The royal family has long believed that actions speak louder than words.
And Tuesday night they issued an eloquent visual rebuff to suggestions that the family is in disarray or crisis.
The four highest-ranking royals—King Charles, Queen Camilla, Prince William, and Kate Middleton—put on a symbolic display of unity, posing for photos in white ties and tiaras at London’s annual Diplomatic Reception.
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It was a striking visual fightback after a week in which the palace was blindsided by allegations made in Omid Scobie’s book Endgame that Kate and Charles were the so-called “royal racists” who questioned the likely skin color of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s children before they were born.
Kate was particularly striking in a fully glammed-up Jenny Packham gown and a glittering tiara, known as the “Lover’s Knot,” a wedding gift from the late Queen Elizabeth that was also a favorite piece of Princess Diana’s.
The Daily Mail’s fashion columnist Liz Jones described the elegant frock Kate wore as “the ultimate revenge dress,” writing, “It signalled, as Diana’s Little Black Dress did at the Serpentine on the night Prince Charles confessed to adultery on national television, that Catherine will not be cowed.”
The carefully curated image of unity marked the first time the quartet has appeared together since Scobie’s book was published and mirrors a decision by the palace to deliver a unified response to the allegations in Scobie’s book—which, so far at least, appears to be to say nothing despite vague, off-the-record threats of legal action.
The glossy Diplomatic Reception event capped a busy day of pre-Christmas engagements for the royals. Kate inaugurated a new surgical unit at Evelina London Children’s Hospital, Charles participated in an advent celebration at a Coptic Orthodox Church, and William sold the street newspaper The Big Issue outside a supermarket with 61-year-old vendor Dave Martin for the second consecutive year.
On the other side of the globe, Meghan was also spotted out and about, and proved she can do royal semaphore too, by wearing a tennis bracelet reportedly given to her by the king.
