Crown Prince Haakon of Norway had an exciting weekend as he celebrated his 51st birthday.
The Norwegian Royal Family shared a new portrait of Crown Prince Haakon on the weekend to mark his birthday. They also shared some casual images of Crown Prince Haakon and Crown Princess Mette-Marit on Sunday while sailing, thanking the public for all of their birthday wishes.Â
Crown Prince Haakon was born on 20 July 1973 at the National Hospital in Oslo to then-Crown Prince Harald and Crown Princess Sonja of Norway. He has an older sister, Princess Märtha Louise, who was born in 1971.
Haakon Magnus became Crown Prince in 1991 when his grandfather, King Olav V, died and his father ascended the throne as King Harald. In 1990, the Storting (Norwegian legislature) passed a law enacting absolute primogeniture, meaning that regardless of gender, the eldest child would be first in line for the throne. However, this was not done retroactively (as was done in Sweden).Â
Haakon met Mette-Marit Tjessem Høiby in the mid-1990s but it was not until the late 1990s that the couple began a relationship. They announced their engagement on 1 December 2000 and married on 25 August 2001.Â
Crown Prince Haakon and Crown Princess Mette-Marit have two children together. Princess Ingrid Alexandra was born in 2004 and is second in line to the Norwegian throne, while Prince Sverre Magnus was born in 2005. The Crown Prince is also stepfather to Marius, Mette-Marit’s older son from a previous relationship.
