When you’re the British royal family, your Christmas card list isn’t just family friends and neighbours – it’s an entire country. And now, thanks to social media, the whole world. So, some haphazard photo from a family holiday or university graduation? Not going to cut it.
Fortunately, with a 170-year-old tradition of sending out Christmas cards, they’ve got plenty of practice. Take 1914, when Princess Mary sent out a demure picture of herself alongside the message “with best wishes for a Happy Christmas and Victorious New Year”, as part of a gift tin for soldiers, or 1942, when the then-Princess Elizabeth sent out a card of herself in her wartime uniform. Fast forward 50 or so years, and there’s a black-and-white photograph of an eyeliner-heavy Princess Diana and her sons, Princes William and Harry.
Click through the history of British royal Christmas cards, and reminisce about the days when spamming everyone you know with a solo glamour shot was totally acceptable (oh wait, we just described Instagram, didn’t we?).
