Princess Anne and the Duchess of Cambridge stepped out for their big joint event yesterday. This is the first time that Anne and Kate have done an event (just the two of them) together, and this only happened because two of their patronages intersect. Anne is patron of the Royal College of Midwives and she’s been patron for twenty years. Kate is patron of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, a patronage which was handed to her in 2018. She hasn’t done much with it although I vaguely remember one or two Zooms and some busywork involving a magazine.

Kate wore Self Portrait and this looks new to me. It retails for £400. I’m grateful for the lack of visible buttons, but I suspect Kate’s fussy dressing is starting to be like a game of whack-a-mole. As soon as you manage to rid Kate of buttons, she wants puffy sleeves or a stiff peplum or, in this case, some kind of giant decorative pineapple stitching. The skirt is too long, but I think that Kate made the call to go very conservative for her event with Anne. Anne would have read her the riot act if Kate wore some flouncy, twirly miniskirt and flashed all of the midwives and gynos. “Would you like to see the royal beav,” Kate asked them as she flapped her jazz hands.

Judging solely from the photos, I think the event went okay. Anne and Kate didn’t seem all that engaged with each other and Anne seemed bewildered by the fact that she and Kate were handed flowers, but it was fine. I imagine we’ll get tons of stories about how Kate is basically the same as The Princess Royal and Kate is “learning” from Anne, etc. Maybe they’ll say something about how Anne is helping Kate “grow into her role.” Call me when Kate tries to copykeen Anne and starts wearing tweed from the 1970s.