Maud Charlotte Mary Victoria of Wales (November 26, 1869 – November 20, 1938), daughter of the future Edward VII and Alexandra of Denmark, married her first cousin, Prince Carl of Denmark, in 1896. They had one child, Alexander, born in 1903. In 1905 the Norwegian parliament dissolved Norway's union with Sweden and asked Prince Carl to become king of the newly independent Norway. Following a plebiscite, Carl accepted, taking the name of Haakon VII. His two year old son's name was changed to Olav; he would eventually become King Olav V.
Queen Maud never had any ambition for such an elevated role; she was shy and preferred the company of her family, especially those in England. But she was well thought of in her adopted country, and was certainly a very well dressed consort; she must have had a considerable dress allowance. A remarkable number of her gowns have been preserved. Here are some of them:
(These would be from the period just prior to WWI, circa 1906-1914.)
 |
| In these images, Queen Maud is wearing the above gown. |
 |
| Rear view of the above. |
***
Postscript:
A friend asked me if that last pictured gown was from the House of Worth. I hadn't been paying attention to the dressmakers when searching for images of Queen Maud's gowns, so the question sent me back to Google. Turns out that, yes, it is a Worth gown. More interesting, it seems Maud requested a revision of the gown's bodice; something a bit more "streamlined". More interesting, still, it seems the same gown - in its original form - was also owned by Maud's first cousin, Queen Victoria Eugenie ("Ena") of Spain. Spain and Norway are at the opposite ends of Europe so, unless they both went home to visit England at the same time, it seems the likelihood of an embarrassing same-dress moment was pretty slim.
 |
| Queen "Ena" and the Worth gown. |
