Well, there’s a lot going on in royal news this weekend between the ongoing BAFTAs, news of the Duke of Edinburgh’s driver’s license and the Markle letter, but first we’re going to back up and cover the slightly less dramatic news of the Duchess of Cambridge’s garden.
After this I will go ahead and cover this evening’s red carpet BAFTAs appearance, but I’m going to save the catch up on what’s going on with the Duchess of Sussex and Prince Philip (separately) for tomorrow.
So, flowers. Kate has been working with the Royal Horticultural Society, Andrée Davies and Adam White to design a “Back to Nature” garden that will debut at the Chelsea Flower Show this spring. Kate has turned up at the Chelsea Flower Show on a few occasions, including 2016 and 2017. She missed it last year while on maternity leave for Prince Louis, but it’s an event that usually draws several members of the British Royal Family, not least of whom is the Queen herself.
Kate’s garden is meant to encourage people finding peace and respite in the natural world, thus complementing her other work alongside her husband and the Sussexes to promote mental health. As we well know, a good portion of Kate’s work supports young people getting outdoors and engaging with nature. Indeed, just this past week she made mention of how much she and her family enjoy playing outside and she’s shared numerous anecdotes over the years of taking Prince George and Princess Charlotte out in the garden or countryside.
The announcement brought with it a few new photos that are now sprinkled through this post. It’s hard to say when exactly these images were taken, but Kate is wearing a tweed jacket by Durbarry that she debuted during an engagement last month in two and the red turtleneck sweater from J.Crew she wore underneath it another. While it’s possible that the image of her in red is from that same day, she is wearing jeans in the photos of her in the garden, so my guess is these were taken at different times.
What I like about this is actually that we’re getting this announcement ahead of time and the images give a little glimpse of how much behind-the-scenes work goes into engagements and projects. It can be easy to forget when we don’t see Kate – or William, Harry or Meghan, etc. – that there are still meetings, events and work happening separate from the public engagements at which we typically see them. It’s something Kensington Palace has gotten better about sharing in the last couple of years and I do think it’s important.
With that, barring any further news, we’ll see the debut during the flower show in May!