These photos are from Wednesday, at a New Year’s reception in Denmark’s Christiansborg Palace. Queen Margrethe attended, as did Prince Frederik and Princess Mary. They will not officially be king and queen until January 14th. Rumors have been circulating all week about why Margrethe is abdicating and whether she’s trying to protect Fred and Mary’s marriage and force them to stay together. While Fred and Mary looked happy on New Year’s Eve, apparently their vibe was “frosty” at this reception.
Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Mary of Denmark put on a frosty display this morning as they arrived at the Christiansborg Palace for a New Year reception. Frederik, 55, dressed in military regalia, while Mary, 51, looked chic in a navy dress as they met with Queen Margrethe, who will step down in 11 days time.
Walking side-by-side into the palace, the couple appeared tense as they walked to greet the diplomatic corps
Insiders told Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet that the ‘the couple did not look they were enjoying themselves’ and described the atmosphere as being at ‘freezing point’.
‘Words were exchanged between the two, and it didn’t look like they wished each other good luck’ the paper claims.
The couple kept a polite distance and barely exchanged words as they walked towards the Knights’ Hall, flanked by soldiers. The atmosphere remained cold when they took their place beside Queen Margrethe inside the hall, both dressed formally for the occasion.
Judging solely from the photos, this looked like a pretty serious reception for (I think?) the diplomatic corps or something. It was work – it would have been inappropriate for Fred and Mary to be laughing or partying. Now, I believe that things are generally “frosty” between them and that the chill is all about Fred’s alleged affair with Genoveva Casanova. Interestingly enough, the Mail also has a story about how Casanova is in the wind. The Spanish media outlet Lecturas (which broke the affair story with photos) says that Casanova went to London for Christmas and she’s only been seen out a couple of times in northern Spain since the story broke. I wonder if she’ll stay silent throughout all of this abdication drama.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Getty.
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- Denmark s future king and queen, Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Mary arrives at the New Year s levee for diplomacy at Christiansborg Palace, Copenhagen, on Wednesday, January 3, 2024 Copenhagen Drabantsalen, The Drabant Hall Denmark Copyright: xKristianxTuxenxLadegaardxBergx IMG_2768,Image: 833986391, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: imago is entitled to issue a simple usage license at the time of provision. Personality and trademark rights as well as copyright laws regarding art-works shown must be observed. Commercial use at your own risk., Model Release: no, Credit line: IMAGO/Kristian Tuxen Ladegaard Berg / Avalon
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- Denmark s future king and queen, Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Mary arrives at the New Year s levee for diplomacy at Christiansborg Palace, Copenhagen, on Wednesday, January 3, 2024 Copenhagen Drabantsalen, The Drabant Hall Denmark Copyright: xKristianxTuxenxLadegaardxBergx IMG_2761,Image: 833986403, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: imago is entitled to issue a simple usage license at the time of provision. Personality and trademark rights as well as copyright laws regarding art-works shown must be observed. Commercial use at your own risk., Model Release: no, Credit line: IMAGO/Kristian Tuxen Ladegaard Berg / Avalon
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- Queen Margrethe, and Denmark s future king and queen, Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Mary, greet the diplomatic corps at the New Year s levee for diplomacy at Christiansborg Palace, Copenhagen, on Wednesday, January 3, 2024 Copenhagen Riddersalen, The Great Hall Denmark Copyright: xKristianxTuxenxLadegaardxBergx IMG_2905,Image: 833995176, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: imago is entitled to issue a simple usage license at the time of provision. Personality and trademark rights as well as copyright laws regarding art-works shown must be observed. Commercial use at your own risk., Model Release: no, Credit line: IMAGO/Kristian Tuxen Ladegaard Berg / Avalon
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- Queen Margrethe, and Denmark s future king and queen, Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Mary, greet the diplomatic corps at the New Year s levee for diplomacy at Christiansborg Palace, Copenhagen, on Wednesday, January 3, 2024 Copenhagen Riddersalen, The Great Hall Denmark Copyright: xKristianxTuxenxLadegaardxBergx IMG_2853,Image: 833995222, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: imago is entitled to issue a simple usage license at the time of provision. Personality and trademark rights as well as copyright laws regarding art-works shown must be observed. Commercial use at your own risk., Model Release: no, Credit line: IMAGO/Kristian Tuxen Ladegaard Berg / Avalon
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- Denmark s Queen Margrethe arrives at the New Year s levee for diplomacy at Christiansborg Palace, Copenhagen, on Wednesday, January 3, 2024 Copenhagen Drabantsalen, The Drabant Hall Denmark Copyright: xKristianxTuxenxLadegaardxBergx IMG_2772,Image: 833995463, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: imago is entitled to issue a simple usage license at the time of provision. Personality and trademark rights as well as copyright laws regarding art-works shown must be observed. Commercial use at your own risk., Model Release: no, Credit line: IMAGO/Kristian Tuxen Ladegaard Berg / Avalon
Funny how the Fail is all over this, but can’t summon up anything on the Wails disastrous marriage.
