Last summer, the Princess of Wales hired photographer Matt Porteous to come to Norfolk to take family photos. I don’t know how long Porteous stayed there, but it was long enough to shoot their summery, denim-clad Christmas card, their anniversary photo and several of the kids’ birthday photos. Kensington Palace has been parceling out those photos for the past year. And here’s another one from the 2022 Porteous Photoshoot, one would assume: Kate in her beekeeper’s outfit, playing with bees in Sandringham. Queen Bee Kate loves bees, don’t you know.
Kate Middleton is giving royal fans something to buzz about! The Princess of Wales, 41, skillfully handles bees in a new picture released by her office on Saturday.
The photo, which was taken by one of Princess Kate and husband Prince William’s favorite photographers, Matt Porteous, last summer, highlights World Bee Day and the royals’ own contribution to creating conditions for the insects to thrive.
The image was also shared on The Prince and Princess of Wales’ official Instagram account, with a caption that began, “We are buzzing about #WorldBeeDay 🐝.”
“Bees are a vital part of our ecosystem and today is a great opportunity to raise awareness of the essential role bees and other pollinators play in keeping people and the planet healthy,” the caption concluded.
In June 2021, Kate debuted the “keen beekeeper” persona and it’s been a while since she dusted it off. That 2021 incident was when she visited the Natural History Museum and she brought “her” honey, the honey she jars from her Norfolk beehive. I wondered at the time if Kate was just taking credit for the larger beekeeping projects at various royal properties. King Charles is bee-obsessed and the Sandringham Estate sells its own branded honey, from the beehives on the estate. So… is Kate in charge of the Sandringham beehives or does she just have some of her own personal-use beehives in Norfolk? We still don’t know! The only thing I know for sure is that Kate is absolutely NOT the queen bee of Norfolk society. Say hello to Queen Bee Rose Hanbury.
We are buzzing about #WorldBeeDay 🐝
Bees are a vital part of our ecosystem and today is a great opportunity to raise awareness of the essential role bees and other pollinators play in keeping people and the planet healthy.
📸 @mattporteous pic.twitter.com/QcBPckaXTV
— The Prince and Princess of Wales (@KensingtonRoyal) May 20, 2023
Photos courtesy of Matt Porteous for Kensington Palace and Avalon Red.
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- Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, visiting the Urban Nature Project at the Natural History Museum, London, on 22nd June 2021,Image: 617144360, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Credit line: Geoff Pugh for the Telegraph / Avalon
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- Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, visiting the Urban Nature Project at the Natural History Museum, London, on 22nd June 2021,Image: 617144366, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Credit line: Geoff Pugh for the Telegraph / Avalon
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- Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, visiting the Urban Nature Project at the Natural History Museum, London, on 22nd June 2021,Image: 617144366, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Credit line: Geoff Pugh for the Telegraph / Avalon
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- Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, visiting the Urban Nature Project at the Natural History Museum, London, on 22nd June 2021. The Duchess gives the children honey to try.,Image: 617168089, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Credit line: Geoff Pugh / Avalon
3 things from me.
1. Bees are so vitally important to protect that even if it’s this irritating faker spreading the word I’ll take it.
2. So there was time for at least one ‘costume’ change during that ever useful photo shoot.
3. Continually using POC as props in posed propaganda photos and at events fools absolutely no one.
Still you can see her white collar through the net. Same dress.
Agree about the bees being vitally important. I don’t know that she actually put the effort into a costume change though… it looks like that same white shirt collar peeking out. So lazy, she kept the same clothes on and just put the suit over them. Couldn’t even be bothered to put her hair in a ponytail. Nothing is organic with this woman. Everything is performative at the most basic level.
There was no need to change costumes, you can see she’s wearing the same shirt from the Christmas photo and anniversary photo. They took it at the same shoot lmao. I wonder why /snark.
Bee suits just slip on top of whatever you are wearing though I’d recommend wearing long pants and boots. Not a fan of hers but hope it encourages more people to get into bee keeping. It is a form of animal husbandry and just about every area has a bee keeping association happy to teach people.
