PA / Matt Porteous
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When you’re the British royal family, your Christmas card mailing list isn’t just family friends and neighbors—it’s an entire country. And now, thanks to social media, the whole world. So, some haphazard photo from a family vacation or college graduation? Not going to cut it.
Fortunately, with a more than century-old tradition of sending out holiday cards, they’ve got plenty of practice. Take 1914, when Princess Mary sent out a demure picture of herself alongside the message “with best wishes for a Happy Christmas and Victorious New Year,” as a part of a gift tin for soldiers, or 1942, when the then-Princess Elizabeth sent out a card of herself in her wartime uniform. Fast forward 50 or so years, and there’s a black and white photograph of an eye-liner heavy Princess Diana and her sons, William and Harry.
Come 2022, the next generation of royals are putting their own spin on the time-honored tradition. This year, the Cambridges released a color-coordinated photograph that showed the entire family walking through the grounds of their Norfolk estate, Anmer Hall. In 2021, they distributed a picture of themselves enjoying a visit to Jordan—a British commonwealth country where Kate Middleton lived for two years as a child.
Last holiday season, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle also shared a photograph of Archie and Lilibet in Montecito. The couple also made sure to highlight several important charities, including Team Rubicon.
Below, click through the history of British royal Christmas cards.
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Getty Images1/18Princess Mary’s Christmas card in 1914, part of a Christmas gift tin for soldiers.
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Getty Images2/18A 1942 Christmas card from Princess Elizabeth (later, Queen Elizabeth) to the Grenadier Guards regiment of the British Army.
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Getty Images3/18Prince Charles, Princess Diana, Prince William and Prince Harry in 1987.
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Getty Images4/18A Christmas card from the Wales family in 1988.
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Getty Images5/18A collection of Wales family Christmas cards, and handwritten notes from Princess Diana.
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Getty Images6/18Prince Charles’s Christmas card in 2005, which featured a photo from his wedding to Camilla Parker Bowles.
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Getty Images7/18Prince Charles with his two sons in 2008.
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Getty Images8/18Charles and Camilla’s Christmas card from 2013.
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Getty Images9/18The Cambridge family Christmas card in 2015.
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Getty Images10/18A happy Charles and Camilla in 2015.
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Getty Images11/182017 saw a color-coordinated Christmas card from the Cambridges.
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Chris Allerton / Courtesy of Kensington Palace12/18In their first Christmas card together, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex shared a never-before-seen shot from their wedding.
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Matt Porteous / Courtesy of Kensington Palace13/18Baby Prince Louis made an appearance in the Cambridges’ 2018 Christmas card photo, taken at Anmer Hall.
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Getty Images14/18Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall’s 2019 Christmas card features the couple driving a vintage car. “The photo was taken in Havana by Ramon Espinosa during the Royal visit to Cuba earlier this year,” they wrote on Instagram.
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Matt Porteous/Courtesy of Kensington Palace (@kensingtonroyal)15/18The Cambridge family in 2020, wearing countryside casual at their Norfolk home of Anmer Hall.
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Courtesy of Kensington Palace16/18The Cambridge family Christmas card in 2021, taken during a visit to Jordan.
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Photo by HSH Alexi Lubomirski, Copyright owned by Prince Harry and Meghan, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex ©2021.17/18The Sussex family Christmas Card in 2021, taken at the family home in Montecito.
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PA / Matt Porteous18/18The 2022 Christmas card from the Prince and Princess of Wales features the family at their Norfolk home.
This article was originally published on Vogue.com
