The Duchess of Cambridge did three work events within about thirty hours. She went on a work spree! And I’m enjoying all of the conspiracies about it too. I’m also wondering if Kate has decided to “look busy” just as Prince Harry draws closer to possibly proposing to Meghan Markle. Kate will want to position herself as the humble, modest, hard-working English girl, as compared to Meghan’s actress career and Americanism. Will it work? Probably not, because Meghan is actually a lot more media savvy than William and Kate put together.
Anyway, these photos are of William and Kate last night in London. They attended the Guild Of Health Writers conference at Chandos House. For the outing, Kate chose a new-to-us frock. This is an Oscar de la Renta two-piece ensemble, a seemingly separate skirt and jacket, likely from the 2015 fall/winter collection. The Daily Mail says the pieces are sold out now, but the retail on the skirt alone was $1290. For that? Really? And you’ve got to figure that Kate had it specially tailored, which is why everything looks off-kilter. This is one of Kate’s favorite silhouettes though – she loves a full skirt in stiff fabric, and she loves a close-cut jacket, preferably with ruffles and buttons. She has like three dozen coatdresses and two-piece suits that look just like this, just in different colors. That being said, I love the color. Also note: The Telegraph is wondering if Kate is taking “style tips” from Ivanka Trump, because Ivanka loves Oscar de la Renta. I hope Kate isn’t taking any tips from Ivanka. Please, no.
As for the Cambridges’ appearance at this conference, luckily the writers weren’t gifted with another Kate speech about how only poor kids from single-parent families have mental health issues. Instead, William gave a speech about how hard his air-ambulance-piloting job is and how his employer “knows about the value of normalizing mental health, and treating it with the same respect that we confer on physical health. This should be the norm.”
PS… I’m obsessed with figuring out if she’s wearing a “fall,” or a wiglet in the back. I can see the “line” where I think the fake hair starts.
Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet, WENN and Getty.
Totally twee.
SO twee.
Yes to the lovely jewel tone, yes to the translucent black hose and black pumps. But the structure of this suit is just plain ridiculous.
I’d like its twee quotient more if the collar were black velvet.
It needs a scarf !!!
Yep! This could be a great look, but the fit is so off.
Uber twee with the full stiff skirt, plus peplum, plus little collar, plus buttons and three quarter length sleeves. Then add the long curls. Kate does love to throw a lot of elements into one outfit so it looks like a girly mishmash. Kate is consistent. She likes the same elements. Her other look is a seventies one. You had the red dress with the deep V neck and a dark green one with slit up the leg. Same look different colors.
Kate likes this silhouette because there is always a chance it will blow up and show her private parts to the world again.
And just as an aside – I don’t think I’ve ever seen a couple with less attraction to each other. They are either being mean to each other, or being cold to each other. It’s odd.No warmth at all.
That’s a horrible skirt.
Yes, it looks like its been starched – too stiff.
Also how does a peplum jacket go with a flowsy skirt. The whole outfit looks off and so overpriced. I will say though that I love the colour.
It wouldn’t be horrible if she hadn’t had it shortened so much. It’s way too full to be so short, and when you do that to the length it makes a full skirt stand out even fuller. The fullness-and-shortness of it makes her look like a toddler.
If it weren’t for that, I would quite like the look. The color is wonderful on her.
I’m afraid Kaiser is right about the fall, though–not only is the color slightly diff, but the texture is, too.
Oh, Kate.
Completely agree! When I saw what the original skirt length was meant to be, I liked it so much better!
Wiglet is back, full, sprayed and swinging!
The colors suits her but the outfit is hideous.
What happened with William’s other passion, wildlife conservation?
A fashion icon, she clearly isn’t.
Would look better with a straight skirt. This cut makes her look like a gumdrop. And I am staring at the pictures – where does the fake hair start? (Regardless, she needs a new hair style and Normal Bill’s College Fetish be damned!)
I have no problem with people wearing wiglets but don’t lie about it. People forget that she sacked her previous hair stylist as he a) used her name for PR (she said it was without permission but am not sure) and b) because he inadvertently confirmed that she wore wiglets after the palace released a press statement confirming this around the wedding saying that it was a childhood scar (that moved positions) when many people pointed out the weave mark.
Hers are toward the back of her head. They catch the light differently.
