After the furore around whether the men of the royal household could and would wear military uniforms for Prince Philip’s funeral today, the decision to wear traditional morning suits was a respectful show of solidarity and neutrality at this most testing of times.

Prince Charles, flanked by his brothers Prince Edward and Andrew, followed by Prince William, Peter Phillips and Prince Harry, led the way in full morning dress, comprising a black morning coat and waistcoat with pleated grey trousers. The rest of the male members of the party followed suit, with the princes’ coats adorned with medals and watch fob chains decorating the waistcoats. Around Prince Charles' neck was his red enamel Order of Merit medal. Prince Charles, Prince Andrew, Prince Edward and Prince William wore the Order of the Garter medal on their chests, while Prince Harry wore the Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order and Star.

The fallout had reportedly come from Prince Andrew’s desire to wear a Navy admiral’s uniform for the funeral in homage to his father and the latter’s naval career. Having stepped back from public duties in late 2019 in light of the Jeffrey Epstein scandal, the Duke of York’s promotion to the rank of Admiral was deferred.

The situation was further muddied by the fact that Prince Harry, having stepped down as a royal, could not wear military dress. This would have meant that the only two members of the Royal family in the procession to have seen active service - Prince Andrew in the Falklands war in 1982 and Prince Harry in Afghanistan in 2013 - would have been in civilian attire. With the final line-up running the risk of looking disjointed and highlighting rumoured fractures amongst the men, it is reported that the Queen made the decision for her sons and grandsons all to wear morning suits in lieu of military attire.

Of course, the full pomp and splendour of military regalia is a mighty thing to behold - and something the men of the royal household do exceptionally well in their Blues and Royals uniforms, as seen at the far happier occasion that was Prince Harry’s wedding. But the princes have a long history of wearing morning suits at important occasions, and the final ensembles were entirely appropriate to the sombre and historic nature of the event.

“Morning dress is as formal as one can be without wearing military uniform,” says Oliver Spencer, founder of formalwear house Favourbrook, which specialises in morning suits. “It’s the next step down, and a respectful way to dress for such an important event. It’s certainly not the kind of thing men wear for any funeral, so to adopt morning suits underlines that sense of importance,” says Spencer. “The crucial thing is that the waistcoat must be black, to show that it’s a different kind of morning dress to any other setting one would wear a morning suit to, such as a wedding or Ascot.”

The Duke of Edinburgh was a fan of Savile Row suiting, and no stranger to the tailoring of Gieves & Hawkes and Kent, Haste and Latcher, and it’s likely that the princes’ morning suits are from those historic institutions. It’s certainly a stately and ceremonial ensemble, with the elongated, sweeping tail of the coat harking back to the Industrial Revolution, and the fact that it requires a waistcoat adding to its formality. It's also a mode of dress that has precedence at royal funerals; Prince Philip himself, alongside his sons and grandsons, wore morning suits to Princess Margaret’s funeral in 2002.

This was in contrast to the procession behind Princess Diana’s coffin during her funeral five years earlier, one of the most enduring images of the royals of the 20th century - Prince Charles and his father alongside Earl Spencer, and the young Princes William, 15, and Harry, 12, walking tense and grief-stricken behind the gun carriage bearing their mother’s coffin.

Notably, the men and boys in this instance wore classic suits; only Earl Spencer wore black while Prince Philip donned grey and Prince Charles wore navy. This chimed with the deeply moving, but less formal, ceremony that followed. Similarly, considering the tender ages of the young princes and the wretchedness of their situation, the decision may have been made to make things as comfortable and familiar as possible for them.

As the procession made its way to St George’s Chapel for Prince Philip's final journey, it was a respectful and dignified way to honour the Duke of Edinburgh’s memory.

Read more:

How Prince Philip's wardrobe of Savile Row suits and sporting panache defined British style

Prince Philip was right - dressing is for you and you alone, gentlemen

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