Regal Asprey: A History of the British Royal Family’s Favorite Jeweler

The British Royal Family and the House of Asprey have been intrinsically linked since 1862 when Queen Victoria gave the luxury goods family business a Royal Warrant for ‘traveling trunks.’ Since that date almost 160 years ago, each Monarch and Prince of Wales has bestowed a royal warrant upon this most British of brands. However, it was George VI who presented Asprey with a Royal Warrant for jewelry in 1940. 

Eight years later, George VI’s wife Queen Mary bought a pearl necklace from Asprey for the 18th birthday of their granddaughter, Princess Margaret — the younger sister of her late Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II. Margaret wore the spectacular five-strand natural pearl necklace, secured with an enormous and exquisite diamond-set Art Deco clasp, for several significant birthdays, all photographed by Sir Cecil Beaton.

In the famous Christie’s sale of her jewels in 2006, the catalog’s description of the necklace reads, ‘The Princess was particularly fond of these pearls and is pictured wearing them in many famous portraits from 1948 onwards.” The incomparable Asprey pearl and diamond necklace sold for the hammer price of £276,000 – more than ten times its estimate.  

Asprey’s Beginnings 

The house was established in 1781 in Surrey, just outside London, as a printer and purveyor of fine silks. Some sixty years later, founder William Asprey’s son, Charles Asprey, formed a partnership with his son-in-law, a prominent stationer on Bond Street in London until 1846. By the end of 1847, Charles Asprey (I) and his son Charles (II) moved their business to 166 Bond Street, London, where it became the luxury emporium of the Georgian upper class.  

By 1847, Asprey’s collection of luxury goods was expanding, thanks to partnerships with the most successful and relevant British manufacturers. The store on Bond Street became known as the “Golden Gift Shop” amongst the elite of early Victorian London. 

In 1851, Asprey and his son chose a magnificent dressing case to display at the Great Exhibition opened by Queen Victoria in Hyde Park, London, also where the infamous Koh-I-Noor diamond had its first public appearance. The dressing case was veneered in fine Brazilian rosewood, also referred to as kingwood for its beauty, with the gilding technique ormulu applied to the front, lid, and handles, and the interior lined with red velvet that contained everything an aristocratic lady needed to do her beauty routine or toilette. Asprey’s Kingwood case was awarded an Honourable Mention for quality workmanship and earned the Asprey name its association with royalty. Immediately, a frenzy of the fashionable and wealthy aristocracy descended upon the splendiferous flagship to purchase trunks they needed to travel across the Atlantic to North America, on the luxurious ocean liners of P&O, Cunard, and La Compagnie Générale Transatlantique.  

In reverse, wealthy ‘Gilded Age’ industrialists traveling from the New World to the Old for a Grand Tour of Europe, needed elegant trunks to ship back the many French fashions purchased during their travels, from the likes of Charles Worth of Paris. Where better than from Asprey? The house garnered unrivaled acclaim after the Queen awarded the firm’s first Royal Warrant for leather cases in 1860.

When they stepped into the store for their Royal-approved trunks, they would then discover the house’s exquisite glass and silverware. Beautifully cut glass bottles and jars with engraved silver lids, and stoppers for fragrances and cold creams; stunning sets of the finest glass and china; bone-handled knives, spoons, and forks. And of course, the silks that started William Asprey’s business a century earlier.  

In 1888, Asprey bought French jewelry maison, Leuchars & Son. Through this acquisition, the family acquired goldsmiths, silversmiths, enamellers, and engravers allowing them to engrave their luxury products on-site, which became increasingly popular with their distinguished clients.  

Royal Jewels

Back to their bejeweled regal treasures, Princess Margaret and many other members of the British Royal Family loved wearing Asprey jewels. Margaret’s mother Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, was given a Maple Leaf diamond brooch in the Spring of 1939, by her husband King George VI, in honor of their Royal Visit to Canada. According to Hugh Roberts’ book The Queen’s Diamonds, the brooch cost £300 and 5 shillings. The spectacular diamond brooch was first photographed pinned to her lapel while they were on board their liner, the Empress of Australia, only four months before the outbreak of World War II. The brooch was also worn by Queen Elizabeth II, who was still a princess, for her first trip to the North American Commonwealth Country in 1951. Then of course, Kate wore the brooch on her first trip to Canada in 2011, only a few months after her wedding to Prince William, and again in 2016. 

Queen Elizabeth II’s Asprey Diamond and Sapphire Suite

In 1979, during her and Prince Philip’s tour of the Middle East, her Queen Elizabeth II was presented with an Asprey creation of a sumptuous sapphire and diamond demi-parure by Sheikh Rashid of Dubai. Despite her vaults already filled with ancestral jewels, this was a prodigious gift. On receiving the gift, the Queen was seen with her left hand pressed to her chest in emotion. 

The Dubai diamond and sapphire suite consists of large circular sapphires amidst a swirling design of loops, set with round diamonds. The earrings emulate the large loops with sapphires in the center. The accompanying ring is no doubt similar, although there is no record of this as it was transformed into a bracelet along with the original earrings. The necklace was reduced in size and a new pair of earrings was designed. Her late Majesty wore the exquisite, modified suite, with the newly created cuff-like bracelet and her great grandmother, Queen Alexandra’s Kokoshnik Tiara, an exceptional 488 brilliant cut diamond extravaganza, in Edmonton in 2005 at the centenary celebratory dinner of the creation of Alberta and Saskatchewan. Fast forward to May 2021, the Duchess of Cambridge wore the new Asprey sapphire and diamond earrings at the Palace of Holyrood.  

Princess Diana’s Asprey Diamonds

When Lady Diana Spencer married Prince Charles in 1981, she became the first Princess of Wales in over seven decades. Crown Prince Fahd of Saudia Arabia gifted her a full parure of diamonds and sapphires from Asprey. According to Suzy Menkes in her 1986 book The Royal Jewels, the diamond necklace suspended a pendant set with a sapphire “as large as Queen Victoria’s brooch, surrounded by an open [diamond] sunburst.” According to the former fashion editor of the International Herald Tribune and Vogue International, the late Princess wore the pendant detached from the original diamond line necklace set on a velvet choker. She asked French fashion legend, Pierre Balmain to design her a blue velvet dress to match the suite. The remainder of the Saudi Parure consisted of earrings, a choker, a ring, a bracelet, and a dress watch – all created by Asprey and set with diamonds and sapphires.

Catherine, the current Princess of Wales, has not been shy in her embracing of Asprey diamonds. Over the past few years, we have seen the future Queen sporting jewels from several contemporary collections, including a very significant piece of jewelry that Princess Diana made famous several decades ago: the emerald and diamond choker of Queen Mary. In 2022 in Boston, at her husband’s Earthshot Awards, Catherine wore a pair of diamond and emerald earrings that perfectly suited the century-old jewel – the earrings were pavé-set with diamonds set as halos around four emeralds.  

She also went to the Asprey Emporium for a pair of their iconic diamond and amethyst 167 button earrings that she wore on a 2017 London Marathon training day with Princes William and Harry. 

Let’s hope the Princess doesn’t wait too long before she wears the Princess Diana parure, alongside her own jewels from the very regal, House of Asprey.