“3. Continually using POC as props in posed propaganda photos and at events fools absolutely no one.”
Agreed Bees are VITALY important to the ecosystem, but the continual use of black people and especially children is EXHAUSTING and ANNOYING.
I’ve actually got to the point when I feel mildly irritated when I see any of the Royals but especially Kate, William, Chuck and Camilla. They’re all just vile and calculating.
As a descendant of beekeepers, I want to see video evidence she does the slow, patient, and sometimes gross and/or stingy work of keeping bees. I had some backyard beehives when I had a huge yard, and it’s daily work. Maybe she really is a beekeeper and that’s why she has so little time to do appearances. Ha!
Houghton Hall has beehives, maybe Kate has seen them at Rose’s home.
It’s a good cause nonetheless, bees are important for the planet and pesticides threaten their existence.
This photo shoot hardly proves that she is a ‘hands on” beekeeper. It is a lot of work (my brother in law used to keep bees), and we all know how work shy Kate is.
She can’t do the daily work at Anmer since she hasn’t been there since that photo was taken last year.
At least if there was a photo taken at Windsor she could pretend she’s in the same county as the bees in a daily basis. Let’s highlight the person actually doing the work for them. Except their egos won’t allow it.
If she’s such a massive beekeeper and she can’t find a photo more recent than last year then she’s lying about her interest in beekeeping.
If she was there that often it wouldn’t be hard to find one.
@Laura-Lee, are bees still a lot of work if you don’t collect the honey, and do you have to collect the honey? I’d like to keep bees just to up their population count. I’m not really a fan of honey, or interested in marketing the honey either.
I know you’re asking Laura-Lee, who knows bees, but I think maybe you’d be better off simply planting bee-friendly flowers and trees around your place, not using pesticides/herbicides, and I’m not sure what else. I’ve been reading about the issues of swarming the last few years, primarily the result of hobbyist beekeepers not really knowing what they’re doing.
I’m a beekeeper. Honeybees are livestock, and require regular care, whether you take the honey or not. You could perhaps try carpenter bees, depending on where you live. They are awesome natural pollinators and can also use all the help we can provide. Little work other than providing a bee ‘house’ and you get to watch them do their thing.
@lady D,
Seconding what Beaniebean said about not using pesticides. I live in the south and people have literal MISTERS just spraying things to keep the bugs away. They spray weed killers into the ground, spray ant killers everywhere else, then into the air for mosquitos, etc. Then they spend an exhorbitant amount on organic raised veg bed garden soil that comes with worm poop and whatnot bc their own backyards are so damn dead.
More than anything else, lay off insecticides/pesticides. Better for your family, your pets, the soil, the air, and the bees.
I don’t use anything. After a while, the critters find an equilibrium – frogs eat mosquitoes, wasps kill the army worm caterpillars that attack my tomatoes, birds come for the frogs and toads. I use roach traps inside the house (I had to draw a line somewhere) and found that shoveling one fire ant colony into a different colony solved that hideous problem – they attack each other more efficiently than any spray.
Anyway, sorry to digress. The point is – please don’t use pesticides.
Many, many thanks for the responses. I’m glad flowers are enough, although when it gets really hot, I’ve seen the bees heavily use a water bowl in the shade. For the past 44 years, every where I’ve lived I’ve planted flowers for the bees and blueberries for the birds, and I have never used a pesticide, herbicide or insecticide on the properties. The last place I spent ten years turning the backyard into a paradise. I saw snakes, toads, frogs, owls, mice, raccoons, worms, spiders, bees, wasps, dragonflies, hawks, a multitude of song birds and a hive of tiny iridescent green bees who live underground. I’ve even had wild duck flocks use my back yard occasionally.
I’m a beekeeper and have little interest in honey. For me, it’s all about the bees. They are so beautifully weird! But yes they require a lot of care, especially in regard to checking and treating for mites. If you are not highly committed to doing this work, I second the recommendation that you just plant tons of nectar rich plants, avoid pesticides and herbicides, and encourage bumbles and carpenter bees in your garden.
