Kate’s Tatler cover story gets rare Kensington Palace rebuttal: A look at royal statements in recent years
A story on Tatler magazine has irked the royal family in England. The July-August cover story for the British magazine published by Condé Nast Publications, which focuses on fashion, lifestyle, and British high society, is about Kate Middleton or Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, the wife of Prince William, Duke of Cambridge. The piece is titled ‘Catherine the Great: How the crisis made Kate the Kingmaker’.
The story begins with, “Has the Duchess of Cambridge suddenly become one of the most influential women in the world? Front and center of the new, slimmed-down monarchy, Kate hasn’t put an LK Bennett-shod foot out of place in the nine years she has been William’s wife.”
It goes on to make a few bold allegations, based on intel gathered from anonymous sources and quote-unquote friends of the Duchess and the royal family. The story alleges that Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, and Kate fought on Meghan’s wedding day over whether or not bridesmaids should wear tights.
This, the magazine claims, was the beginning of a long-running feud between the two sisters-in-law. The story further alleges that the Cambridges were furious over the Sussexes’ exit from the royal family, something that led to a greater workload for Kate.
Kensington Palace reportedly issued a statement on Wednesday, May 27, in response to the story. It read: “This story contains a swathe of inaccuracies and false misrepresentations which were not put to Kensington Palace prior to publication.”
The Tatler responded with its own statement: “Tatler's Editor-in-Chief Richard Dennen stands behind the reporting of Anna Pasternak and her sources. Kensington Palace knew we were running the 'Catherine the Great' cover months ago and we asked them to work together on it. The fact they are denying they ever knew is categorically false.”
Kensington Palace is not known to issue statements very often. So rare is this occurrence, in fact, that whenever it happens, headlines like ‘Kensington Palace issues rare statement on…’ immediately become commonplace. So, what are these rare occasions when the royal household has been compelled to say something?
In 2015, the Palace issued a statement regarding the spate of sexism and racism being faced by Prince Harry’s then-girlfriend Meghan. The statement mentioned both, “the outright sexism and racism of social media trolls and web article comments” and “the substantial bribes offered by papers to her ex-boyfriend.”
In 2018, tabloids carried rumors that Kate had allegedly snapped at Meghan after the latter supposedly spoke rudely to members of the Duchess of Cambridge's staff. Following that, the Palace denied the incident, saying, “This never happened.”
In 2019, a British plastic surgeon, Dr. Munir Somji, shared two side-by-side pictures of the Duchess on his clinic’s Instagram account, with the caption, “Our Kate loves a bit of baby Botox.” He further went into detail how this particular cosmetic treatment had apparently been used on Kate several times.
Following this, Kensington Palace said that Dr. Somji’s claim was “categorically not true,” adding that the royal family does not support commercial activity, such as treatments like Botox. “The Royal Family never endorse commercial activity,” the statement said.
The same year, Vanity Fair carried a report that suggested Prince Harry and Meghan were planning to raise their yet-unborn child with a “fluid approach to gender”.
A source allegedly told Vanity Fair that “Meghan has been talking to some of her friends about the birth and how she and Harry plan to raise their baby. Her exact word was fluid. She said they plan to raise their child with a fluid approach to gender and they won’t be imposing any stereotypes.” Once again, Kensington Palace categorically denied this and called the story “totally false”.