She looked her age at that sports event two days ago, but in that two-piece ensemble she looks 40+.
I also think this is super aging. Peplums are so ugly. The color is the only thing going for this. The shoes too.
Kate has a simultaneously little girl and matronly look. Being matronly always will age age you and dressing like a little girl with the curled hair, peplum, poofy skirts and little collars will age you because the look is too young for your age. That means Kate is hitting herself twice.
So so ugly. It looked awful on the runway model as well. Kate following Ivanka’s lead style wise wouldnt be so bad. She mostly looks good in her role as first lady/ baby fists baby sitter/ the only thing between us and the end of the world
the color and the fabric are beautiful and look good with her coloring, but i feel the styling is off. I might have called for more exciting shoes – always – and an up do or at least a ponytail sort of style. Oscar de la Renta is for ladies who lunch and it should be worn more elegantly.
Awful hair but hey – I guess Wills likes it and that’s why she doesn’t change it.
I’m going against the grain–I like the outfit. I wish the jacket didn’t have the pleated ruffle at the bottom, but I like the fabric and the cut of that (expensive) skirt. Not wild about the tights, they could be darker with that color. And it looks like her handbag has been Velcroed to her vag.
Does she think she’s still in school or why no new haircut?
Twee…always twee. It’s Kate for heaven’s sake
Poor dears – 3 engagements in 2 days, they must be in need of a long vacation now after this. Its the BAFTA’s this weekend so this is all good PR for them leading up to the awards – they’ll go quiet again after Sunday’s event. This is their normal pattern when there is a big event coming up plus its MH Week so they need to show their faces for it.
I see William is also cutting and pasting his speech’s as well – not the first time he’s spoken about his employer and how they promote MH awareness with staff.
The horse had bolted with these 2 – no matter if they do put on their big girl and big boy pants and step up it will be too late to repair the lazy image they have. If they think they are hard done by now wait until Charles takes the throne, it will get worse.
I can’t say anything about Will, but it really does seem like Kate is working more. I don’t know what’s behind it, but it truly does seem like we’ve seen a steady stream of engagements from her lately. It’s a little late, but I still think it’s a good thing.
I agree, I think she has been working more. But I think she’s done this before – work a bunch at the beginning of the year and then fade out. Maybe she’s getting her numbers up so she can take a few months off for Pippa’s wedding.
I also don’t like the outfit. It looks like it was shrunk in the dryer. The sleeves are at a weird length and the skirts a little short. The peplum looks weird and the balloon thing with the skirt also looks weird.
They have six days off in a row until the BAFTAS. Time for a quick trip to Mustique or St Barts.
Even the 90-year-old Queen dresses better than she does.
You know, I don’t get it. I would give my left toe to have access to the clothes she has, to be able to wear this outfit. It is beautiful. And Kate is a very, very pretty woman when she has a few more pounds on her. But she either ruins her clothes by wearing them too short, or makes them matronly or twee with changes she makes to them. It’s so weird. This could have been gorgeous a little longer and less full, with some smashing shoes, maybe with a pattern? And the hair – she always looks so unpolished with it down, and blowing, or swinging around, or playing with it. It is beautiful, but looks great on her when she pulls the front back, or wears it up. She looks like an awkward teen messing with her hair the way she wears it often.
I don’t know, it just seems to have so much potential that is unrealized. Just like Kate, actually. So much unrealized opportunity. Sad.
I like this. Good job, Kate. Considering her past fashion choices and all her hard work (haha) I’ll give her this.
I think she realizes if she wants to make Pippa’s wedding a Royal Wedding 2.0 she has to be more visible. A few Pippa stories came out over the weekend in the US and went unnoticed. Katie is working for the fam, namely hers. Ha. We see you Katie.
ITA that the only family Waity is working for is her own. Maybe she and her husband/children should live of them instead of my tax dollar.
I really like this! Love the color and cut of the skirt. Only complaint….the jacket is too small the buttons are pulling all the way down the front and she is long waisted like me so the jacket need another 1inch of fabric
She still thinks she’s in her 20s and dresses like it. Sorry, it is time to get a serious wardrobe. Even Diana had to give up the frills, bows and ruffles as she got older. Vogue needs to help her.