Also, I don’t believe for a minute that she or QC actually do any of the real work of beekeeping. As with everything else, I am sure they have servants for that. Her suit looks too new and neat, and nobody bothers with those heavy gloves. Nitrile gloves are easier to work with and just as effective. This is just another shallow photo op.
I’m willing to be she really has bees, but someone else does all the messy work. I have a friend who has bees, and like you said, it’s quite involved.
Kate gets photo ops again. I doubt she’s a beekeeper
Every picture I’ve seen of her doing things other than shopping, clubbing and some sports stuffs is always extremely awkward. Either she’s a complete ungraceful person or she has zero experience aka being in a fish-out-of-water situation. I guess, it is the latter.
We already know that Kate is a lazy cow. This photo might fool some – ok, a lot of people, but not us. She has all these properties to do whatever number of things, but she does nothing.
Beekeeping takes a lot of work. I recently visited a former pupil of mine, an autistic young man who everybody said would amount to nothing. When he was in grade 4, I took him and three other kids for remedial reading. The teacher had them reading kindergarten books. No way was I going to have them continuing with those, so started, then on some non-fiction reading. One of the books we read was about bees. The kids were fascinated. They wrote their own story about bees, and we even did an art work. Fast forward, and this boy carried on an interest (obsession) in bees right through high school. I didn’t know them that he started keeping these when he was about 13. He started with a couple of hives., and encouraged by his family, the number grew to 120. He wanted more, but there was no room left on his parents property. One of the neighbours offered him some space and he got another 64 hives. His knowledge about bees is phenomenal. He has learned how to make his own hives, and gives demonstrations at various places, about how to set up and care for the bees. For him, it is a full-time job. He sells his honey, which generates his income. He was even featured on TV recently!
Nah, Kate might eat the honey, and she might get the odd photo, but that is all. She can’t even be arsed doing what she gets paid to do. Oh, but wait. Now that she has been elevated to the second-highest female post after the decrepit, Camilla in the Royal pecking order,, she is the Princess of Everything! Or so the British media would have us believe. Blah.
It’s a sad state of our world that shallow rich fools like Kate get praised for a photo but serious people like your former student don’t get the recognition he deserves for doing the real work at preserving the bees.
Annakist, thank you for sharing that story about your former pupil! I just read it to my husband. Our son, who’s autistic, is five, and it was a good reminder to us to never impose artificial limits on him and to nurture his interests, because you never know where it can lead!
AnnaKist, you made me tear up!! I love stories about teachers on a good day, but you actually had a hand in helping a kid find his lifelong passion, and now he is sharing it with the world.
@AnnaKist Teachers are the best and teachers of students with learning differences are the best of the best.
I find it interesting that with these sort of things it’s always kate that gets pushed to the forefront. Eurovision? Employ kate. International bee day? Employ kate.
It would be great if she did more engagements rather than photoshoots.
She’s gonna be the fallguy should things go awry
I think some of the extra attention is related to Party Pieces going bankrupt. She is trying to bury that.
It will be interesting to see what William does with this and if he curtails it.
After all there were a few kate is the new Diana and kate is a revolutionary articles before she was shut out of the statue unveiling.
Why settle for a plastic Barbie-beekeeper-playset when you can have the…
Karbie-beekeeper-playset – See that Karbie bee farmer has a sweet day on the job with a colorful beehive toy that has working features, plus bees, flowers and honey. Karbie-beekeeper is – Easy to pose with Flexible Joints, Long Wavy Brunette Hair & beekeeper-wear included. Suitable for kids and gullible adults. (Additional leisure, career, activity outfits, wiglets, accessories and props available to buy separately).
https://www.toyscentral.uk/products/barbie-beekeeper-playset
This was brilliant. Thank you. I needed a laugh with my coffee this morning.
