Royal weddings are just popping up left and right these days, aren't they? (Not that I'm complaining.) Here's one that happened while I was on vacation:
Prince Rashid bin El Hassan of Jordan and Zeina Shaban
July 22, 2011
Amman, Jordan
Prince Rashid is the son of Jordan's Prince Hassan bin Talal and Princess Sarvath El Hassan. His bride, Zeina, is a table tennis champion who represented Jordan in both the 2004 and 2008 Olympic Games.
The bride wore an a-line dress with a lace top and button closure down the back. Her lace-trimmed veil was topped with a diamond tiara belonging to her mother-in-law, Princess Sarvath.
Though it seems that anything involving lace these days will garner comparisons to the
Duchess of Cambridge these days, for me, this one most closely resembles
Princess Claire's wedding gown with its lace overlay top. And that's a good thing, since Claire's gown has a spot on my
10 favorite royal wedding gowns, though this one doesn't seem to be quite as elegantly executed.
Their wedding at Basman Palace attracted quite the royal crowd.
Above, left to right: Queen Noor of Jordan (last wife of the late King Hussein), Queen Anne-Marie of Greece, Prince Hassan and Princess Sarvath (the groom's parents), the bride and groom, King Abdullah II of Jordan, Queen Rania of Jordan, King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa of Bahrain, Queen Sofia of Spain, and the Duke of Edinburgh.
Even more royal spotting fun can be found in the group picture:
I spy: Crown Princess Victoria and Prince Daniel of Sweden, Prince Lorenz of Belgium, Prince Nikolaus and Princess Margaretha of Liechtenstein, Archduke Carl Christian and Archduchess Marie-Astrid of Austria, Prince Maurits and Princess Marilène of Orange-Nassau, Prince Guillaume and Princess Sibilla of Luxembourg, Prince Felix of Luxembourg, Prince Louis and Princess Tessy of Luxembourg, Princess Margriet of the Netherlands, Prince Constantijn and Princess Laurentien of the Netherlands, Crown Prince Alexander and Crown Princess Katherine of Serbia, Prince Georg Frederich of Prussia and Princess Sophie of Isenburg, and others that I'm not calling out too.
It's useful here to note that the groom's parents were Crown Prince and Princess of Jordan for many years while King Hussein ruled. (Prince Hassan was King Hussein's brother; the King switched his heir to Abdullah just before he died.) As such, they were Jordan's chief representatives at many international events, and one can assume they developed ties with many European royal families. The Jordanian royal family on the whole has close relationships with a few of the other royal families, so perhaps this accounts for such a major turnout.
What did you think of Princess Zeina's wedding gown?
Photos: Hola/Reuters/Daylife/Ammon News/Hoymujer
