Tag Archives: duke of cambridge

Royal Tour: Prince William Beats Duchess Kate in Boat Race

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The Duke of Cambridge beat his wife – who used to belong to the Sisterhood boat crew – by 10 lengths as they each joined a team to race across Dalvay Lake on Prince Edward Island in Canada on the fifth day of their tour of the North American country.

Before the contest the prince was asked who he thought would triumph, and he joked: “We are of course.”

But Kate quipped: “He’ll be lucky.”

The royal couple – who tied the knot in London’s Westminster Abbey on April 29 – hugged and congratulated each other following the race.

Kate steered her team’s boat, while William’s boat led from the start and it was clear from the beginning his vessel looked more likely to win.

The duke and duchess arrived at the event via horse-drawn carriage and were greeted by thousands of supporters, and some had camped overnight to get a glimpse of the royal couple.

Earlier in the day, the prince – who flies Sea King helicopters in the RAF (Royal Air Force) – took part in a dangerous helicopter manoeuvre on the lake, landing a Canadian military helicopter on the water for the first time.

The couple – who will leave Canada for California on Friday – also took in Province House, where the idea for the country was born.

William said in a speech, which he partly spoke in French, it was “quite a moment” to be stood in front of the building where the “Canadian federation was forged”.

Kate Middleton and Prince William Heckled by Protesters in Canada.

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The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are going to St Lawrence River on the third night of their tour of Canada.

The royal couple are going up river on board HMCS Montreal, a City Class Frigate of the Canadian Navy.
They will be surrounded by a crew of 225 for the 11 hour journey to Quebec. Although they have been given the most comfortable quarters, it seems incredibly unromantic for the newlyweds.

The couple will arrive in Quebec at 2pm BST and have been briefed about possible protesters and republicans.

The Quebec Resistance Network, which wants the province to become independent, have threatened to disrupt the visit where the couple will be given the freedom of the city. Previous royal visits have fared no better, being marred by violence between demonstrators and riot police. The Queen has not returned to Quebec City since protesters turned their backs on her and booed in 1964.

This comes after the Duke and Duchess facing their first organised protests against their visit to Canada on their arrival in Montreal on Saturday night.

Demonstrators had placards calling the couple “parasites” as they arrived at the world renowned Sainte-Justine university hospital. There were also lots of supporters to cheer the couple on. One of the main protesters, Guillaume Martin, told reporters: “We think the monarchy is something from the middle ages and we don’t want to pay for the trip.”

The Canadian government will be paying the £950,000 to host the couple, this amounts to only a few cents a head for the country’s population. The couple ignored the protesters and spent more than an hour chatting to child cancer patients inside the hospital.

Prince William welcomed the Canadians with; “Bonne fête, Canada, happy birthday,” in his speech.

Catherine Middleton had never been to Canada before, or America, which is also part of their tour.

This Month's Magazines; Kate Middleton and Getting in Shape Lead.

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This is the first of Frost magazine’s new monthly magazine round-up. Here at Frost we are addicted to magazines and our guess is that you like them too, so, here goes….

Vanity Fair has the new Duke and Duchess of Cambridge on the cover. The world has gone crazy for Kate Middleton and there is 16 pages on the new couple, including the interesting fact that Kate has never been to America before and is ‘beyond excited’.

Horrible fact of the month comes from Christopher Hitchen’s column, which is on Pakistan: in Pakistan not only is rape not illegal, it’s a punishment. Mark Shand tells Nick Haslam about the Elephant Family, Stieg Larsson’s girlfriend tells of their life together and there is good articles on Justin Timberlake, Silvio Berlusconi and the Falcons.

Marie Claire (who are in my bad books, as they do not send the subscribers the free gifts that come with the magazine. This month it’s a choice of eyeliner or eye-shadow, last month a Body Shop moisturiser, not nice way to treat those who are most loyal) Jennifer Lawrence is on the cover, and has a very good interview inside where she says that she tells director she won’t lose more weight and was initially scared of fame.

Emily Eavis, daughter of Michael, talks about growing up as part of the world’s greatest music festival, there is lots of fashion and a summer’s sandals piece that I enjoyed, there is a low down on the Russian invasion of Chelsea; lead by Roman Abramovich and Dasha Zhukova, Writer Natasha Green writes about choosing between her husband and her lover and 5 friends, who all went to university and did a performing arts degree, meet up to discuss where they are 10 years later. Marie Claire also have an exclusive interview with Aung San Suu Kyi. Other good article are dating advice you don’t need from your friends, a good piece on Jean Paul Gaultier and a brilliant article on the life of Princess Diana, very apt.