Oh my goodness! That Beekeeper Barbie even has Kate’s jeggings & boots!! Who’s copy keening who?
I’m going to guess that the official beekeeper let her open the bee hive for the photoshoot.
Bees are a critical part of the ecosystem, so I’ll give her a pass on her posing. But here’s my question: where is the actual future monarch? We haven’t seen the future king in a hot minute. Where is he hiding? What is he up to? Is he cool with his wife doing all the heavy lifting of their future reign?
That is always my question. Where is he? If someone said he was out of the country I would believe them. Like he has a totally seperate house somewhere. It’s weird. No one snitches about him.
Is he at home watching TV? Im awake during the day but I’m a night owl. People don’t see me for weeks. Is that how he lives his life as well. Lol.
Kate the beekeeper? Is there anything this woman can’t do? Apart from not being able to play the piano?
I have friends who keep bees. First thing they say is tie your hair up as bees get confused around long dark hair and tend to fly into it. Kate’s hair is loose. The other thing is that smoker. In the years I’ve helped care for bees I’ve never seen any of them put a smoker down with smoke pouring out of it like that.
But now CarolE doesn’t have to go to her day job she has lots of time to come up with stories that make Kate look good? Shame Kate doesn’t just get up off the sofa and actually DO something?
Bees and other pollinators are vitally important, and unfortunately they’re disappearing. So, if Keen is raising her profile by decorating her Instagram with bees for world bee day, I’ll take it. And I’ll honor Angelina Jolie for having done it better two years ago: https://www.celebitchy.com/716070/angelina_jolie_is_the_godmother_to_women_for_bees_she_cares_a_lot_about_bees_now/
Indigenous (wild)flowers and flowering plants and trees help to support your local pollinators. Even having flowerpots and containers on your balcony can help!
Dandelions are the first flower to come up in Spring, and a vital first food for the bees. Try to wait a couple of weeks before cutting them.
Their social media presence is so juvenile. To whom are they catering their content? Everything they do embarrasses me. Is that a strategy of some sort? All these emperors and empresses have no clothes. Who’s gonna tell them?
I wonder if that was put down as an engagement.
I wonder when we’ll get to the point of them tallying their IG posts as engagements.
I’m certain we are already there.
Next she’ll say how much interested George is in beekeeping
@TESSA, exactly, I agree that bees are important, but, Katey dear, is that why William spends so much time tending to his Rose bush, to keep it’s pollen nice and fresh 😂😂😂🌹!
Ha! Glad I’m not the only one thinking this.
Do they not realise how contrived it seems when they’re parcelling out pics from the same shoot? It makes all the “happy family” shots seem like business and all the “cause” shots seem staged.
I’m willing to bet this is their new model though and we’ll see the results of the 2023-24 shoot from later this year. Such nonsense.
It is likely this is done because William and Kate do not want to be in the same vicinity anymore than they need to. And I don’t think Kate is encouraged to be at Anmer ever since she got Adelaide Cottage. This massive photoshoot for multiple purposes was likely negotiated for this specific purpose.
Locals will know more if she’s been seen shopping in Kings Lynn as much as she was seen pre Adelaide Cottage move.
Word, NIc. They did a massive photo shoot, before Kitty was shuffled off to Adelaide.
IMO The Royal Family doesn’t care how contrived any of their engagements look. They are not doing this to appeal to intellectual, educated, thoughtful, concerned, forward thinking Brits; they are appealing to their flock. The flock of brainless, backward thinking, pro monarchists who hang their entire identity on bring British SUBJECTS. The ones who think “for King and Country”, those who wallow in the faded glory of a long ago empire not realizing those glory days are gone. In other words they are appealing MAGAS of the UK. The MUKGAS, lol
For all his awfulness as a husband to DI and a father at least Charles HAD a genuine concern for the environment. K and W are embarrassingly void of any concerns for anything but themselves
I guess I’ll disagree with the crowd here – I think this is an efficient use of time, and a good way to knock out all of these fluffier “branding” moments at once. If they were actually doing the bread and butter stuff alongside this, it would probably be enough to at least make an argument for the huge amount of resources they suck up from taxpayers. They want to move to big projects but they’re not suited for it. Do this instead, and schedule 1 hour 2-3 days a week shaking hands, and soon they’d be at the top of the royal engagement list.
