The Duke and Duchess of Sussex made it clear in their Oprah interview: the royal lifestyle is an expensive one, especially for those who are considered relatively “minor.” So who is going to underwrite the security bill and the clothes and the ability to at least give the impression of high-end solvency? In the case of Harry and Meghan, it will be Spotify and Netflix, but those who are closer to mere-mortal status are being enlisted to serve as ambassadors for luxury brands.
In the day and age of the self-made influencer, royal blood is at a premium; it’s one of the few things that money and likes can’t buy.
Jack Brooksbank, the husband of Princess Eugenie, has been affiliated with the $45-per-bottle Casamigos tequila since 2016. Owners Rande Gerber and George Clooney initially enlisted him to serve as a brand ambassador, but promoted him to the role of European brand director just a few months before his 2018 wedding. When the royal couple announced the arrival of their first child—the ninth in line to the throne—Casamigos was on the case. Eleven minutes after news broke of their son’s birth, the brand sent out a press release asking media outlets to “use his official title” if they planned to mention “any further details.”
And so, over the past few months, a spate of houses from Chanel to Dolce & Gabbana have signed on next-gen royals as models, influencers, art directors, and luxury-brand ambassadors. Whereas their parents’ generation wasn’t allowed to stray far from the palace, this “not employed, but working” generation has opted to monetize their bloodlines.
When Grace Kelly married Prince Rainier of Monaco, in 1956, she was ordered to stop working as an actress. It’s a much different story for the Hitchcock heroine’s granddaughter, Charlotte Casiraghi. The accomplished equestrienne had previously posed for Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent, but on January 1 she became the first royal brand ambassador, thanks to her contract with Chanel. (The relationship goes way back—her mother, H.R.H. Princess Caroline of Hanover, was the late Karl Lagerfeld’s close friend.)
In the day and age of the self-made influencer, royal blood is at a premium; it’s one of the few things that money and likes can’t buy.
Besides shooting the Chanel spring-summer campaign in Monaco, Casiraghi, who studied philosophy and is also president of the cultural organization Les Rencontres Philosophiques de Monaco, will host a series of literary talks in the brand’s new haute couture salons, at 31 Rue Cambon in Paris.
And then there’s Beatrice Borromeo Casiraghi, a sister-in-law of Charlotte’s. The 35-year-old radio-and-television journalist was recently anointed as the new face of Italian fine-jewelry brand Buccellati, and, in late January, Dior signed her as an ambassador to represent “new facets of femininity.”
Over in the United Kingdom, the next generation of Spencer sisters are rising to stylish prominence. Kitty Spencer, the 30-year-old niece of the late Princess of Wales, has been named a global ambassador for Dolce & Gabbana. It’s quite a departure for the young woman, who grew up in relative anonymity in South Africa. Now that she’s engaged to Michael Lewis, the 61-year-old owner of a retail-clothing company whose estimated net worth is $105 million, she likely won’t rely on her wages. But at least she has a fallback plan. And expect to hear plenty more about her little sisters, Amelia and Eliza Spencer, who just appeared on the cover of Tatler.
Another regular face of the fashion glossies? H.R.H. Princess Maria-Olympia of Greece and Denmark, 24, who once walked the catwalk for Dolce & Gabbana. Now she’s appearing in advertisements for Louis Vuitton’s Capucines handbag. The campaign was photographed at the Bristol, while Jacqueline Taïeb music played in the background. In the images, the princess conveys an impertinent, carefree attitude that seems worlds away from a society dominated by the coronavirus, racial inequity, and the gilets jaunes.
Young men are getting in on the action, too. Charles de Vilmorin, 24, whose great-aunt was writer Louise de Vilmorin, was recently named creative director at Rochas. H.H. Prince Nikolai of Denmark, 21, a member of the royal Danish family, has modeled for Dior and Burberry. His father has declared that he does not want him “to be forced into something,” and yet the young model has been financially cut off from the Crown—except for funding for his studies.
Some of these brands are even taking their royal fixations one step further. In the past six months, Dior has decamped to Versailles to unfurl its fall-winter 2021 collection, Chanel held an opulent fashion show at the vast Château de Chenonceau, in the Loire Valley, and Celine fashioned a catwalk in the halls of the 16th-century Château de Chambord.
What’s next—a haute couture show at Harry and Meghan’s place in Montecito? Anything is possible.
Katia Kulawick-Assante is a France-based writer