The Princess of Wales Makes a Gleaming Return to Windsor Castle

On Wednesday, the Princess of Wales wore gleaming gold earrings as she met with a young photographer at Windsor Castle, marking another milestone in her gradual return to regular royal duties.

The Prince and Princess of Wales were at Windsor Castle on Tuesday, where Prince William held a series of investitures. Afterward, he and Princess Catherine had a meeting with a sixteen-year-old photographer, Liz Hatton, who had been invited to take pictures during the investiture ceremony. Liz’s family accompanied her from Harrogate to Windsor for the event.

Kensington Palace released a pair of pictures from the meeting. This image shows Kate hugging Liz, who is currently undergoing treatment for a rare and aggressive form of cancer. Kate Mansey of the Times writes that William and Kate learned about Liz’s story through London’s Air Ambulance Charity and decided to invite her to take pictures during the investiture. Prince William has been the air ambulance charity’s patron since 2020.

Princess Catherine wore a wine-colored trouser suit to meet the Hatton family, accessorized with a pair of earrings that have been in her jewelry box for more than a decade.

These are the Temple of Heaven earrings from Cassandra Goad. The design of the yellow gold earrings was inspired by the details on the roof of the famed Temple of Heaven in Beijing.

Kate acquired the earrings before her royal marriage, and she’s been wearing them since at least 2010. We saw them particularly often in the early years after her wedding to Prince William, on engagements both in Britain and abroad.

The versatile earrings have accompanied Kate to both day and evening engagements. Here, she wears them for the Place2Be Awards ceremony at Kensington Palace in November 2014. In September of this year, we saw her wear them for a church service near Balmoral Castle in Scotland.

This photograph also shows that Kate is still not yet back to wearing her famous sapphire and diamond engagement ring on her left hand. In recent months, we’ve seen her opt to wear a new eternity-style band in place of the large ring.

That newer ring took center stage in last month’s video announcing the conclusion of Kate’s recent round of chemotherapy treatments. I discussed the ring and the symbolism of the video here, and chatted about a possible provenance for the piece here.