hat)
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Katie Vale: Possibly my favourite hat we’ve seen so far. I love the slight lip in the disc & the large bulbous bow. The bow isn’t over powering, but actually very delicate. And I really like the one colour of it; if it had another colour incorporated I’m just not sure it would work. Well done Autumn.
Royal Hats Blog: This is how to do an exciting neutral coloured hat! There is a lot of bow going on here but I love it. Love the shape, love the tilted brim, love the flourish under and over the top brim, love the angle Autumn is wearing this at and LOVE the pairing of this hat with the clean-lined jade green day dress. Did I say that I love this hat?! I agree Katie- this is the best hat we’ve seen this week so far.
Princess Eugenie in a Nerida Fraiman design
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Katie Vale: Yesterday was so lovely! And today we are presented with this! Urm…..the colour is dull, the flower is flat. I love the aqua of her dress though. Not sure what else to say, but this doesn’t work for me.
Royal Hats Blog: Eugenie wears textured berets very well. I think the cool grey colour is surprisingly good on her and contrasts nicely with her hair. I like the hat quite well but think it would be better worn at more of an angle instead of right on top of her head.
Princess Beatrice in a Philip Treacy design
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Katie Vale: Yes! Love!!! Beautiful golden tone to match the beading on her dress. I love the central placing & the perfectly round disc. And the splay of feathers is eye catching, but not over powering! The colour also goes so well with her colouring. I really like this fascinator.
Royal Hats Blog: I also adore this hat – it goes so beautifully with Beatrice’s auburn hair and green eyes. She wore it three years ago at Ascot and I like it better this time around (you’re right Katie- it beautifully compliments and coordinates with this dress). The feather/flower spray is interesting without taking over the hat. This is a big winner for me as well!
Princess Haya of Jordan, Sheikha of Dubai in a Stephen Jones design
Katie Vale: As you may have been able to tell I’m a fan of disc hats and fascinators (both peaked in places or completely flat) and thus I like the base of this. The crin material makes sure it is lightweight and delicate. But I’m not a fan of the loops of ribbon in the centre. They have no purpose or reason to be there. So I’m 50/50 for this one.
Royal Hats Blog: I agree that this hat would be much better without the ribbon bows in the middle but I like the shape and the striped effect of the concentric circles of crin. It’s quite sedate and the third black hat in as many days for Haya which disappointed me. One of my favourite Ascot hats of all time was this breathtakingly beautiful pink statement hat she wore last year for Ladies’ Day. That hat still gives me goosebumps and this one is flat in comparison
Other notable hats worn today included: Emma Spencer; Mary Berry; Lady Cecil; Victoria Pendleton; Mrs. Max McNeil; The Royal Baby hat; The Golden Umbrella hat; The Leftover Bits from the Chelsea Flower Show hat and a whole lot of other wild, wonderful and utterly bizarre hats seen here.
All in all, it was a great day of hats. Katie and I will be back tomorrow with another review. To sign off, I just can’t resist posting these photos of Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie during the Gold Cup Race. How utterly adorable are these two, cheering for their granny’s horse?!)
Photos from Getty as indicated
Royal Hats 
Glad you are liking this weeks posts, I’m loving doing this! 🙂
Do you suppose the queen’s hat and coat were worn intentionally so that she would match the silks of
jockey? Or are the royal silks always that color?
What a great question! Back in April, The Queen’s horse Sign Manual won at Newbury. Her winning jockey, Hayley Turner was in purple and red (I posted a photo of Hayley and the Queen here on the blog). Today, her jockey Ryan Moore was also in purple and red. I suspect that is not a coincidence! Can anyone fill us in?
All queen’s jocjey wear this uniform. It’s queen’s colours.
Purple and red are the colors of the Queen ‘s silks. Those don’t change.
Each horse owner has his or her own registered racing silks or colors. Those seen yesterday are the Queen’s that all the jockeys wear when riding one of her horses. Here is a link with some information on them: http://www.royalcollection.org.uk/microsites/thequeensyear/MicroObject.asp?row=4&themeid=1168&item=5
I am new to you blog and I love it. Thanks so much for taking the time to post so many wonderful pictures and write great commentary.
Thanks for the clarification on this, all of you. And welcome here Andrea! I’m so happy to have you join us in the discussion!
Thanks Hat Queen and all others that responded. I’ve just been here a few weeks and have already learned so much. I’m especially enjoying the opinions of Katie Vale along side of yours. Although, I do think Katie should consider changing her last name to “Veil.”
The Queen for the win……just because she actually won!! She looked delighted. Right off the bat I thought Anne’s hat appears too big. It kind of overwhelms her. Loved Autumn’s hat. It was just gorgeous. And I agree it was perfect one color.
