Kensington Palace ‘should have done more to protect Kate’ over photo blunder
As is standard with photos issued by the Royal Family, the Princess of Wales’s Mother’s Day portrait of her and her children was accompanied by a stern stipulation from palace aides: “The image must not be digitally enhanced, cropped, manipulated or modified in any manner or form.”
The irony did not go unnoticed by staff at one leading international news agency, which joined rivals in issuing a “kill notice” for the portrait after it became clear that the image supplied by Kensington Palace had indeed been “manipulated” prior to its release.
As one staffer put it: “Royal photos in particular come with a long list of strict conditions for use. There was an amount of bemusement when it became clear that adherence to the same rules hadn’t necessarily been checked with the princess herself.”
The portrait, showing a smiling Kate flanked by her equally beaming children, was the first authorised image of her since she underwent abdominal surgery in January.
Its release was a fairly transparent attempt to quash the wilder conspiracies that have circulated online about her whereabouts. Instead, the portrait – and Kensington Palace’s cagey response – has only served to pour more fuel on the fire.
The eruption of what has variously been dubbed “Kategate”, “Photogate”, or even “Sleevegate” – after signs of digital manipulation were spotted on the arm of Princess Charlotte’s cardigan – drew criticism that the picture had made its way into the public domain without being rigorously vetted by aides.
In a statement issued almost 24 hours exactly after the portrait was released, Kate took personal responsibility for altering the image and apologised for the “confusion” caused.
But royal experts said that such was the inevitable scrutiny that would be applied to the picture, Kensington Palace also had questions to answer.
Ed Owens, a royal historian and expert on the Windsors, told i: “This is one photograph that the Waleses and Kensington Palace simply had to get right.
“Given the princess’s illness and absence, it was obvious that the image was going to be pored over and it is significant that the discrepancies were picked up by the public on social media before they hit the mainstream media.
“It was totally inept by Palace aides and communicators to have allowed this to happen on their watch.”
He added: “It goes to a deeper complacency being shown by the Waleses and their operation. They have been very successful at projecting this image of authenticity, of using social media to create this more personal and intimate relationship with the public.
“But we are in a different world now where you cannot just switch this narrative on and off. There will always be this hunger for more details and that information must itself be unimpeachable and authentic.
“Instead, the Palace allowed this information vacuum to be created in recent weeks. William and Kate and those who advise them cannot take this relationship with the public for granted.”
Royal sources stressed that only “minor adjustments” had been made by Kate to the photograph, said to have been taken by her husband late last week at the family’s home, Adelaide Cottage, on the Windsor estate.
An analysis of data linked to the image by broadcasters found it had been saved twice – once on Friday night and again on Saturday morning – on Adobe Photoshop software on an Apple Mac computer.
One of the Royal Family’s more vocal critics suggested the episode highlighted a worrying trend in public perception of the House of Windsor.
Omid Scobie, the biographer of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, said on X that the incident was an example of how “it’s becoming increasingly difficult for the public to believe a word (and now photo) they [the Palace] share”. He added: “Gaining that back at this point is an almost impossible task.”
Peter Hunt, a former BBC royal correspondent, agreed that there had been a failure in the royal firmament to fully understand the “intense interest” that the photograph would generate.
Describing the episode as “damaging” to the royals, he said: “Their challenge is that people will now question whether they can be trusted and believed when they next issue a health update.”
The pattern set by William and Kate of issuing family portraits, taken either by loved ones or professional photographers, has allowed the couple to offer the public regular glimpses of their children while sparing Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis more intrusive media scrutiny.
Kate, the author of many of those images, revealed in 2021 that her children sometimes object to her hobby. She said: “Everyone’s like, ‘Mummy, please stop taking photographs’.”
The taking of pictures will almost certainly continue. But royal aides will need to be far more careful about their release – and more mindful of their own warnings about digital manipulation.