Vogue could only help her if she’d listen, and I doubt she’d listen. $3400 worth of bad new suit to show up for 1 hour? What about the $200,000 worth of clothes she bought last year?
Similar color and silhouette to several Diana outfits, including Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital 1994.
And once Diana went to more streamlined simple clothing, she looked amazing all of the time. She really became the star, rather than competing with all of the frou-frou. I remember thinking she got much more beautiful as she got older.
Ugh. Kate is one year younger than Diana when she died. Comparing their accomplishments makes me angry at the privileged and lazy Waity Katie.
Taking tips from the spawn of baby fists is not a good idea. She needs a new stylist she suppose to be a “young hot royal” not a 46 year old housewife from the 1940s. Trying to make herself look busy to upstage Meghan isn’t going to help because…
A. We aren’t stupid
B. We don’t have short term memory
C. Her natural lazy instincts will kick in.
D. Shaking hands, smiling for pics, giving speeches that’s written for you and cutting ribbons isn’t “work”
A) In my perfectly humble opinion, Melania Trump has a better sense of styling and mostly she dresses well.
B) Like it or not, She is Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge (wife of future king and mother of his heir) who possibly couldn’t care less about a supposedly z list actress no one knows anything about. Even if Meghan marries Prince Harry, she still won’t upstage Kate Middleton. To keep people interesting media always spun a fairytale, to every good and innocent Elizabeth, there is a vain and evil Margaret, to every shy di, there is “Duchess of pork” , sad but true. Press will always favor Kate.
C) She should dress in whatever she is comfortable in, I don’t think she is interested in being a fashion icon, nothing to fault her for.
I am not defending Kate or acknowledging “her highness” , I think she is totally void in her personality and deficient in originality but I don’t see a valid criticism sometimes here. I think she deserves a chance, she has started 2017 well.
Harry is more popular than his brother, the heir to the heir and if he marries Meghan, as his wife, she could easily get more coverage than Kate because Kate is so dull. The press outside of the UK won’t be following primogeniture rules but what sells. Right now Meghan sells and she isn’t even a fiancée. Meghan also has a solid work history and would be the American princess that the media would love. Kate has done nothing of note with her life and never will. She came from money and chased down Will, sacrificing her life to get a prince. They have tried to make her the next Diana, but it is not working.
Carole knows this which is why she is giving the media more stories.
I watched Suits from the beginning so have known about M for years. Mrs Trump looks like a waxwork.
If you think Kate isn’t studying Meghan and figuring out how to take her down, you haven’t been paying attention to Kate over the years. Or her mother. They are both plotting against the lovely MM.
regular contact with Ivanka would explain this weird crotch-clutching habit.
Haha!
She’s working hard to ensure that when the time comes, she’s completely justified in taking a holiday to avoid Trump!
Conspiracy theory – she’s working really hard so she can have a medical event. Look at how hard Kate worked, literally worked herself into a sick bed. She’s not preggers again is she? That would be the coupe de grace.
Pretty color but I’m not crazy about the design. Black sheer stockings and pumps are a boring choice. Meh!
Boring, boring…just like Kate herself.
Hate the skirt- it’s to frilly and young for Kate. As for all the work baby number three will probably be announced sometime this year and/or taking time off to help the kids adjust to the move to London. Gotta get those numbers up early on less work to do later.
Twee to the max. She might as well go all the way with Mary Jane shoes and a big purple bow in her hair. Snark.
Dowdy.
Just blah, nothing about that outfit is exciting. I hate that she wears so many suede shoes, they always look scuffed and worn within an inch of their lives. Im sure she has access to someone who can at least make her shoes look decent but for whatever reason they never do.
So blah. I do love the combination of high heels and black tights though. I will never stop loving black tights.
She’s wearing a lamp shade.
I bet Mustique is coming after the Baftas. Or the Maldives. The Cambridges need a holiday after their stressful month of hard work.
They have six days off now, I think. Could be on St Barts already.
Beautiful colour but oh so twee. She’s got to learn that sleek and elegant can also look fresh and young. There’s no need to look like a schoolgirl to suggest youth.
Someone on Twitter yesterday mentioned the full royal press pack wasn’t covering these past few events of W&K. Anyone know if that is true?
It’s the skirt length – she had it shortened if you compare to the runway look. Too high abover her knees. The hair is just too much. Does she not get that we can look at the scout photo where her hair went solo?
