Sunday, October 6, 2013

Belgian Noble Wedding in Germany

Photo: Hannes Schmitz / Aachener Nachrichten
In much quieter fashion than the royal wedding in the Netherlands, Princess Marguerite de Mérode married Count Philippe d'Oultremont at the old monastic church in Wenau, a small village between Aachen and Cologne, yesterday. Princess Marguerite is the fifth and youngest child of Prince Charles-Louis de Mérode and his wife née Countess Clotilde d'Oultremont (of another branch of the family than her new son-in-law, just to make that clear). The groom is the only child of Count Arnould d'Oultremont and his wife née Countess Isabelle d'Aspreont-Lynden.

With such an illustrious family background, it is not surprising that there were quite a few other nobles and royals in attendance. Even though there are no pictures (yet -- I'm hoping for Point de Vue and L'Eventail here), I can tell you that according to advance media reports, Grand Duchess Maria Teresa as well as princes of Liechtenstein were supposed to attend the wedding. All in all, there were about 500 guests including members of the Orléans, Ligne and Lobkowicz families.

After the religious wedding in Wenau, the party made their way to Schloss Merode, which is only a stone's throw away, for the reception. Firstly mentioned in 1174, it is the ancestral seat of the family by the same name who were made princes of the Belgian nobility in 1929; before they were counts of Mérode. The castle is owned by the bride's father, Prince Charles-Louis, and the place were Princess Marguerite, who wore a dress by an Aachen-based designer for her wedding, and her siblings grew up.

By the way, I don't think that the Grand Duchess was the only member of the Luxembourg family to attend the wedding. For Marguerite's older sister Blanche's wedding with Baron Philipp of Bodman two years ago, there was a whole array of Grand Ducal guests including the Hereditary Grand Duke, Prince Félix, Princess Claire, Prince Louis and Princess Tessy as well as Archduke Imre, Princess Maria-Anunciata and Princess Marie-Astrid (and those were only the ones we saw pictures of).  Princess Blanche also is a good friend of Hereditary Grand Duchess Stéphanie and one of the witnesses at last October's wedding. So, let's keep our fingers crossed that some pictures will come up somewhere at some point in time, preferably soon.


Source: Aachener Nachrichten

2 comments:

  1. The priest in the picture is Archduke Paul LC, son of Archduke Michael and Princess Christina of Löwenstein-Wertheim-Rosenberg.

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  2. Thanks, interesting to know. I thought that he looked kinda familiar...

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