Imagine being a royal reporter and being tasked with embiggening the Princess of Wales’s newfound obsession with ill-fitting pantsuits. Silk purse, sow’s ear, that’s the Rota’s assignment, and Kensington Palace has clearly been briefing reporters on Kate’s clothes and what her Big Pantsuit Energy says about She Who Keens. If you can imagine, this 41-year-old is only now coming into her own and “hitting her stride.” Someone at KP is very fond of the phrase “spread his/her wings” because this is like the fifth time I’ve read that phrase in the past week. It reminds me of when Buckingham Palace put out the notice that King Charles was “sanguine” about Harry. They used “sanguine” every day for a month, I swear to God. Anyway, let’s hear about the Pantsuit Queen:

Kate’s new look: [Her new look] has led many to ask whether there is a new face on the Princess’ team, or whether there is a style advisor in the wings. Sources close to the future Queen insist that is not the case, saying the spring in Kate’s step is simply down to her being a woman who has finally hit her stride. One explains that while the ‘step-up’ to become Princess of Wales was a daunting one, she now has a year ‘in the job’ under her belt.

Spreading her wings: A source said of Kate: ‘She’s been spreading her wings and creating a public awareness on important issues that are close to her heart. People have sat up and taken notice. This [Shaping Us] is a lifelong campaign for her and the fact that it has been so well received has given her an enormous amount of confidence.’

Kate wants credit for styling herself: Kate still works closely on her wardrobe with long-term personal assistant Natasha Jackson, but insiders said that to paint the Princess as a ‘passive participant’ would be to ‘massively underestimate’ her. Others believe the advent of the new Carolean reign has also loosened up Kate’s boundaries and emboldened her to plump for more cutting-edge choices, without having to complement the late Queen Elizabeth II’s traditional dress sense.

Her kids are getting older & she’s a Top CEO: Another insider said: ‘There’s a definite sense of the couple running their duties in a more business-like away, with far less of the historic fripperies, and I suspect that’s filtered through to other areas of their lives.’

Jo Elvin likes Kate’s new look: Elvin, host of Palace Confidential on The Mail+ and former editor of Glamour, gives her firm seal of approval to Kate’s new ‘chief of the board’ look. ‘It’s not very traditional princess-y and I suspect there are some royal fans who prefer seeing a member of the royal family in a pretty dress but I like the quiet luxury of her new look. She’s got so much more confident and relaxed about not following protocols so rigidly. I suspect she was probably always keeping half an eye on what the late Queen would have approved of. So now we are probably seeing more of what Kate likes to wear off duty.’

Reassuringly expensive?? ‘They are very mid-level labels that really appeal to that Mumsnet crowd. Real yummy mummy favourites,’ Ms Elvin said. ‘These labels are reassuringly expensive, in that you won’t see everyone wearing them, but not eye-wateringly so. There’s also a lot of tonal, taupe-y dressing, so sharp but nothing to shock the traditionalists. I really, really like it.’

[From The Daily Mail]

“A lot of tonal, taupe-y dressing” gee I wonder where Kate saw that! It’s almost as if Kate was just as obsessed as the British media when Meghan wore “sad beige.” Anyway, things are definitely afoot. At the moment, William and Kate are briefing the media separately, but they’re not really briefing against each other. Yet. There is a real separation though – William is off in one direction, spreading keenery about Earthshot and copying every since thing Harry does. Kate is in the other direction, embiggening Shaping Us and talking endlessly about her clothes. It’s also weird that people are like “how dare you suggest that Kate has a stylist, she’s VERY INVOLVED in what she wears!” Yeah, we know. Even a bargain-basement stylist would have done a better job styling her in flattering pantsuits and separates. Even the worst stylist in the world would tell Kate to burn her Meghan lookbook because it’s creepy AF. Kate constantly reveals that she only cares about the image, and that she’s really bad at the imagery. She doesn’t look rich, confident, content, hitting her stride. She looks like an insecure psycho who constantly copies her sister-in-law and can never get it right.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.