A beautiful colour but otherwise nothing special. Very juvenile look for a woman in her mid-30s.
There is usually a sudden burst of appearances (I refuse to call it work) just before a holiday so it’s possible they will disappear again some time soon. Alternatively, as others have said, it could be to counteract all the stories about Harry and Meghan. Waity will not take kindly to being upstaged no matter how much she and Whiny complain about the media.
I like the suit/dress but not the stockings. Nude would have been better. I like her hair, fake or not. As I’ve told before, as blonde woman with thin hair her mane amazes me. The same goes for Amal Clooney. HAIR ENVY!!!
She looks nice and that’s a fantastic color. Not a fan of the skirt shape, though.
Is this wool? It looks stiff and somehow itchy. The jacket looks tight, I wonder what she wears under it. I get itchy just thinking about it. She just has no sense of style at all, I can’t really blame her as I’m the same, except I’m aware of it and she probably thinks she’s good at it.
William is such a *terrible* dresser. Why can’t he wear a nice suit and a stylish pair of shoes?
So i LOVE Oscar de la Renta, but she’s not pulling this off at all. For one thing, she should have done something with her hair, for another the fit just doesn’t suit her at all. Instead of looking elegant but serious, she looks like a girl playing dress up with her mom’s old suits.
I love the color. The hair is uninspired (think of the choices she has for hair up!) and the shoes are totally boring. She is super boring in the shoe area, as always. One-trick pony.
I noticed Kate is wearing her hair down more often. I kind of liked her up do looks she had last year and hoped they’d continue with a little variety. I’m guessing William prefers the long hair look on Kate.
I will say even though they still have a lot of improvement with regard to their workload, it’s nice to see them appear together unlike Charles and Diana after 5 years of marriage.
Ugly. Sorry, but it is.
I like this very much nice colour and material also buttons very pretty but I just don’t like the super high heels with it and the shortness of the hemline. William looks like he has to endure the next few hours it always looks like a chore. I stumbled on an Australian astrologer on you tube who said he had a similar chart to abdicated Prince Edward who gave up the throne for mrs Simpson.
Starlight, DO tell!!
They are very similar characters, that’s for sure. Feckless.
Several astrologers have said that William doesn’t have the marker of a king in his chart, but HM, Charles, and Harry do.
what about George’s chart?
So 90s! Princess Diana could have worn exactly this…
I don’t think Diana wore skirts like that in the ’90s. In her 30s, Diana’s skirts seemed to go straight down. She seemed to stop with the pouffy stuff once she was past 25.
Now that I think about it that kind of skirt does look like something I might see at H and M, but in a more interesting color.
I like the color of the outfit.
I don’t think the clothes are the problem…I think it might be the person wearing them. I do think she looks better here clothes-wise than she has in the past, though. And in this instance, I think it helps that she’s so thin. That dress would probably make anybody else look fat.
I like it, it’s a bright burst of color and the cut is completely appropriate. Even though it’s conservative, it’s more youthful and contemporary than some of her previous choices. That said, $1200+ for the skirt alone?! Man did she get ripped off.
She looks like she always buys her shoes at Payless or KMart!!
Think outfit is lovely colour but thats it… she looks hideous looks like she is still a teenager and not 35 years old hair hanging sooo boring…….. hope she didnt speak with her fake voice as its dreadful this pair have totally lost respect with their arrogance and laziness they will never be popular like Harry..
Here’s the low-down from inside the fashion world: the only good thing is the colour. Otherwise it’s a complete fail: the sleeves are too short, the jacket strains across her shoulders and chest, the soft ballooning skirt has had all the life starched out of it and is too short compared to the original design. The entire outfit is a bad fit and completely unflattering and far too fussy. Not to mention outdated – look when she bought it. Ever since her crushed and crumpled suit visiting the king of the Netherlands, she has been obsessed with starching her clothes – even the woolen skirts! Also, although the colour suits her, it is baffling why she wore lighter hues in mid winter (pale blue, pale lilac) and now that fashion is looking towards spring she brings out the deep jewel winter shades. To take styling advice from someone in their twenties who has zero experience in fashion when Kate is heading towards forty in a handcart is what leads to these sartorial dead ends. Verdict: there is no saving her. HOWE: Her Own Worst Enemy.