The Spanish Nobility and High Society joined the House of Alba to celebrate the Wedding of Cayetana Fitz-James Stuart y Silva, the 18th Duchess of Alba and Alfonso Díez Carabantes in the Chapel of the Palacio de las Dueñas in Seville on this day in 2011.
The 18th Duchess of Alba married Alfonso Díez Carabantes in a Catholic Ceremony in the Chapel of the Palacio de las Dueñas in Seville, one of the two primary residences of the House of Alba.
The wedding took place at 1.15pm in the Chapel of the Palacio de las Dueñas in Seville where 38 guests witnessed the ceremony. They included four of the duchess’s six children from her first marriage to Luis Martínez de Irujo y Artázcoz, son of the Duke of Sotomayor. Her son, Jacobo, Count of Siruela, famously went to Paris instead of attending his mother’s wedding, after she insulted his wife, the journalist Inka Martí, on live television before the event, calling her “a jealous liar”. Her daughter Eugenia was unable to attend as she was ill with chickenpox.
The Duchess, then 85, wore a pink dress made of silk and lace with a lime-green velvet bow, created by Seville-based designers, Victorio & Lucchino. One of the most memorable photographs of the day was the Duchess dancing the flamenco with her new husband, 25 years her junior, after the ceremony.
The Duchess of Alba was previously married to Don Luis Martínez de Irujo y Artázcoz in 1947, with the couple having six children before his death in 1972.
The Duchess then remarried to Jesús Aguirre y Ortiz de Zárate, a former Jesuit priest, from 1972 to 2001.
Before her third wedding, the Duchess spoke candidly of the travails she faced overcoming her children’s objections.
“They don’t want me to marry, but they change partners more often than I do,” the duchess previously said about her children
“The tough part was that my children didn’t understand and they got quite angry with me.
“It’s true that I planned to marry. We were both full of enthusiasm for the idea. I took a step back for my children. I saw that everything was going to be very complicated.”
To allay their suspicions of her prospective husband, she divided up her wealth between her six children and grandchildren, and Mr Diez has reportedly also relinquished his rights to her fortune.
