Hello, I'm Lucy Worsley, chief curator at Historic Royal Palaces.

You're listening to our podcast that explores the history and stories of our six palaces.

These talks are a collection of some of our best live events.

I really hope you enjoy listening.

Throughout history, the clothing of British royalty has influenced fashion tastes and trends. This series, compiled from our archive, explores contemporary

royal fashion and its influence on what we wear today. This talk explores the wardrobes of

seven royal women who have used and continue to use

clothing and fashion as a tool for diplomacy. At its heart, fashion rules restyled is an exploration

of royal dress and the continued fascination we as observers have with it. So, for example,

painted portraits like these have formed the main way that a layman or viewer have been able to

access a monarch. We love to analyse portraits that depict individuals for whom dress

formed an integral part of a cultivated royal image. Expensive materials, richly embroidered textiles,

and extraordinary jewels represented in royal portraiture were symbols of power and authority.

And so we see with the famous portrait of Queen Elizabeth I on the left-hand side.

This portrait is known as the rainbow portrait. As Elizabeth is holding a rainbow

with the inscription in Latin, no rainbow without the sun, which reminds the viewer that only the

Queen's wisdom can ensure peace and prosperity. The portrait has been carefully crafted to impress

and to convey wealth, authority and power. Although it was painted

only three years before her death in 1603, Isaac Oliver has made her ageless. She would in reality

have been in her 60s. He also includes many other iconographic devices. So you'll see a jeweled

serpent on her sleeve, the symbol of wisdom, and the eyes and

ears all over her orange robe imply that she saw and heard everything. These grand royal images also

...