It’s Elle’s body issue, Elle always give there subscribers the free gift, as do RED and Glamour, Rosie Huntington-Whitley is on the cover and interviewed inside, and there is a free vest top my Kate Middleton fav Reiss.

Celia Walden ponders over why we fawn over the famous, the impossibly stylish Ines De La Fressange is in Elle edits, my personal style crush tells us about her philosophy on life, House of Holland are this month’s Style Spy, make up artist Lisa Eldridge gives a peak inside her closet and Debbie Harry tells is what books changed her life. Rob Lowe is interviewed and there are a lot of great articles on how to get in shape and be happy with how you look. Of course, there is also lots of great fashion. Lorraine Candy is temporarily stepping down from the Elle editorship to have her fourth baby.

Tatler has Romola Garai on the cover, she is interviewed inside and talks about her “ordinary body” and her desire for people to find her sexy. Kate Reardon has been the new editor for a few months now and is doing a good job, though I couldn’t find an editor’s letter.

Royal Wedding photographer Hugo Burnand talks about photographing the biggest wedding in decades, there are other articles on the top 10 poshest ghosts, Clive Anderson writes about losing his cool, there is lots of gossip, A very good guide to the Murdoch dynasty, an article on how the rich buy life (a very good read), some property porn as Belvoir Castle is featured by it’s owners the Duke and Duchess of Rutland.

There is also an article on (the last taboo!) woman’s facial hair and how to get rid of it, Alice Temperley also spills on all of her beauty secrets. If you buy it form the news-stand you get a free pair of sunglasses, but Tatler doesn’t give free gifts to it’s subscribers.

Vogue has Vanessa Paradis on the cover, she talks about staying on the move and being comfortable with your body, Stella Tennant models (can you believe she is in her 40’s!)

I really like the article by Carol Woolton on the lost world of legendary balls, including the jewellery that Elizabeth Taylor wore to the 1971 Rothschild Proust Ball, lots on the Royal wedding and who wore what, editor Alexandra Shulman was one of the guests and gives a good account. The rise of folk (as in music) gets a good spread and supermodel Arizona Muse keeps a diary for Vogue.

I also love the inspirational women who feature in Vogue’s Wonder Women piece, scientists and theatre directors alike. There is also an editorial on fashion dynasties, if you love glamour the way I do you will love reading about the Guinnesses, Dellals, Agnellis/Brandolinis and the Jaggers.

Donna Karen also does a wonderful interview and writer Vicky Ward talks about her divorce; “the equivalent of undergoing heart surgery without anesthetic.” There is also a brilliant free beauty supplement with lots of celebrities and models giving their beauty and health routines, tips and hints.

Glamour has a free Benefit beauty product (I got the Benetint) Karl Lagerfield on fashion do’s, celebrity couples you forgot about, how to find a man anywhere, the rise of gold and fame digging men, why is friendship so hard?, how the Glamour staff got their job, a very good, and slightly depressing article on female war reporters; read about the same time I saw Channel 4’s Killing Fields of Sri Lanka, you think women are equal and safe….

There is interviews with the Glamour women of the year awards, including the brilliant Adele, who is on the cover. There is lots of brilliant fashion and beauty, a very good article on why we should all see Bridesmaids by Zoe Williams, there is a number of articles on how to fake tan well and I really enjoyed the piece on Get a Blockbuster body, what Blake Lively, Jennifer Lawrence and Rosie Huntington-Whitley did to get in shape for their films. There is also a good article on the secret to good health in 100 words or less.

So, until next month!

Kate Middleton & William Sidelined by Posh & Becks

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After all the Royal Wedding fever has died down and with the patter of a little baby Posh on the way, it would seem that the royal couple have been sidelined…

A new survey by House Exchange, the mutual exchange website for social housing tenants, reveals that nearly twice as many Brits said they would rather swap homes and lives with David and Victoria Beckham (13%) than with Kate Middleton and Prince William (7%). The poll shows that it is in fact the glamorous jet-setting lifestyle of the Beckhams that us Brits really hanker after rather than the down to earth, low-key approach favoured by Kate and Wills.

