It’s no secret that modern royal brides often debut a second wedding dress for their glamorous evening receptions. But, 37 years after Princess Diana tied the knot with Prince Charles, it’s been revealed that Diana actually also had a second wedding dress on her big day that has never been known about until now. 

Hello! magazine recently uncovered that designer David Emanuel and his then-wife Elizabeth Emanuel created another less lavish wedding gown for the People’s Princess in case something went awry with her iconic dress. 

princess diana wedding dress
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The couple confessed they created a second dress for Diana for “peace of mind” and because they were concerned that her gown’s design would be leaked to the media prior to her July 1981 nuptials. Funnily enough, Diana never even knew about or saw the replacement dress. 

“At the time we wanted to make absolutely sure that the dress was a surprise,” David told People, according to Hello!. “We didn’t try it on Diana. We never even discussed it. We wanted to make sure that we had something there; it was for our own peace of mind, really.”

David also revealed that Diana’s second dress was never actually completed but made from the same ivory silk taffeta that the Princess’s gown included. While appearing in the royal documentary Invitation To A Royal Wedding, Elizabeth revealed how she and her husband kept Diana’s wedding gown totally under wraps until she walked down the aisle. 

“I kept every scrap and we had to be very careful not to let any scraps fall on the floor because we didn’t want them to end up in the [trash]. We had a lot of journalists going through the [garbage] to see what color the dress was, so I kept them pretty much as they were on the cutting table. Every thread was important as far as I was concerned,” she recalled. 

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