The princesses with a point to prove | Royal | News (Details)

Beatrice, who will be 30 next Wednesday, and Eugenie, who is 28 and preparing for her wedding to Jack Brooksbank at St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, on October 12, have a point to prove after suffering some damaging headlines over the years.

“We want to show people who we are as working, young, royal women, but also not to be afraid of putting ourselves out there,” Eugenie told Pithers, in an interview published today in British Vogue magazine.

The two sisters have experienced their fair share of negative publicity. They were ridiculed over their outfits – remember Beatrice’s giant pretzel hat? – at the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s wedding in 2011. The criticism made them cry. Similarly suggestions that they were left looking unglamorous and very much in the shadow of the Duchess of Cambridge at big royal events proved hurtful. Beatrice, too, faced knocking stories over changing jobs four times in five years and the 18 holidays she was said to have taken in one year.

Eugenie was alleged to have taken eight holidays in 15 months while working at a New York art gallery, including 25 days in her first 10 weeks.

The sisters, who actually both have good university degrees, were lampooned as nice-but-dim girls completely out of touch with the real world in the Channel 4 comedy The Windsors. This reputation perhaps stems from Beatrice’s embarrassment in 2009 when she left the keys to her BMW in the ignition while shopping in London’s West End and was surprised to find it had been stolen.

In fact, their real world is a busy one of juggling full-time careers with numerous charity engagements that take up most of their evenings. “There are meltdowns,” laughed Eugenie, who is an associate director at contemporary art gallery Hauser & Worth. “But we have very understanding bosses.”

Their charity work includes supporting Teenage Cancer Trust, and the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, where Eugenie had surgery to correct a curvature of the spine in 2002. She has also championed action against modern slavery, while Beatrice supports the Be Cool, Be Nice campaign which combats cyberbullying.

Beatrice, who split from her boyfriend Dave Clark in 2016 after a 10-year relationship, works as vice-president of partnerships and strategy at Afiniti, a US-based technology company. Like her sister she has an Instagram account, unusual for members of the Royal Family, and is obsessed with new technology. Her favourite app is Happy Not Perfect, a tool that helps her meditate.

Eugenie, ecstatically happy in the run-up to her wedding to Jack, a 32-year-old brand ambassador for George Clooney’s drinks company Casamigos Tequila, is looking forward to having her sister as her maid of honour. “I’m not stressed,” she said. “It’s very nerve-racking because you want it to be perfect but then you realise you’re going to be with the person you love for ever and nothing else really matters.”

A committed environmentalist, she has decided to make the wedding plastic-free. “My whole house is anti-plastic now – and Jack and I want our wedding to be like that as well,” she said.

They are close to their mother, Sarah, Duchess of York, whom they call “Mumsy”. Divorced in 1996, she uses one end of the family home, Royal Lodge at Windsor, which Andrew moved into a couple of years after the death of the Queen Mother, its previous occupant. Indeed Fergie popped in to see them as they got ready for the fashion shoot. “Great hair. Let’s make those eyes pop!” she told Eugenie.

Andrew too is close to his daughters and asks them to accompany him on some of his royal engagements, even though they are not officially designated as working royals. There has been speculation that they would have liked to have been but were prevented by Prince Charles’s plans to slim down the monarchy.

The sisters and Prince Andrew have always insisted that it was their choice to forge their own careers outside the Firm. Even before they had finished university – Beatrice read history and history of ideas at Goldsmiths in London, while Eugenie studied history of art, English literature and politics at Newcastle – they had decided that a life of ribbon-cutting was not for them. But they have retained their HRH status and all the perks that go with it. Eugenie and Jack have moved into an apartment in the grounds of Kensington Palace after the sisters spent years sharing a flat in St James’s Palace, renovated in 2008 at a cost of £250,000 to the taxpayer.

“It’s hard to navigate situations like these because there is no precedent, no protocol,” Beatrice said. “We are the first: young women trying to build careers and have personal lives, and we’re also princesses and doing all of this in the public eye.”

They have their spats but are also very close. “We’re each other’s rocks,” Eugenie said. “When we were younger, I used to make her go into parties first. I’d hide behind her and she’d make the first move. Then I’d get louder and louder as she made me more confident.”

The full feature is in the September issue of Vogue, available on digital download and news stands from today.