When the wedding cake is unveiled for the nuptials of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, we can expect a grand confection, modernized, calling back to the elaborate official royal cake created for the wedding of Harry’s mother and father, Princess Diana and Prince Charles. Diana and Charles’ was a fruitcake over five feet tall, adorned with both Charles’ coat of arms and Diana’s family crest, all topped with a spray of blooms.
We can thank Harry’s great-great-great grandmother Queen Victoria for the appearance of modern, and extravagant, wedding cakes. Hers, a large tiered cake with white icing, was crafted for her wedding to Prince Albert in 1840, which measured nine feet in circumference and weighed nearly 300 pounds. But the history of wedding cakes transcends the royal family.