Guillaume Gives a Speech

Together with his usual companion in crime Luxembourg's Minister for Economy and Foreign Trade Jeannot Krecké, The Hereditary Grand Duke attended the ALFI Global Distribution Conference in Association with NICSA & HKIFA today. Both gentlemen gave speeches at the opening of the two day conference but we'll focus solely on what our dear Guillaume said.

During his speech about Microfinance, Guillaume asked the participating market players for long-lasting investments and investments in the field of microfinance stating, "Poverty is not a serious issue in Luxembourg and the EU, but unemployment has been rising since 2008 and young people are the first victims. Our youth is in dire need of job creation. So microfinance might be solution even within our borders." (taken from ALFI Events - Microfinance for Europe)

More information about the conference can be found on the ALFI conferences blog (in English) and on paperJam.lu (in French). Photos of the event taken by Luc Deflorenne are now available on paperJam.lu and in the blog post about Guillaume's speech.


Sources: ALFI Events, paperJam.lu

New Parents Attend Concert

Back in August, a concert with the title Les musicales de Belœil took place at the, you probably already guessed it, Château de Belœil. In case you are not exactly up to date about the ownership of Belgian castles; since 1394 the castle is the home of one of Belgium's oldest noble families, the de Ligne's. The head of the family Prince Michel de Ligne, who organised the event together with his family, is the son of Prince Antoine of Ligne and Princess Alix of Luxembourg; that makes him the nephew of Grand Duke Jean and the cousin of of the current Grand Duke.

Among the guests at the concert were Archduchess Marie-Christine of Austria, the daughter of Archduchess Marie-Astrid (née Princess of Luxembourg), and her husband Count Rodolphe of Limburg-Stirum. To see a picture of the young parents all happy and smiling, have a look on page 72 and 73 of the Point de Vue-edition from last week over at youkioske.


Sources: Point de Vue 3295, Les Musicales de Belœil

And, as basically always when it comes to news that made it into Point de Vue, thank you to Iza and Rocio for letting us know about it!

The Norwegian Birthday Party

On Thursday Norway's Princess Märtha-Louise celebrated her 40th birthday, belated best wishes! Yesterday, her parents King Harald V. and his wife Queen Sonia threw a birthday party for their only daughter and oldest child. As mentioned previously, Luxembourg's very own Hereditary Grand Duke was at hand to celebrate the Princess' decadal birthday.

More pictures, sadly none in another setting or of Guillaume arriving, are available at Aftenposten, siste.no and the major photo agencies.

Source: Aftenposten, siste.no

A Birthday, a Conference and Much More

Thanks to the recently introduced agenda we now know what the members of the Grand Ducal Family will be up to. Unfortunately, the agenda still is somewhat sketchy as there are more events the family attends than those listed on the official website. Still we are happy about any information we get on their official engagements, so here is what is planned for the next couple of days...

Tonight, the Hereditary Grand Duke will be in in the Norwegian capital Oslo to attend a private dinner that will take place at The Royal Palace to celebrate the 40th birthday of Princess Märtha-Louise, the daughter of the King and Queen of Norway.

On Tuesday, Hereditary Grand Duke Guillaume will give a speech at the opening of the 20th Alfi Global Distribution Conference. In case you are not in knowledge of every abbreviation there exists: Alfi is the short form for Association of the Luxembourg Fund Industry and the conference will focus on the latest developments in cross-border distribution of Luxembourg investment funds especially in the Asian region.

Three days later on upcoming Friday, Guillaume will attend the 21st charity gala of the Kraïzbierg Foundation in Mondorf-les-Bains.

On October 1st, Grand Duke Henri will make his way to Muri, Switzerland to attend the funeral of Archduke Félix of Austria, the last surviving child of Blessed Emperor Karl and Empress Zita who died on September 6th, just a few weeks after his brother Archduke Otto, aged 95 in Mexico. Archduke Felix was named after Prince Félix of Bourbon-Parma, the brother of Empress Zita, a born Princess of Bourbon-Parma, and, I'm sure you all know, the husband of Grand Duchess Charlotte.
As always at a Habsburg event, we can hope for appearances of Princess Marie-Astrid, her husband Archduke Carl-Christian of Austria and a few of their children.

A day later, the Grand Duke will attend a church service at the Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Luxembourg in the course of national commemoration day. Afterwards he will visit the Monument National de la Solidarité on the Kanounenhiwwel. The monument was erected to commemorate the dead of the Second World War, as well as Luxembourgish resistance and solidarity against Nazi Germany, that invaded Luxembourg on May 10th, 1940.