I love your blog! As an American, we don’t see many beautiful hats except for the Kentucky Derby. Sophie’s hats for the past few posts are beautiful.
I’m so happy you enjoy the blog! Here in Canada, we don’t see many beautiful hats either. It’s really quite a shame.
I disagree with you about Princess Haya’s hat. It is mysterious and very glamorous. One of the best of the week.
My favorite hat was Autumns. She has such a beautiful face and this hat really highlighted that!
Bea’s hat is Philip Treacy.
I agree- Autumn’s was my favourite today, too. And thank you for the reminder about Philip Treacy!
I really dislike the Queen’s hat. Angela Kelly needs to just calm down; you can see her designs a mile off – over done and too fussy. It would be fine if she left the flowers and the blue bow off – just didn’t work for me.
Bit hello Autumn! She’s normally a bit of a disaster, but today – this is amazing! Who’d know she is a mum of 2! Just stunning!
An a good showing from Bea too! Phew. She can look fabulous, but lately she’s been swallowed by shapeless sacks. This – I like!
The Queen’s hat would be fine without the extra bow and flowers. It is better than the hat she wore yesterday but not as nice as the pink one from two days ago.
Too bad so many of the family were absent today and missed sharing the big win with HM. I always love the Queen in lavender. The shape of her hat is nice, the bunches of tiny milinary flowers above and below the brim definitely twee, but they match her dress. As you said, with the big win today, who cares! The Trainer was quoted as saying, “she can often be a big pain in the behind…..” hoping he was referencing the filly! 🙂
I don’t like Anne’s hat as well as Day 1. Autumn Phillips takes the day – her hat is great and placed perfectly. She seems to have good hat sense and frequently picks nice hats. Eugenie’s hat seems to be one of a series of berets with a big flower plonked on top. It would be fine if placed better, and her outfit is nice. Beatrice’s ensemble (and I hardle ever like her clothes or hats) takes 2nd prize for me today. The hat is really lovely and does go well with her reasonably nice dress and her coloring.
Big pain int he behind- my goodness! I hope he was talking about the horse! I agree with everything you said about the hats. I’ve just been loving the posts here this week and the guest comments! You two are very funny but spot on with what you’ve said.
Indeed. The commentary and coverage here has been excellent as usual.
I do declare there are some real pretty hats going on here! LOL! The Queen just takes the cake. That is such a beautiful hat and she is grinning from here to Texas. I am just so happy that her horse won the race. That news might cheer up the Duke. I hope he is still getting better. I don’t have much to say about those Yorkie granddaughters but bless their hearts they are so happy for their granny. Princess Anne’s hat is also a real beaut.
Will we be getting a full week of new hats and outfits from HM?…..One has to respect her fondness for thrifty repeats, but my heavens…there is nothing like a clutch of new chapeaux to make one’s heart flutter a bit. Even if some of these new toppers are less than, um, shall we say stellar.
HMs hat today is so close to being wonderful, but once again, Ms. Kelly’s ongoing fondness of craft projects and questionable taste ruins it. The shape works well, but the corsages are far too twee, and look cheap and common. Their placement above and below the brim doubles the insult, as does the bizarre ribbon wrapping out over the brim. Two unfortunate thumbs down from MrFitzroy, who still wishes hearty congratulations to Her Majesty! With her smiles today, she could have made an old tea cozy look good!
The Princess Royal, Lord love her, seems to be valiantly trying to channel the spirit and style of dear Princess Alexandra, but she just isn’t quite making it work. Note to Anne: Please keep trying, you are getting SO close, and it’s such a treat when you make an effort.
Mrs. Phillips makes it work! It’s dangerously close to Princess Michael territory, but she owns it!
Princess Eugenie appears to have sat on her hat in the carriage, and one is still loves Beatrice’s golden clam shell with Sea Anemone bloom.
Sea Anenome indeed. The bigger mystery is why I actually like it…
It seems that the Queen is indeed on a roll, unveiling new hats. I wonder what is better- a repeated beautiful design by Rachel Trevor Morgan or a new craft project by Angela Kelly? I think I would lean toward a repeated hat of beauty. What would you choose?
Haha! You’re right! Angela Kelly is just too prone to the craft gun and the bedazzler. Can’t Rachel Trevor Morgan make all the hats ?! She knows what she’s doing!
I love the Queen’s hat. It’s pretty and delicate with the flowers. She looks so excited that she won the race! I’m so excited for her too.
I really like Autumn’s hat. It reminds me of the hat Kate wore to Zara’s wedding.
Great observation! Both hats were made by Gina Foster.