The British public, however, were quite happy to move into some rather Royal properties with Buckingham Palace (12%) and Warwick Castle (10%) coming top of the list of famous House Exchanges, closely followed by Monica’s flat in friends (9%) and Mum and Dad’s House (5%).

The survey results also show that many people are happy in their current homes, especially the over 55s, of which more than half (55%) said they wouldn’t want to swap homes. This is in direct contrast to the 16-24 age group, where only 19% were happy to stay were they were.

Kim Doran, House Exchange Manager, said: “Young people often struggle to find their ideal home due to high rents and difficult lending conditions. However, the situation is much bleaker for social housing tenants who are not on the property ladder. We estimate nearly 500,000 of the UK’s 3.9 million social housing tenants would like to move home but can’t.

“They end up stuck on transfer lists for years and this is why we have developed House Exchange, a mutual house exchange database for social housing tenants anywhere in the UK.”

The House Exchange website currently has around 70,000 properties listed around the UK and makes around 1,000 successful swaps per month. Over half the social housing tenants that sign up have been trying to move for more than two years, yet 80% of tenants using House Exchange find their perfect match within six months, and many move within only six weeks.

House Exchange boasts two exciting features to make it easier for tenants to find their perfect match.

Three way swap

If tenants can’t find a direct swap, they can find a third property to complete the house exchange. A three way home swap is a good way of completing more house exchanges. It also helps more people move into homes that are appropriate for their needs.

Real-time matching

House Exchange matches all properties instantly. This means that when a perfect property match is found, tenants are notified immediately by email.

Visit House Exchange at www.houseexchange.org.uk

Royal Wedding Attracts Over 1 Million Facebook Updates.

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The Royal Wedding gathered world attention and a massive amount of Facebook updates. Read on for who was popular….

The Big Numbers

· Over a million people in the UK used Facebook statuses to discuss the Royal Wedding in the past 24 hours.

· During this morning alone some 684,399 status updates referencing the wedding were posted in just 4 hours in the UK – equating to an average of 47 mentions every second.

· Many people in the UK were so excited they couldn’t sleep, with just under 500 people updating about the pending nuptials per hour ahead of 8am

· Much has been said about the US obsession with today’s wedding – and this was reflected in our numbers – with greater numbers of American Facebook users posting updates than those from the UK – 1.953 million to the UK’s 1.004 million.

So who were people talking about?

· David Beckham’s arrival led to a surge in discussion – with 9,000 mentions of his name in just 20 minutes!

· Just under double the number of people were talking about David Beckham than Victoria Beckham

· The Queen and Prince Philip didn’t even feature in the top list of discussed people – and Prince Andrew was nowhere to be seen.

· Instead, we saw Harry’s position at number three and fledgling Royal celebrity Pippa Middleton at number 8

· Kate’s rebrand into ‘Princess Catherine’ has begun in earnest, with nearly 2,000 people mentioning her new name for the first time after the ceremony

· Prince Beatrice’s hat became the subject of a Facebook fan page – ‘Princess Beatrice’s Ridiculous Royal Wedding Hat’ (4000 fans) http://on.fb.me/lGyn7z

US versus UK

· Despite not featuring in the top ten list in the UK, in the US the Queen was the 14th most discussed topic – with a position in the list similar to that of Victoria Beckham in the UK.

Here’s the list for the UK:

1

Kate Middleton

131,385 mentions

2

Prince William

104,747 mentions

3

Prince Harry

64,107 mentions

4

David Beckham

22,421 mentions

5

Victoria Beckham

12,346 mentions

6

Elton John

12,283 mentions

7

Princess Diana

11,103 mentions

8

Pippa Middleton

8,619 mentions

9

Prince Charles

6,791 mentions

10

Princess Beatrice

4,439 mentions

11

Princess Catherine

1,928 mentions

12

Princess Eugenie

1,385 mentions

13

Guy Ritchie

290 mentions

And what got people chatting?

The dress…

· Speculation grew throughout the morning as to the designer of Kate’s dress; with references to Sarah Burton of Alexander McQueen, and Diana’s dress designer, David Emanuel.

o 13,120 mentions of Sarah Burton

o 7,863 mentions of Alexander McQueen

o 4,264 mentions of Emanuel

The hat…

· Samantha Cameron’s lack of a hat attracted a lot of attention – as she arrived at Westminster Abbey there was some 600 mentions of her total lack of hat…

…and the nose…!