Who is it efficient for though? They still cost more and more every year despite these efficiencies which only really serve to give them more time to spend more money and not do engagements.
But part of doing even ONE photo shoot for a day is changing multiple times and if you’re going to use that shoot to represent various seasons, the stylists change for clothes matching the season, hair and make up changes too.
I mean, talk about doing the very very bare minimum. This couple is the laziest example I can even imagine.
How can you be a beekeeper when the bees are in Norfolk and you live in Windsor? This is such narcissistic contrived bs and they don’t even bother to conceal this photo was taken last year in a photoshoot that covered all possible events it now seems.
No one outside of people who read UK tabs will even see this so she’s not helping anyone but herself.
Her track record with causes is pretty bad, with some losing and another one recently being investigated for abusing children. Let’s hope she stays away from bees because we really need them far more than we need her PR nonsense.
Lol, your question is too logical @nic919. If the bees were kept in Windsor near Adelaide then sure. But you’re right. How often is she really in Anmer to beekeep?
Does Katie Keen take the helicopter to Norfolk every time she needs to check the bees?
I don’t know why they sell her as the beekeeper. Why not say she wanted to help the environment and so they got experts to lead and she learned z y z to share. Why is everything such a big lie.
“Ok, Matt, now can you do one of just me in this beekeeper outfit? I want to post something around my brother in law and his wife’s anniversary next year”.
Seriously, this is out of character for the Wails account. A family that is so conscious of the calendar and making sure not to “overshadow” each other? My bet is if bee day were, like, July 2, they wouldn’t bother. Am I crazy?
That said, I actually don’t mind the strategy of getting a year’s worth of photos done by a professional and then just scheduling them to post for the following year. But if posting those photos is the only thing you do, that’s the problem.
Great that she’s highlighting the importance of Bees but, I doubt very much she’s a “hands on” bee keeper. The added bonus for her team is that this photo-op is taking attention away from the failure of the family business. It also help to push down the page the headline about a children’s home ran by one of her supported charities having to be closed down.
I see nothing wrong or objectionable about this. It’s a softball engagement, on-brand and good that it’s bringing awareness about an ever-increasing fragile element of nature that probably gets little buzz.
Not a fan of Kate & the BRF, but anything that possibly fosters awareness of pollinators is a positive thing to me, regardless of when the photos were taken or how many clothing changes took place or didn’t.
The wacky mix of proportions going on with Khate’s pink jacket, white top, and jeans combo is not great. After so long, her efforts to disguise her long torso still seem to fail 50% of the time. She should just try to own her body shape for a change.
This is how bad I feel about Kate. My first thought was she faked the picture! That it’s her head on someone else’s body. It’s more likely the len but I put NOTHING pass her and her laziness.
This picture hits home that no one wants to interact with her. Even little kids at a beehive.
What is she saying that makes people not want to acknowledge her? No one wants to get dragged into her orbit.
What’s that badge on her beekeeper outfit? Is she Sheriff of Beetown? Does it indicate some sort of certification?
That badge. I freaked out for a minute, thinking it was a yellow JUDE star from a Nazi concentration camp. Then I zoomed in, and it said SHERIFF, and now I’m just confused.
You say Rose, I say Angelina Jolie.
AJ got a Damehood from Betty and there was a meet and greet with AJ and Cannot.
AJ been on the bees and their importance for awhile.
Bill must have told AJ that Tomb Raider is one of his favorite movies.
I am Team Save the Bees!
Kate is using this as another photo opp. for her image, counting this as work.
Man, this chick has it so damn easy!
Meanwhile 99.98% of us are living one paycheck from disaster.
