Alan Webster, Dean of St Paul's, presided at the service, and Robert Runcie, Archbishop of Canterbury, conducted the marriage.

[19] Two nights before the wedding, a gala ball was held at Buckingham Palace, and the Queen subsequently hosted a dinner for a crowd of 90 individuals.

[21] In a series of tapes recorded for her 1992 biography, Diana said that she recalled discovering a bracelet which Charles had bought for his longtime lover Camilla Parker Bowles shortly before their wedding.

Two million spectators lined the route of Diana's procession from Clarence House, with 4,000 police and 2,200 military officers to manage the crowds.

[28] At 10:22 BST the Queen and the royal family were taken to the cathedral in eight carriages, the Prince of Wales in the 1902 State Landau, which was later used following the ceremony to take the couple back to Buckingham Palace.

[21] Lady Diana arrived at the cathedral in the Glass Coach with her father, John Spencer; she was escorted by six mounted Metropolitan Police officers.

[9] As the orchestra played Trumpet voluntary, an anthem by Jeremiah Clarke, the bride made the three-and-a-half minute walk up the aisle.

[31] In keeping with tradition, the couple's wedding rings were crafted from Welsh gold from the Clogau St David's mine in Bontddu.

[34][33] Music and songs used during the wedding included the "Prince of Denmark's March", "I Vow to Thee, My Country", "Pomp and Circumstance No.4" and the British National Anthem ("God Save the Queen").

[38][39] She wore a pair of low-heeled Clive Shilton shoes "with C and D initials hand-painted on her arches" and decorated with 542 sequins and 132 pearls.

[41] Per the Queen's orders, two similar bouquets were prepared for the bride by David Longman which contained "gardenias, stephanotis, odontolglossum orchid, lily of the valley, Earl Mountbatten roses, freesia, veronica, ivy, myrtle and trasdescantia".

Eleven-year-old Lord Nicholas Windsor, son of the Duke and Duchess of Kent, and eight-year-old Edward van Cutsem, godsons of the Prince of Wales, were page boys.

[20] All of the governors-general of the Commonwealth realms, as well as the reigning European monarchs, attended, with the exception of King Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofía of Spain.

(The Spanish king was "advised" not to attend by his government because the newlyweds' honeymoon included a stopover in the disputed territory of Gibraltar.

)[46] Most of Europe's elected heads of state were among the guests, with the exceptions of the President of Greece, Constantine Karamanlis (who declined because Greece's exiled monarch, Constantine II, a kinsman and friend of the bridegroom, had been invited as "King of the Hellenes"), and the President of Ireland, Patrick Hillery (who was advised by Taoiseach Charles Haughey not to attend because of the dispute over the status of Northern Ireland).

[47] While Gambian President Dawda Jawara attended the wedding, the Gambia Socialist Revolutionary Party attempted a coup d'état in his home country.

David Avery, head baker at the Royal Naval cooking school in Chatham Kent, made the cake over 14 weeks.

The Prince of Wales's coat of arms and the Spencer family's crest were used in the decoration of the five-foot-tall layered fruitcake which weighed 225 pounds.

[54] Angela Rippon, Peter Woods, Tom Fleming, Wynford Vaughan-Thomas, Rolf Harris, and Terry Wogan provided the coverage for the BBC on television and radio.

[54] BBC Two's coverage was designed to draw in hearing impaired viewers by providing subtitles, which marked "the first big outing for the Palantype system".

[57] British opponents of the monarchy were largely "muted" during the wedding, with some travelling to France or Ireland or releasing black balloons over London to express their disapproval.

However, these represented only a small minority of the British public, and The New York Times noted that "even cynics felt a surge of sentimentality" towards the royal family.

[29] The couple received gifts from foreign officials, including an engraved Steuben glass bowl and Boehm porcelain centerpiece from the United States; a set of antique furniture and "a watercolor of loons" by Canadian Robert Bateman for Prince Charles, together with "a large brooch of gold, diamonds and platinum" for Diana from Canada; handcrafted silver platters from Australia; an "all-wool broadloom carpet" from New Zealand; "a matching diamond and sapphire watch, bracelet, pendant, ring, and earrings" from the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia; a "small oil painting by the American artist Henry Kohler of Prince Charles playing polo" as the personal gift of John J. Louis Jr., the American ambassador to the UK; and a clock in Art Deco style by Cartier's chief designer, Daniel Ciacquinot.

[62] The Greater Manchester Council offered engineering apprenticeships for a small number of unemployed young people, and Cambridge University sent "a spare copy of The Complete English Traveller" by Robert Sanders.

[29] The couple was driven over Westminster Bridge to catch the train from Waterloo station to Romsey in Hampshire to begin their honeymoon.

[44] They stayed there for three days,[44] then flew to Gibraltar, where they boarded the Royal Yacht Britannia for an eleven-day cruise of the Mediterranean, visiting Tunisia, Sardinia, Greece and Egypt.

[29] Then they flew to Scotland, where the rest of the royal family had gathered at Balmoral Castle, and spent time in a hunting lodge on the estate.