Kate’s cold shoulder is still the hottest royal look
Pushing the realms of regal etiquette with the racy style that has even been seen on a queen...
It was seen as being very racy for the time
EVEN amid the stunning dresses at the Baftas, one stood far above the rest. Kate Middleton shone in a white, one-shouldered Alexander McQueen dress. With her hair in an elaborate updo, and no necklace to distract, she looked the ultimate queen-in-waiting.
This daring one-shoulder look is actually the epitome in British royal family eveningwear. Modest enough to be appropriate, but showing enough to be interesting, it has been the go-to glamour choice for royals wanting to make an impact.
The late Princess Diana — one of the greatest fashion icons the world has ever known — used the same stratagem with a stunning, heavily beaded, asymmetric dress by Japanese designer Hachi.
The Princess first wore it in 1983 for the premiere of the Bond film, Octopussy. It’s been said that the premiere — two years after her marriage to Prince Charles — was the point at which Diana realised the extent of her fashion impact.
She wore the same dress again, in 1985, to a formal dinner at the Washington National Gallery of Art, and to another gala in Australia.
More than three decades earlier, in 1951, Princess Margaret celebrated her 21st birthday in a frothy, white, one-shouldered ball gown by Dior, which she described as her ‘favourite dress of all’.
In fact, says etiquette and royal expert Jean Broke-Smith, principal of the former Lucie Clayton School of grooming and modelling, it was seen as being very racy for the time and terribly avant garde.
‘Her father — King George VI — was rather shocked,’ she says. ‘Don’t forget, it was the Fifties and the royals were seen as a species above the rest of us.
‘It was out-of-the question that they be perceived as sexy. Princess Margaret was quite outrageous then in her choice of gown.’
The problem, Broke-Smith says, is that whatever the decade, being royal means you aren’t supposed to show much flesh at all when attending formal events.
‘You can’t have a plunging neckline or a backless dress.
‘Even straightforward strapless isn’t really appropriate. There’s always a vast expanse of flesh showing, at front and back. It’s too naked.’
And while it’s actually quite hard now to imagine Queen Elizabeth in a revealing gown, she was famously beautiful as a young woman. In 1954, aged 28 and visiting New Zealand, she’d only been queen for a year.
Her one-shouldered Norman Hartnell lace gown is incredibly ornate, though still dignified and very structured. With a wrap around her shoulders and covering most of her arms, there’s just a hint of shoulder showing.
So while there is undoubtedly something erotic about showing one shoulder, for Kate Middleton, it was in the mould of a classic Greek or Roman goddess, especially with her slender neck and elegant updo.
Fashion designer and style consultant Charlotte Balbier sayst-
that one-shouldered is very hard to carry off well. ‘You have to have incredible shoulders and arms, as well as a swan-like neck.’
So what Kate wore was about as daring as a member of the British royal family could get, while remaining within the confines of what is appropriate.
‘It must be hard, sometimes, to have such a stunning figure but be unable to show it off to full advantage,’ says Broke-Smith.
Of course, you need regal posture to carry off a one-shouldered gown — and Kate’s posture is ‘spectacular’, says Broke-Smith.
‘She pushes her shoulders back nicely, as I always used to make my pupils do.’
Funnily enough, Broke-Smith thinks we’re all more aware of posture these day as we hunch over our laptops and phones. And it’s something we should try and change for ourselves too.
‘Many of us stand so appallingly, that we notice when people do stand tall.’ says Broke-Smith. ‘It just looks sophisticated.’
Achieving that Greek statue level of toned shoulder isn’t that easy, though.
‘Ideally, you need to have toned arms for shoulders to look truly fabulous,’ says celebrity personal trainer Cornel Chin, who has worked with such Bafta regulars as Naomie Harris and Colin Firth.
‘Kate is lean and shapely, but without the bulging muscles of, for example, Madonna. I’d say Kate definitely has a personal trainer. She has an athletic look which is very hard to acquire naturally.’
Her body fat appears low, but healthily so, he says, which helps with the definition of her arms and shoulders.
‘She’ll be doing cardio for fat burning, as well as arm-specific exercises such as bicep curls, tricep extensions and shoulder presses, and probably a lot of planks.’
Of course, a oneshouldered dress offers a great deal of variety within one style; Princess Diana tended to go for fitted dress; Kate chose a classic ballgown.
Even the newest British royal on the block, Meghan Markle, successfully sported the one-shoulder look at the British Fashion Awards last year — and she had a new accessory to contend with: a baby bump!