First her grade 3 piano recital, then the ‘bee keeping’. She’s going to be showing off her bronze swimming certificate next.
More vapid posing.
I will now be referring to her as Mumble Bee. 🐝
🤣🤣🤣
For me, she’s a Zom Bee
Sometimes years ago you’d hear of swarms (pictures somewhere I’m sure online) will cover part of a house when a keeper dies to pay last respects.
They are *extremely* intuitive which is why Khate is wise to never remove any part of that suit near the hive….
Oh look, I didn’t know snakes and bees get along. A snake is always a snake. Sorry, she gets no passes from me for this photo op, she remains a garbage person and I see through this PR. She is still the white-knuckling, seething, jealous, Easter-gift-seeker that Harry wrote about.
So, if that picture makes one person go “Huh, she’s not afraid of bees, I’m not sure why I am..” then its worth it. Bees are so important that I applaud this effort to promote raising bees. If she had stood off to one side and watched someone else in the bees, I would have been furious. Raise your own bees! Princess Kate does it! I love it.
How can she raise bees from a place where she barely shows up? They are in Windsor for the school year for the kids. Do the bees just take care of themselves? Even if she just showed up every single weekend, what about during the week?
Maybe if they were honest about the staff that helps them it would show people that there is some level of work involved in bee keeping and this was more serious than a photo op. Perhaps a real video about the work involved would inspire people serious about learning this skill. What evidence have we seen of a Kate photo op leading to anything of substance? Nothing since 2011 in any case.
So, I check on the bees in the spring, kill the mites.
Then a couple times in the summer, i look into them, but I don’t do much.
Then I check the bees in the fall, kill the mites.
Then I put a sugar board on top of the bees before winter, and in the spring I repeat step one.
Always happy healthy bees are inside, I let them keep their honey.
It does not take much to be a beekeeper.
Sure there are other things, she might have help, but simply owning bees is a big thing. Even if someone else does the checking.
Stop it, Nic, your rational brain does not work against a human who thinks her brain would be fried if Kitty stood off to the side, while someone else did bee things.
“I would have been furious.” With “someone else in the bees”?
Sure thing.
Totally! I too will overlook a racist gaslighting Karen as long as she takes one photo with bees, and never does anything for them again.
That photo is giving Mike Dukakis in a tank. Except Dukakis was actually smart.
I am Team Bees!
But the bees we need to save are not so much just the honey bees, although they are great. We must save the wild bees. Carpenter bees, blue bees, we have those where I live. And a multitude of other bees. I have flowers and trees that were encouraged with bees in mind. I also have watering dishes with stones to keep them safe. And try to use as little chemicals of any kind as possible.
This is something I am sure most people are unaware of, that the disappearing bees, are not so much the domestic ones even with hive collapse, because they are the visible bees. Our wild friends need our help too.
Okay, off my soap box now.
SAVE ALL the BEES!
She’s even grimace-grinning at the bees. Is she EVER natural? Stop baring your chompers, Katie, the bees are endangered enough!
Yet another staged photo. It is very clever of her not to have one bee flying around, there is not enough smoke to stop them all moving.
There she is again “creating awareness” by not elaborating. There’s no meat to her messages as usual.
They’re always shoving down our throats that’s Kate’s a saint and she’s soooo perfect. Even though there’s nothing she’s really done here except staged a photo op with the bees. That’s definitely getting OLD for a lot of people . I bet they’re having a field day that Disney and now Amazon Studios(with the new show Citadel) are taking a dig at their perfect Kate 🤣🤣 . The script writers know what they were doing 😊. Everyone knows she’s never worked in her life except a career in partying with wealthy men.
I saw Boycott Disney was trending today. But there were some people asking Why the hell is this trending lol.. most people actually loved what they did regarding Florida/Desantis.
This is going to sound weird but I think they are being respectful by including Kate in the princess spot. Most people don’t acknowledge her. The little mermaid would’ve got more mileage saying Eugenia or Beatrice.
When is Kate getting a chicken coop?