Silvia Renate Sommerlath (December 23, 1943) is Queen of Sweden as the wife of King Carl XVI Gustaf. She has held this title since her marriage to Carl Gustaf in 1976. The King and Queen have three children: Victoria, Carl Philip, and Madeleine. As the eldest child, Victoria is the heir apparent to the throne.
Silvia Sommerlath was born in Germany, and is the only daughter of Alice and Walther Sommerlath. Her father was German and her mother was Brazilian.She has one older brother, Ralf. Her other brothers were Walther, who died in 2020, and Jörg, who died in 2006.
During the 1972 Summer Olympics, Silvia met Crown Prince Carl Gustaf. At the time, she was leading a marketing campaign for the city of Munich. He and Silvia announced their engagement on March 12, 1976 and were married three months later, on June 19, 1976 in Stockholm Cathedral. It was the first marriage of a reigning Swedish monarch since 1797.
Queen Silvia established Mentor International in 1994 in collaboration with the World Health Organization. Her vision was to offer mentoring as inspiration, empowerment, and motivation for young people to make healthy life choices and view their futures more positively.
She was also a co-founder of the World Childhood Foundation in 1999, having been inspired by her work as Patron of the first World Congress against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children held in Stockholm.
Her commitment to the work with dementia and the care of the elderly at the end of life is also well known and respected. She chairs the Royal Wedding Fund, which supports research in sports and athletics for disabled young people and the Queen Silvia Jubilee Fund for research on children and disability. She holds honorary positions in the Swedish Amateur Athletic Association, the Children's Cancer Foundation of Sweden and Save the Children Sweden.