Sources: Cour Grand Ducale, Kongehuset.no, Alfi Global Distribution Conference - Programme, Wikipedia - German occupation of Luxembourg in World War II, Wikipedia - Kanounenhiwwel

What They've Been Up To

The Grand Ducal Family et moi should start to coordinate our holidays; I went away at the time they came back... Therefore, it is now time to do a little recap of what they have been up to during the last two weeks or so.

The after-vacation events of our favourite Hereditary Grand Duke kicked off with attending a concert of the Europeen Union Youth Wind Orchestra at the Teatro Ribeiro da Conceição in Lamego, Portugal. My dear Guillaume, if you look like that afterwards, you should go on holiday every second week ;) More eye candy is available on the official website.

A few days later, on September 14th, the Grand Duke himself joined in when he received Josette Sheeran for an audience at the Palais Grand-Ducale. The 11th Executive Director of the United Nations Worlds Food Programme visited the Grand Duchy on a working visit.

Life and work went on with an anniversary celebration for Luxembourg's steel industry and the first appearance of la Grand Duchesse. On September 15th, Grand Duke Henri and Grand Duchess Maria Teresa, both looking tanned, relaxed and happy, attended an event celebrating 100 years of steel industry in the Grand Duchy.

More information and pictures can be found at Wort, Tageblatt, Cour Grand-Ducale, Revue, L'essentiel, Journal, and probably all over the internet.

According to Wort, later the same day, Grand Duke Henri met the new British ambassador to Luxembourg, Mrs. Alice Walpole.

A day later, the Grand Duchess had her first solo engagement after this year's holidays when she received Muhammad Yunus at the Palais. In case you are a regular follower of the Grand Ducal Family, you already know that the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate is a frequent guest in Luxembourg, as both he and the Grand Duchess are active in the field of Microfinance and Social Business.

And finally, on last Sunday (September 18th), Grand Duke Henri visited the Oeko-Foire 2011, a fair specialising in the topic of sustainable development.

A Posing Princess

In the newest edition of Spanish magazine ¡Hola!, that is fortunately available at youkioske, one can find an article about Archduchess Sophie of Austria, the Princess of Windisch-Graetz. What does that have to do with a blog about the Grand Ducal Family of Luxembourg, you may rightfully ask...
The article, that among other things addresses the unfortunate death of her son Alexis who died last year at the age of 18 in a car accident, also includes pictures of a photoshooting that took place at her home Il Palazzo in Sant Angelo d'Alife, Italy. Not only Archduchess Sophie, her son Maximilian and her daughter Larissa posed for the pictures but also friends of her children. Among them, and now we finally come to the reason the article made it onto the blog, Princess Marie-Astrid of Liechtenstein. Princess Marie-Astrid is the daughter of Princess Margaretha of Liechtenstein (nee Luxembourg).

So, just venture over to youkioske and have a look at it. The article spans from page 6 to page 18, the photos of Marie-Astrid can be found on page 10/11 and 13.


A big thank you to your and my fellow Luxaholic Rocio for calling attention to the article.

Princess Sibilla Showing Off Her Bling Bling **

My wishes have been fulfilled, not only was Princess Sibilla present for the evening event of the wedding of Prince Georg Friedrich and Princess Sophie of Prussia but also did she wear her very own Diamond Art Deco Tiara. As earlier today, she was again accompanied by the Hereditary Prince and Princess of Baden, Bernhard and Stephanie.

A little excursus: The Art Deco Tiara was given to Sibilla by her parents when she got married, alas, she didn't wear it on her wedding day as she chose not to wear a tiara. Interestingly, the tiara can be worn in two different settings; Princess Sibilla decided to wear the larger setting for the wedding of Crown Prince Haakon and Crown Princess Mette-Marit of Norway almost exactly ten years ago and the smaller one for the wedding of Princess Alexandra of Sayn-Wittgenstein-Berleburg and Count Jefferson of Pfeil and Klein-Ellguth, one wonders how those two fit their names into those tiny form checkboxes... But back to Sibilla: she is also wearing a Diamond and Ruby Necklace today that must be a favourite of hers as she often wears it for formal events she attends. It was given to her by her parents-in-law, Grand Duke Jean and the late Grand Duchess Joséphine-Charlotte, on her wedding day.

Apparently, Princess Sibilla was not the only one of the extended Grand Ducal Family to attend the wedding festivities - Princess Maria-Anunciata and Princess Marie-Astrid of Liechtenstein were in Potsdam as well. A picture of the two Princesses can be found in the photo gallery of Marianne van Dam; another picture of the lovely sisters is available on Netty's Royalty Page.


