For London locals, the royal rumors will come as a bit of a shock: Prince William and Kate Middleton are seriously contemplating leaving city life behind and making suburbia their official and permanent home. Where to exactly? Windsor, of course, the current home of Queen Elizabeth—at least during the pandemic—with the benefit of quite a few other royal neighbors (think Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank) nearby.
On the latest episode of the Royally Obsessed podcast, my co-host Roberta Fiorito and I dig into the details. Nothing is official just yet, but per a report in The Telegraph, it seems that William and Kate are feeling much like other families during the pandemic: Cooped up and ready to move on from city life. Still, they’ve got Anmer Hall, their 10-bedroom weekend place in Norfolk, so what’s so appealing about Windsor? And will they officially leave Apartment 1A at Kensington Palace behind? Here’s what we know so far:
• The appeal of Windsor isn’t just proximity to the queen. Yes, Queen Elizabeth has dubbed Windsor Castle her permanent residence throughout the pandemic, but should William and Kate relocate to the area, they’d have a number of royal family members nearby. Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank are currently borrowing Frogmore Cottage from Prince Harry and Meghan Markle (who, BTW, were the first of the younger generation of royals to make the Windsor move). But that’s not all: The Wessexes (Prince Edward and his wife Sophie) are in Bagshot Park and the Yorks (ugh, Prince Andrew) are at Royal Lodge. Also, a bonus: The Middleton family—Mike and Carole, Kate’s parents—would be just 15 miles away in Bucklebury. Not bad.
• Their commute would improve. While country life in Norfolk is appealing, for Kate and William, it comes with a two-hour commute to work. On the flip side, Windsor is just 45 minutes away—25 minutes on a good day, per The Telegraph—from their offices at Kensington Palace, which isn’t that much different than their current drive to drop Prince George and Princess Charlotte off at Thomas’s Battersea for school. (Also, Ludgrove and Eton College—both schools Prince William and Prince Harry attended as young boys—are within walking distance should William and Kate choose to send George, Charlotte and Louis down a similar path.)
• They’d still have a place to sleep at Kensington Palace. Shifting their permanent residence doesn’t mean William and Kate wouldn’t continue to have access to their residence at Kensington Palace. The relocation is more tied to school, but also the effort to have a better work/life balance. According to The Telegraph, it would allow for greater separation between those two worlds.
As for where they’d live in Windsor? Right now, reports say they’re eyeing Fort Belvedere, the former home of Prince Edward and Wallis Simpson, which comes with 135 acres of its own grounds and is just 30 minutes from London. (It also has a pool and tennis courts.)
Yeah, we’d probably be OK trading city life for that.
For more about the latest news on the royal family, listen to the Royally Obsessed podcast with co-hosts Rachel Bowie and Roberta Fiorito. Subscribe now or follow us on Instagram @royallyobsessedpodcast.
