Eugenie: I want to run down the aisle
A reading from The Great Gatsby will mark the moment the princess fell for her future husband
EIGHT years ago, the eyes of Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank met across a crowded ski resort in Verbier and, with a shy smile, their romance began.
As they marry in St George’s Chapel today, that moment will be commemorated in a reading by Princess Beatrice, who will deliver a passage from The Great Gatsby as the one unconventional moment in an otherwise traditional ceremony.
Princess Eugenie, 28, and Mr Brooksbank, 32, will marry at Windsor Castle today, from 11am, surrounded by their families and 850 guests.
The order of service, put together by the bride and groom, shows their traditional preferences, based on the 1928 Prayer Book Service and using the oldfashioned language eschewed by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, who were married in the same venue.
Hymns include Immortal, invisible, God only wise and Love divine, all loves excelling, with a star turn from opera singer Andrea Bocelli, a friend of the Duchess of York.
Charles Brooksbank, the groom’s paternal cousin, will read from St Paul’s Letter to the Colossians, while the address – given so memorably by American Bishop Curry at the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle – will be in the hands of the Dean of Windsor.
Princess Beatrice, who is maid of honour for her sister, will read from The Great Gatsby, describing the protagonist’s gentle manner and kind smile, and continuing: “Precisely at that point it vanished – and I was looking at an elegant young roughneck, a year or two over thirty, whose elaborate formality of speech just missed being absurd.
“Some time before he introduced himself I’d got a strong impression that he was picking his words with care.”
In an interview ahead of the wedding, Princess Eugenie described her fiancé as “humble and generous”, saying he was “the kind of guy, you know when you’re lost at a party and you can’t find anyone to talk to, and you start panicking and you need help? He’ll walk in and make everyone feel so special”.
In return, Mr Brooksbank called her a “bright shining light”.
Last night, the princess said the nerves were “definitely creeping up on us”, calling their romance “love at first sight”.
Asked of her first impressions, in a bar in Switzerland, she said: “I thought, ‘What a silly hat!’ and I thought, ‘Who’s that?’ and then you [Jack] came over and shook my hand and I was all butterflies and nervous. I think I rang my mum that night and said ‘I’ve met this guy Jack’ ... and that was it, I think, about how it started.”
The couple gave little away about their wedding reception, confessing that they had not planned a routine for their first dance, and joking they might sing at the reception.
The princess, whose dress is a closely-guarded secret, gave a hint towards her priorities on the day, saying it was “very important” to her that the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, was represented.
“I had an operation when I was 12 on my back, and you’ll see on Friday, but it’s a lovely way to honour the people who looked after me and a way of standing up for young people who also go through this,” she said. “I think you can change the way beauty is, and you can show people your scars and I think it’s really special to stand up for that.”
The bride’s “something borrowed” will be a tiara lent by the Queen, her grandmother. The heirloom from her own personal collection “hasn’t been seen in years”, a source told The Daily Telegraph.
It is not known which tiara it might be. The York tiara, worn by Sarah Ferguson for her 1986 wedding to Prince Andrew, has not been seen since 2001.
Curiously, the printed order of service will include, on its final page, a reproduction of an artwork by Mark Bradford, who is represented by Hauser and Wirth, the art firm Princess Eugenie works for, and has spoken about his political views and distaste for the rules of the “middle classes”.
Guests at the second royal wedding of the year are reported to include the singer Ellie Goulding, supermodel Cindy Crawford, David and Victoria Beckham, Prince Harry’s ex-girlfriends Cressida Bonas and Chelsy Davy, model Cara Delevingne, singer James Blunt and George Clooney.
This morning, royal admirers will gather in Windsor to catch a glimpse of the newlyweds’ carriage procession through the town centre.
Yesterday just two well-wishers manned their position outside Windsor Castle, with one of them, Kerry Evans, a 54-year-old carer and freelance writer from Hull, saying she was surprised at the low turnout.
“I’m sure some crowds will still turn out to cheer,” she said. “I certainly hope so. It is their big day after all and everyone loves a wedding.”
Staff at AP Souvenirs said they were not selling Eugenie and Jack merchandise, adding: “It’s not like Harry and Meghan’s wedding. Then we couldn’t sell the stuff fast enough. It was so busy – not like now.”
Not all were so cynical. Choristers Alexios Sheppard, 11, and Leo Mills, 12, both performed at the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s wedding, and now will sing with others for the Queen’s granddaughter and her fiancé.
Alexios said: “They call it a once-ina-lifetime experience, but not for us.”
The full interview with the bride and groom, along with live coverage of the wedding, can be seen from 9.25am today on ITV.