Sources: me, Newscom

Prince Marries Princess With A Lux Princess In Attendance

Today, Prince Georg Friedrich of Prussia, the great-great-grandson of the last German emperor, got married to Princess Sophie of Isenburg. The wedding took place in the Church of Peace that is situated in Sanssoucci Park in Potsdam, Germany. Among the many attendees of German and foreign royal- and nobility was Luxembourg's very own Princess Sibilla.

The bride wore a rather unusual dress of the label Wunderkind designed by Wolfgang Joop that, in my humble opinion, looked wonderful. It is not the style of dress that I usually prefer but, nevertheless, I really liked it because it suited Sophie very well, and don't get me started on that magnificant Isenburg tiara ;)

Princess Sibilla walked into the church with Bernhard, the Hereditary Prince of Baden and his wife Princess Stephanie. In the church, she was seated next to Prince Laurent of Belgium, her husband's cousin.

Pictures of the wedding are available at most of the big photo agencies, for example Newscom, Daylife, PPE Agency and Isopix. They are constantly updated and I hope that a few more pictures of Sibilla, who, by the way, looked especially lovely today, will surface.

I am also eagerly awaiting the dinner that will take place tonight. It is a tiara event and all of us should keep our fingers crossed that Sibilla will also be in attendance to show off her beautiful Art Déco Tiara that we only get to see very rarely.


Pictures are taken from: Newscom (left), Daylife (middle), PPE Agency (right)

Summertime Is Partytime

At least for the extended Grand Ducal Family.

As Point de Vue is reporting in last weeks issue, Prince Guillaume and his wife Princess Sibilla, Princess Margaretha and her husband Prince Nikolaus of Liechtenstein, as well as Prince Jean and his wife Madame Diane de Guerre attended a party hosted by the Baron and Baroness Gillion Crowet. The Arabian Nights themed party took place in Taroudant, a city in the southern part of Morocco.

During the same week Prince Jean and his children Princess Marie-Gabrielle and Prince Constantin attended the 50th birthday party of Prince Charles-Emmanuel of Bourbon-Parma organised by his wife. Also in attendance for the big birthday bash at the Polo de Bagatelle in Paris were Princess Margaretha's children Princess Maria-Anunciata and Prince Josef.


Source: Point de Vue no. 3289

And last but certainly not least a special thanks to our fellow luxaholic Iza for providing the news!

Biographical Updates

The Cour Grand Ducale has updated parts of the official biographical information provided about members of the Grand Ducal Family. The updates include a general reorganizing of the layout of information provided in the sections dedicated to certain individuals.

It is wonderful to note that Princess Tessy now occupies several more lines in Louis' section! Her own section would still be the better, but, I can't complain, too, much about this development! While it isn't news to any of my fellow Luxaholics, it is super stellar to finally see an official mention that Princess Tessy is undertaking a university education!! The updates also include confirmation of the family's move to England and two mentions of hobbies that the Princess enjoys. Finally some much needed kudos for Princess Tessy!!! You will also find several lovely newish pictures of Prince Louis' family in the photos section attached to his bio. The section includes several other little tidbits of new info about Louis.

We are now informed that the Princess Alexandra has given her patronage to Lëtzebuerger Déiereschutzliga. According to the organization's website Princess Alexandra has been their patroness since 2008.

The Hereditary Grand Duke's section has also been updated to make a note of his interest and dedication to Social Business. It also echos our thoughts in stating that he began working full time in his role as Hereditary Grand Duke in 2009, following his university graduation.

I did  note some unusual inconsistencies related to names and titles. Alexandra and Felix have their full names  punctuated with many commas. Princess Alexandra is listed as a Princess of Luxembourg, Nassau and Bourbon-Parme. Louis and Felix are "de Luxembourg" while poor Prince Sebastien is just a prince of nothing.   It would end a lot of discussion on various forums if the usage of titles was consistent and thorough. All of the children of Henri are Prince(sse) de Luxembourg, Prince(sse) de Nassau and Prince(sse) de Bourbon de Parme. If you acknowledge the full title of Alexandra why not do it for her brothers? It is inconsistent and confusing. I also think that adding a section that deals specifically with the special titles held by Guillaume and the stages of his acquirement of each would be interesting. 

I still think Princess Tessy deserves her own section and that Henri's siblings should be mentioned as more than just children listed in Grand Duke Jean's section. The family is very large (one of the largest in Europe) and I will always consider it a loss that so few members are mentioned.

Check out these new updates. The website continues to improve.

Source: Cour Grand Ducale