Royal news in the UK papers this weekend:
Charles has ordered his gardeners to dig up rogue orange azaleas planted on either side of a path at his Highgrove estate in Gloucestershire which have turned out to be a flaming orange rather than the more tranquil pink he expected. The unwanted blooms are at odds with his plans for a garden replicating the calming colours of an Impressionist painting.
A spokesman told Katie Nicholl at the Mail on Sunday: "The Prince is a lover of plants and a keen gardener but the colours he goes for are more blue, pink, purple and burgundy. He is an artist and enjoys certain colours, and that is why there are lots of blue delphiniums, purple lupins, and white and pink roses. The orange flowers were supposed to be pink and were not expected. They are now going to be moved to another part of the garden.”
Also in the Mail: Princess Beatrice to get a job in finance. Yikes!
The Sun: Prince Harry is ‘wooing’ pretty actress Gabriella Wilde but she is nervous about becoming a ‘royal girlfriend,’ pals say. The posh actress and model — real name Gabriella Zanna Vanessa Anstruther-Gough-Calthorpe — starred as Constance opposite Orlando Bloom in last year’s film The Three Musketeers. In the Sunday Telegraph: Kristina Kyriacou, the long-term mentor to Cheryl Cole, a former judge on The X Factor, has been quietly appointed by Prince Charles as the public relations supremo for his sprawling charity empire.
“It’s a big move,” one of Charles’s friends tells the paper. “His Royal Highness was frustrated that his charities, which do so much good work, were not getting the public attention that they deserve.”
Matters seem to have come to a head since Kate Middleton married Prince William last year. Since then, Prince Charles’s pet projects have struggled to attract the attention they previously enjoyed, as media attention on the Royal family has concentrated on the Duchess of Cambridge’s every move.
Sunday Telegraph: Interview with Saudi Arabia’s “Barbie” princess; Princess Sara bint Talal bin Abdulaziz, who, is claiming political asylum in the UK over fears for her safety back home. The claim, the first ever made by such a senior member of the ruling family’s inner circle, will embarrass the Saudi dynasty and threatens a diplomatic row.Princess Sara, 38, accuses senior Saudi officials of plotting to kidnap her and smuggle her back to Riyadh, having subjected her to a “well orchestrated and malicious campaign of persecution”.
She currently occupies a suite and several rooms in a five-star London hotel with her four children and two dogs, guarded by a private security team.
