All Of The Worst-Dressed Trooping The Colour 2026 Attendees

The U.K. celebrated King Charles III's birthday officially by grabbing a cuppa and catching the coverage of the 2026 edition of Trooping the Colour. Charles' age won't actually change until November, and some royals dressed exactly like they'd been invited to a grown man's birthday party — complete with a parade and flypast in his honor — a few months too early. It feels like they grumbled and grabbed whatever screamed, "I'd rather be spending my Saturday afternoon doing anything else."

The royal celebration always features a lot of one color in particular: red. It's an expected choice from Charles and Prince William, who match the troops that the king inspects in their usual uniforms, all cluttered up with a muddled mess of royal regalia. You'd think the royals who have more freedom to choose their outfits would make things a little more interesting, but that actually wasn't the case this year: The looks were a royal procession of ensembles that might give you a sense of déjà vu.

Queen Camilla made the 2023 Trooping the Colour worst-dressed list with her red military-inspired ensemble, and she was at it again this year in a similar outfit. Her red Fiona Clare coat looked like a discount knockoff of King Charles III's regal uniform, but stripped of all its honors. There have been rumors that Charles is worried about Camilla's future in the royal family, should he die before she does, and her look might be a way to send a message: She's Colonel of the Grenadier Guards, by jove, so don't you forget it. Or with that hat, she might be sending the message that she'd rather be leading the military parade than cruising with the king in a carriage.

Last year, Catherine, Princess of Wales, ruined her Trooping the Colour outfit with one glaring mistake: nude heels. This year, the issue was that she wore yet another coatdress (no shocker there) that was another shade of blue — she just turned down the color saturation and the placement of the white contrast on her lapels. And just like last year, her Catherine Walker coat could be a nod to one of Princess Diana's looks. Isn't it high time the new Princess of Wales found the confidence to do her own thing sartorially? The sun filtering through the brim of her hat also had the unfortunate effect of making her skin look blotchy. 

Birgitte, Duchess of Gloucester, rolled into Trooping the Colour in a look that just might deliver a killing blow to the grannycore trend. If the wardrobe department of a high school stage production was trying to put together a costume for a grandmother character, the result could be her look: a dark polka-dot dress with a huge frill around the neck, a netted hat, and white gloves. Her dated (as in, back to the '40s with a tinge of the 17th century, thanks to that ruff) look even had a string of pearls for her to clutch when she saw what Queen Camilla was wearing.

Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh, played it safe with her collared cream dress, but she decided to kick things up a few notches above her forehead. Unfortunately, her Jane Taylor saucer hat was the perfect argument in favor of royal headwear trends getting a serious refresh. It looked like she had slapped a sieve on her head — and some unfortunate white dove had made the mistake of trying to fly through it.

During the 2026 Trooping the Colour celebrations, Prime Minister Keir Starmer's wife, Lady Victoria Starmer, looked like she was seriously regretting her outdated attire. Her dress might have looked better with a little tailoring, but the poor fit and pleated bishop sleeves created a frumpy silhouette. The woeful garment was also constructed from a lightweight fabric, and the end result of all of these elements that simply didn't work together was a gown more fitting for a ghost haunting a gothic Victorian novel — one who died wearing her nightgown.