Kate Middleton Saves Herself From Near Wardrobe Fail
Celebrity wardrobe malfunctions — they fascinate us probably because they can happen to any of us, British royals included. At a 2010 birthday party for King Constantine of Greece, Queen Elizabeth suffered not one but two simultaneous malfunctions, wearing a coffee-stained gown and a handbag with a broken strap, per the Daily Mail. As an onlooker told the outlet, the queen was "jolly brave to have walked out without getting someone to stand in front of her" to hide the stain. That is one composed queen, for sure. Even dating back to Elizabeth's 1953 coronation, the queen admitted being fearful of a major wardrobe malfunction: breaking her three-pound, gloriously bejeweled crown. "You can't look down to read the speech. Because if you did, your neck would break — [the crown] would fall off," she told the BBC in 2018.
A lesser-known royal wardrobe malfunction was that of Princess Diana's iconic 1981 wedding gown. In an appearance on ITV's "Invitation to a Royal Wedding," one of her dress' designers, Elizabeth Emanuel, said Diana was "horrified" and "actually felt faint" when she saw how creased the gown looked come ceremony time, per Insider. Who would have thought one of fashion's most celebrated moments had a faux pas in disguise?
The pressure to prevent wardrobe malfunctions alone makes it seem difficult to be a royal! But Kate Middleton did just that during the Cambridges' royal visit to Jamaica recently.
Kate Middleton versus the wind
Of all the headlines Kate Middleton is making on her Caribbean tour with her husband Prince William, a near-wardrobe malfunction was an unexpected one. Touching down on March 22 in the Jamaican leg of their tour, Kate is captured in an onlooker's Instagram video fighting the strong breeze. Wearing a yellow Roksanda dress (in honor of the Jamaican flag) with a flowy skirt, Kate prevented an incident by holding down the sides of her dress just in the nick of time.
In 2018, British etiquette expert Myka Meier revealed Kate's secret to helping avoid an upskirt moment to The Sun. As Meier explained of the royals, "Often they wear body suits and clothes that actually increase static so it's much hard for something to fly up. So you have an under garment that is almost like a body suit." Everyone else, take notes!
Interestingly, Kate's stepmother-in-law Camilla Parker Bowles had a similar "Seven Year Itch" mishap in 2018. Attending the NHS Heroes Awards, the front slit in the Duchess of Cornwall's dress blew upward in the wind, even revealing her lacy underskirt, per the Daily Express. Well, royals are only human, right?