Kate Middleton’s Year in Heirloom Jewelry: Something Old, Something New, Something Straight From the Royal Vaults

After Kate was diagnosed with cancer in early 2024, she took an extended break from her role as a senior royal. Though she returned to work full-time in 2025, she’s done fewer engagements than she used to, prioritizing events with the biggest significance for British patriotism—and giving her plenty of opportunities to break out jewelry that might be too distracting for lower-wattage engagements.

During these engagements, she’s often returned to a few pieces with special diplomatic history. On Commonwealth Day in March, Kate wore a four-strand pearl choker with an elaborate clasp. This necklace, often called the Japanese pearl choker, has been in Kate’s wardrobe since at least 2022. According to Lauren Kiehna of jewelry website The Court Jeweler, the late Queen Elizabeth II commissioned the necklace in the 1970s after receiving the pearls as a gift from the Japanese government.

In 2025, Kate frequently wore the Bahrain pearl drop earrings, another favorite of the late queen. When then Princess Elizabeth married Prince Philip in 1947, the Hakim of Bahrain gave her a selection of pearls—“obtained locally,” as a Foreign Office official later noted—and sent them to London to be made into earrings. The pearls hang as drops from a platinum frame and an Art Deco–style arrangement of round and baguette diamonds.

Though Kate brought back some of her most familiar pieces, like the Queen Mary Lover’s Knot Tiara she has worn for banquets since 2015 and the Sapphire Double Cluster Drop and Collingswood pearl drop earrings she inherited from Princess Diana, she also showed off a few key additions to her jewelry case this year. In May, she was given a thistle brooch after she christened the HMS Glasgow, which she wore again to the Festival of Remembrance in November.

During her first public engagement in January, she wore a pair of Cartier Trinity earrings (valued at about £4000) to meet with patients receiving treatment at the same hospital where she underwent chemotherapy. She wore those earrings again during two outings during Wimbledon; when she presented Jannik Sinner with the tournament’s trophy on July 13, she paired it with a custom necklace from British jeweler Daniella Draper. In May, she debuted a new pair of drop earrings featuring rubies surrounded by clusters of diamonds, reportedly a new creation from London jeweler G Collins & Sons. She brought them out again for Donald and Melania Trump’s visit in September and Remembrance Day events in November.

Here, take a tour through Kate’s year in jewelry—from stunning tiaras to the tiniest diamonds.