· Tara Palmer-Tompkinson’s nose attracted a lot of discussion – with 2046 mentions in just 20 minutes!

Elton

· National treasure Elton John featured prominently in pictures from the Abbey – leading to over 12,000 mentions of him within status updates.

Where were people talking about the wedding?

· Thousands of people crowded the streets of London in order to see the event – and lots of them got closer to it by checking in to the key locations along the route using Facebook Places.

· Buckingham Palace and Westminster Abbey were most popular – with XXX and XXX people checking in.

New ways to interact with a Royal Wedding….

· ITN’s live stream was available on its Facebook Page with live comments: www.facebook.com/itn – It saw 3.5million streams + peaked at 110,000 viewers online.

· ITN used Facebook Questions to ask “who is the best dressed” and “where should they go on their honeymoon?” https://www.facebook.com/eonline#!/ITN?sk=questions

· CNN live streamed the event on its website with live comments: http://edition.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2011/royal.wedding/live/

· ABC live streamed the wedding on its Page: https://www.facebook.com/abcnews as well as creating royal wedding polls: https://www.facebook.com/abcnews?sk=app_20678178440

· ITN, CNN and ABC incorporated live Facebook statistics into their TV broadcasts.

Facebook Stories

· Facebook Stories, an app that enables people to share their thoughts and views, saw thousands of submissions from more than 30 countries, in more than 20 languages

Kate Middleton: The Making Of A Duchess

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Few people manage to capture the publics attention, but it is fair to say that Catherine Middleton is huge right now. She’s bigger than a movie star, just as famous as Diana, she’s (arguably) more popular than her fiancee Prince William. If you google “Kate Middleton” you get 51,700,000 hits. If you google “Catherine Middleton” you get 8,600,000.

The tale of a commoner (okay, millionaires over privileged daughter) done good is a story usually only read in fairytale. Yet on the 29th Miss Middleton will walk down the aisle and marry into royalty. Yet to call her a millionaire’s daughter doesn’t really scratch the truth of the surface. Her mother was a flight attendant (snobbishly nicknamed “doors to manual” by Williams posh friends), it doesn’t take long to find coalminers in her family history. This is what makes her fresh. The royal family need her to make them relevant again. The Queen and Prince Philip are cousins, he of Greek royalty.

Catherine Elizabeth “Kate” Middleton was born on 9 January 1982, she grew up on Bucklebury, Berkshire. Her parents Carole and Michael. She is the eldest and has a sister, Phillipa, and a brother, James. She met Prince William in 2001 when they were both studying at the University of St Andrews. They lived together (and at one point were both seeing other people), they became a couple. There have been two break ups, including one in 2007 that lasted a few months. Kate stayed friends with William and the romance was rekindled. During the break up Kate went out a lot, always looking stunning, and mostly with Williams friends.

It seems naïve that when Kate started dating William she complained about harassment through her lawyer saying “she had done nothing significant to warrant such publicity.” She must have known that you cannot date royalty and come out unscathed. She has had Royal Protection officers since 2006. Kate has done more than her fair share of work on the relationship. She has learned how to shoot, joining a royal deerstalking party in Scotland in 2007, Kate and William had broken up that year and it was a make or break trip. They had broken up because Prince William felt he was too young to get married and because he was too close, and disclosed too much, to ex-girlfriends.

At the Concert for Diana they were just friends but after the shooting party she moved in with William at Clarence House. The home of the Prince of Wales, William’s father. When Kate’s parents were photographed on a stalking trip to Scotland three years later the press went into overdrive. Like Kate they were given shooting lessons. The shooting party was hosted by William and was at his father’s residence, Birkhall. The Middleton’s were all doing their best to fit in and have some royal fun. Kate has said of Prince Charles: “I was quite nervous about meeting William’s father, but he was very, very welcoming, very friendly. It couldn’t have gone easier for me.”

Kate will shortly become Princess or Duchess, she already has her own coat of arms and will be going to Canada for her first Royal tour after her honeymoon. She has come a long way after seeing Prince William playing hockey at her school, from becoming his house mate. She will become the first Queen to have a degree. She hasn’t had any career as such, working at Jigsaw as an accessory buyer and then for her parents. Always on call for William, working her life around his. And now she will become his Queen. Let’s wish her luck, she might need it.

Update: Kate has become Duchess of Cambridge and William Duke of Camdridge. Kate’s dress was designed by Sarah Burton of Alexander McQueen.