The Duchess of Sussex is the surprise guest editor of Vogue for its bumper September issue
Already heralded as a fashion icon, the Duchess of Sussex is the surprise guest editor of Vogue for its bumper September issue, I can reveal.
The controversial appointment will see Meghan devote sections of the magazine — known as the ‘fashion bible’ — to reports on her favourite charities, as well as articles concerning the environment and women’s issues close to her heart.
The Duchess’s one-off editing gig has been a closely guarded secret and is a publishing coup for Edward Enninful, the suave editor of British Vogue who tempted Meghan to take up this role.
It will bring a pang of envy to Dame Anna Wintour, editor-in-chief of Vogue, who, I’m told, has been wooing the Duchess in a bid to persuade her to guest edit the American title. But, despite Meghan’s U.S. heritage, she resisted Wintour’s pleas.
Great care was taken to disguise Meghan’s editorial role. Meetings, I’m told, were very few and carried out clandestinely. Instead, a large number of emails went back and forth between Vogue’s West End offices and the Sussexes’ Windsor residence, Frogmore Cottage.
The Duchess’s one-off editing gig has been a closely guarded secret and is a publishing coup for Edward Enninful (pictured), the suave editor of British Vogue
It will bring a pang of envy to Dame Anna Wintour, editor-in-chief of Vogue, who has been wooing the Duchess in a bid to persuade her to guest edit the American title
Insiders wonder if Harry has been tempted to give Meghan tips for her time in the editor’s chair, drawing on his experience as guest editor of Radio 4’s Today programme.
It is now 15-all between Edward and tennis fan Dame Anna, who famously failed to inform him that she had invited the Queen to British Fashion Week last year.
Meghan will be in her element. Vogue is known for its cutting-edge fashion — as well as its scorchingly expensive clothes, just like the reportedly £56,000 Ralph & Russo creation the Duchess wore in her engagement photos.
Lady Camilla’s grand designs
Karen Millen (left) and Lady Camilla Beresford (right) are launching a clothing label
Her father, Henry, the 9th Marquess of Waterford, contents himself with running the family’s 2,500-acre Curraghmore Estate — the largest estate in private hands in Ireland.
But Lady Camilla Beresford’s tastes are more metropolitan: she celebrated her 24th birthday party last night at Mark’s Club in London’s Mayfair. And it’s from London that Camilla is set on making commercial conquests.
‘I’m launching my own clothing label,’ she tells me. ‘It will be sold online and then I hope to get it into department stores like Selfridges. I’ve been helped by Karen Millen who mentors me. We were introduced through a family friend.’
An alumna of Millfield School in Somerset, Camilla has the Beresford appetite for life in the fast lane.
She numbers Kate Moss’s model sister, Lottie, among her friends and exhibits the same panache on the polo field as her late grandfather, a star of the Duke of Edinburgh’s team, and great-uncle, the indefatigable Lord Patrick, 85.
Adventurer Ben: I’ve lost my political compass
Adventurer Ben Fogle has admitted he is a ‘political refugee’
Undaunted by Everest, at ease on the high seas, adventurer Ben Fogle admits he is completely lost when confronted by the wildernesses of Westminster politics.
‘I’m a political refugee,’ the 45-year-old tells me. ‘I don’t mind Boris,’ he adds, ‘but I don’t feel allegiance to any party anywhere. I feel like I’m stuck between a rock and a hard place. And I don’t think I’m alone.’
Fogle — who famously rowed across the Atlantic with Olympian James Cracknell — admits that, at one stage, he thought of trying to fix things at Westminster himself.
‘I dabbled with the idea of going into politics for many years, but I don’t think I will now,’ says the father of Ludo, ten, and Iona, eight. ‘You’re kind of damned if you do and damned if you don’t.’
Come on, Ben. Remember Mallory’s attitude to climbing Everest: ‘Because it’s there!’
Revelling in Ireland’s historic first Test Match at Lord’s, former Undertones frontman Feargal Sharkey serenaded the crowd with a chorus of: ‘With me shillelagh under me arm and a twinkle in me eye, I’ll be off to Tipperary in the morning’ at the fall of every English wicket.
The unabashed Teenage Kicks singer is sure that fellow spectators were appreciative. ‘Besides,’ he adds, ‘people used to pay to listen to me do that kind of thing.’
He has yet to disclose the lament he played after Ireland were skittled for 38 in yesterday’s second innings.
Bargain Hunt star settles out of court
Bargain Hunt and Flog It! star Charles Hanson has, I can disclose, just paid his former business associate Susan Haswell more than £6,000 in unpaid fees and commission rather than face her in court.
It had promised to be a dramatic showdown.
Bargain Hunt and Flog It! star Charles Hanson has just paid his former business associate Susan Haswell more than £6,000 in unpaid fees and commission
Former Christie’s auctioneer Hanson had hoped to have the case heard in his hometown of Derby, while Haswell argued it should be heard in Kingston upon Thames, close to where she helped him establish his London base last year.
In the end, Hanson settled in full.
The Prince of Wales is evidently delighted with Beatrice. Not, in this case, his 30-year-old niece — but Scotland’s huge £2.5 billion windfarm, whose opening he attends on Monday.
A volte-face by Charles, a steadfast critic of wind turbines disfiguring the landscape? Not at all: Beatrice is offshore.