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Whether you're a monarchist or not, with season four of The Crown becoming the show of lockdown 2.0, there's no doubt you'll be drawn into the fanfare surrounding this season's central figure, Princess Diana (played by newcomer Emma Corrin). Tantalising court drama aside, for us the excitement lies in the show's costumes. The supersize meringue wedding gown is of course be a highlight but beyond the showstopping fashion moments that punctuated Princess Diana's royal engagements, it's her off-duty style which continues to strike a chord.
While photos of her in frou-frou Laura Ashley-esque dresses or a minimalist LBD and pearls circulate Instagram's best '80s and '90s throwback accounts, many of the pieces Diana influenced people to wear at the time have come back around – just ask Virgil Abloh and Alessandra Rich, designers who have each paid homage to the princess, or Hailey Baldwin, who broke the internet with a Miss Vogue shoot dedicated to Di's best looks.
"She was ahead of her time," Rowing Blazers founder Jack Carlson told Refinery29 ahead of the brand's launch of reissued Princess Di knitwear. "She perfected the art of mixing high and low, and blurred the lines between menswear and womenswear. She was doing streetwear before streetwear was a thing — but at the same time she was the archetype of the Sloane Ranger! She was all of these contradictions, and that’s what made her so iconic – and what makes her so relevant to what’s happening in fashion now."
Ahead, we've recreated 11 of Princess Diana's most enduring looks, from lockdown-appropriate loungewear to Ganni-esque XXL collars.
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