Two years ago, on a chilly Tuesday night in November, the king and queen hosted their first state banquet at Buckingham Palace. State banquets are impressive affairs whatever the weather, all stiff white tie and polite toasts, but they’re not exactly a barrel of laughs. That night, though, Queen Camilla looked like she was having a ball. Why? Sapphires. She appeared to have told the crown jeweller, ‘Bling me up. I’ll take everything you’ve got.’ Everywhere you looked there were sapphires: tiara, chandelier earrings, necklace, bracelets. She looked thrilled to bits. After the sadness of Queen Elizabeth’s death, and the never-ending sulky psychodrama of Megxit, we had a new queen with a twinkle in her eye – and an endearing soft spot for sapphires.
Camilla at her first state banquet as queen, November 2022, wearing the sapphire ‘suite’ of jewels from the late Queen Elizabeth’s collection
Even a few years ago, the former Mrs Parker Bowles did not seem destined to become a national treasure. For a long time, she didn’t even seem destined to become queen. Her longstanding friend the Marchioness of Lansdowne, at whose stately home, Bowood, Charles and Camilla used to have secret trysts, recently said that ‘never in a million years’ did Camilla think she would become queen. This, after all, is the person Queen Elizabeth is said to have called ‘that wicked woman’, but with whom she later bonded over a shared love of horses and dogs. It took a concerted effort on the PR front over two decades to turn her image around, and a typically elegant nudge from Queen Elizabeth who, in her Platinum Jubilee speech, spoke of her ‘sincere wish’ that, when Charles became king, Camilla would be referred to as Queen Consort.
That was the title sorted, but winning public affection was up to Camilla. Not that she ever looked like she wanted the top job, largely because she didn’t. A former communications secretary to the king and queen, Julian Payne, said that ‘it was never a role that she actively campaigned for’. And she never looked like she was trying too hard to be liked. She is known by some aides at Clarence House as ‘the lady boss’, and a friend says that she has succeeded ‘just by being herself’. Camilla was not, they added, someone who could be pushed about, but nor was she liable to have a hissy fit. After the histrionics of Harry and Meghan and the disaster that is Prince Andrew, it came as a relief to have someone in the palace who kept calm and carried on.
If Camilla had a family motto it would be ‘Thou shalt not whine
‘She is resilient, and she was brought up with this extraordinary sense of duty,’ the Marchioness of Lansdowne told The Sunday Times shortly before the coronation. ‘It has stood her in very good stead.’
As Tina Brown observed in her book The Palace Papers, if Camilla had a family motto it would be ‘thou shalt not whine’. That was thrown into sharp focus earlier this year, with Charles and the Princess of Wales both temporarily absent from royal engagements while they underwent cancer treatment. Camilla stepped up her duties with cheerful good humour and the energy of someone considerably younger. Back in 2018, Meghan went on a walkabout in Australia and is said to have complained, ‘I can’t believe I’m not getting paid for this.’ In contrast, Camilla stuck to the royal rule book: she turned up, showed an interest, looked delighted, then went home with the air of a woman likely to kick off her shoes and call for a stiff drink.
Camilla with actress Emerald Fennell, 2022. Fennell played Camilla as a ‘sexy, lusty chain-smoker’ in The Crown
‘Camilla has earned her stripes through the love and loyalty she has shown to her husband, and by devotion to duty to the crown,’ according to Robert Jobson in his book Charles at Seventy.
For Gen Zers, Camilla is a TikTok sensation. The hashtag #queenconsort has racked up almost half a billion views from people who probably hadn’t been born when Princess Diana died. According to YouGov, Camilla’s popularity is on the rise, and currently double that of Harry. The blows he aimed at her in his autobiography, Spare, and in interviews to promote it, largely failed to land because he was so busy punching other people as well. As for Camilla, she learned from Queen Elizabeth how to react: never complain, never explain. As the Marchioness of Lansdowne puts it, ‘Don’t whinge, put your best face on and keep going’ is Camilla’s philosophy, as is ‘Don’t make a thing of it. Least said, soonest mended’.
So Camilla keeps her head down and gets on with the job. She takes a close interest in her charity The Queen’s Reading Room, which promotes literacy and literature, and her work with organisations supporting survivors of rape and domestic abuse. Apart from the days that call for sapphires, she’s aware that if the royal family needs glamour, it will be Kate’s phone that rings, not hers, at least once the Princess of Wales is fully well again. As Brown put it, Camilla was ‘always more of a horsewoman than a clothes horse’. But she has nevertheless found a style and sticks to it: zip-up dresses, fitted round the bust, flaring to just below the knee. It’s a length that gives fashionistas the heebie-jeebies, as do her well-worn black suede knee-high boots, but Camilla hasn’t got where she is today by caring too much what other people think of her clothes. If anything, she probably allowed herself a wry smile when the fashion press gave a thumbs-up to her appearance in an electric-blue jumpsuit.
She’d be far happier wearing old jeans and a sweater to pootle round her private home, Ray Mill House, in Wiltshire, cooking roast chicken for the grandchildren, and her staff know to block out time in her diary to do just that. Yet as gatekeeper to the king, her soft power is immense. When Harry flew over after his father’s cancer diagnosis, it is hard not to suspect Camilla’s hand in the decision to grant him only half an hour of the king’s time. She is the person who can calm Charles down when he’s agitated and cheer him up when he’s down in the dumps.
Camilla with Charles, 2013. ‘They are always laughing together,’ says an aide
‘They are always laughing together,’ an aide told Brown. ‘They are a glove that fits. She brings out the best in him and he brightens whenever he sees her.’ Their affection and ability to work well as a double act comes across to the public, perhaps especially those who remember the toxic rivalry of Charles and Diana.
Then there’s Netflix’s The Crown, which reimagined ancient history for a whole new audience. Some in the palace went into conniptions at Emerald Fennell’s decidedly unregal portrayal of Camilla as a sexy, busty, lusty young chain-smoker who was fun to be around. But in a royal family that can seem wildly dysfunctional, being fun is relatable. Camilla came across as the holy grail of reputation management: authentic. Gen Z went wild for it and Camilla owned it. When Fennell was invited to a reception at Clarence House, Camilla agreed to be photographed with her and even joked that if she ‘fell off her perch’, her fictional alter ego could step in.
‘Nobody likes to be looked at all the time and, you know, criticised,’ she told Vogue in an interview to mark her 75th birthday in 2022. ‘But I think in the end I sort of rise above it. You’ve got to get on with life.’
The Secret Diary of Queen Camilla by Hilary Rose is published by Constable, £18.99. To order a copy for £16.14 until 13 October, go to mailshop.co.uk/books or call 020 3176 2937. Free UK delivery on orders over £25.
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