Royal Event of the Day: September 17

Ah, Prinsjesdag: that wonderful September day when we all gather around and patiently explain old fashioned dress codes to each other (and when the Dutch sovereign gives a budget speech to parliament, but this is a shiny happy place, so we won't worry about that). I always look forward to events that keep the old court dress style alive (meaning long dresses and hats - but not tiaras, because this is not an evening event - for the ladies, once a common way of dress for formal royal events, but now growing scarce). But this year's event left me with a case of the mehs, I'm afraid to say. A bright red outfit shouldn't leave me with a mere shrug, and yet:
The flower arrangement next to the King is looking very Christmas tree-esque. You could hide a person in there. If this was The Princess Diaries 3, you would hide a person in there. Yeah, you can tell when the outfits aren't doing it for me, because I have drifted to the flowers. My floral musings typically don't extend past pretty/not pretty. Very sophisticated, I know.
Okay, to the clothes: Queen Máxima is wearing a Valentino silk-gazar gown with a Fabienne Delvigne hat and Miu Miu shoes. She is red from top to toe, including her gloves, and it is...a lot of red. It fits her beautifully, but the solid red background basically just reminds me that I'm not a huge fan of red together with the blue and orange of her Order of the Netherlands Lion sash.
I could have been on board with the red as an excuse to pile on the rubies, but Máx went instead with diamonds and pearls. This is a pretty modest level of jewelry for Máxima, really. Luscious, of course, but fairly average on the MAX scale.
Also present were Prince Constantijn and Princess Laurentien, and (per ModekoninginMaxima) Laurentien wore a dress from Talbot Runhof. A dress made from...wait for it...CORDUROY! About the least formal fabric I can think of, apart from denim. And yet, I gotta say, it absolutely works. Her modification of the dress to a shorter sleeve definitely helps. The dress is dark enough to pass for navy or black, but it is aubergine, a wonderful pairing with her Order of the House of Orange sash. She finished the look with a hat close enough to her own hair color to trick me into thinking she might have rocked up in a glorious faux bouffant 'do for about half a second.
Maybe a big old bouffant would have done the trick to pull me out of the mehs. I could just deal with the fact that I miss the presence of Princess Beatrix and Princess Margriet, and the King in his grand uniform, but suggesting a major fake hairdo seems a more logical choice. Yeah. 

Are you finding anything to fall in love with here?


Photos: Pool/Getty Images, NOS video, Net-a-porter, Mark Cuthbert/UK Press/Getty Images, Talbot Runhof