Or about their pedo problem Andrew.
Yes – they are trying to deploy this as a weapon of mass distraction.
It won’t work.
Or about the neo-nazi white supremacists being jailed for issuing death threats to Prince Harry and his son Prince Archie.
You summoned up my exact thoughts. If they are so desperate to talk about an affair they can start with wandering willy of their favorite royal.
They can’t talk about the Wails, so Fred and Mary are easy target! 🙃
That’s the thing. They’re calling this appearance frosty. And maybe it was. There is a lack of eye contact but the pictures mostly just show a formal event. However, we have all seen much frostier appearances than this. Much frostier. And that was with the wales couple. All the while the BM claimed the wales have festive glances. So the BM does not have a good track record for saying anything about anyone. They’re mostly liars with an agenda.
He is a Kook,always was,,her dad should whoop his,,,she is a straight shooter,,,
Or why any modern country needs a King/Queen at all?
Eh, I don’t see a big deal here. It’s a formal event, and they are both preparing to assume the throne. Now, if they were at a more relaxed event, I might think differently.
But this scrutiny of the couple is why I don’t really buy the argument that Queen Margrethe’s abdication is somehow a masterstroke to save the marriage. All it has done is put a huge spotlight on them and brought the cheating story back into the headlines. The kindest thing for them would probably be to allow the story to die away and decide for themselves if their marriage will continue and how that will look going forward. I don’t think that piling on a new role helps things at all.
Maybe the Queen thinks a new job will keep him too busy to get up to any shenanigans with people who are named after famous hoes from history?
No, but this does lock Mary in as QC and would be harder to replace with someone else. Mary has invested decades into this role and life and QM is making sure she collects. Mary has proven herself to be 100% suitable for the role.
That role comes from being married to the King and with these frosty interactions could cause problems in the future. It’s hard being married to someone that’s right for the role but you don’t want to be married to.
Bingo!
If you look at past pictures of the event it is very formal.and they generally look serious walking in. Margrethe typically has a pleasant expression walking in and is smiling when she greets the individual guests.
I don’t think she’s abdicating to save Fred and Mary’s marriage, she’s shown her priority is the crown by streamlining who is “royal” vs who is part of the royal family. I think this was about her health and if she thought she could still do it 100%.
I also think she has seen what happens when you stay on the throne till you die from GE. The country ends up with a tired old guy that no one likes. She want the new king and queen to be young and attractive.
I agree with you 100%. I think this is another example of people trying to find hidden conspiracies in things. No one can just take things at face value anymore.
But others have noted that the Queen has been having health problems for many months before this announcement. Also, you have to figure that it takes a lot of time and effort to make a transition like this, even in a small country. It makes no sense for Margrethe to have suddenly decided to abdicate within 2 weeks of the announcement, if she hadn’t already let everyone in the family and high levels of government know and prepare.
As for Fred and Mary, they’ve been married for 20 years and have four kids. For those of us who have had long relationships like that, you know you have ups and downs. Good days and bad. I doubt this Casanova lady is the first bump in the road.
Agreed. She probably started thinking about abdication when her husband died around 5 years ago. She’s been actively setting the stage for the last two years. Her back surgery may have accelerated the time line a little, but this was not a sudden decision and it was not prompted by the news stories about Fred’s alleged infidelities.
As someone who has been married for 22 years, I am echoing the belief that every long-term couple have ups and downs (and not always caused by infidelity – unemployment/financial woes can also cause havoc in a relationship). A fishbowl existence can only make the downs worse because they are so public.
The fail is all over this because they can’t comment on Andrew (old news for them) or their perfect couple who can’t stand to be together and act professionally even for an hour…🙄
The DF and other tabloids can absolutely comment on Paedrew and WanK. They don’t.
Personally, a big thank you to ArtHistorian and other Danish (or knowledgeable about the situation in Denmark) commentators here! I trust them over any reporting on Margrethe’s abdication from the DF. And they’re telling a very different story.
She’s 83 and she has had significant health problems for years! The Danish Glûcksburgs are generally not as long-lived as their Windsor cousins. People seem to forget that 83 years is actually old. And she had significant surgery last year – that is hard on an old body – and her rehab was long as well. My father got a knee replacement at 80 and while the surgery was a success and he was diligent with his rehab, he was significantly weaker after the surgery than before.
I just think that she doesn’t have the energy, and that she’s seen that it may be better for the institution if the new monarch isn’t old like Charles (though his low popularity has a LOT to do with his personal flaws).
Finally, maybe she wanted her son taking on his new job without having to grieve at the same time. Just look up the pictures and the video of her own accession speech: the looked devastated. She loved her father dearly and she had to address the nation the day after his death. It must have grueling. I lost my beloved father last year and I can’t even begin to image to give a public speech the day after without breaking down.
Tak, ArtHistorian! Honestly, in continental Europe sex scandals are usually considered “private life.” In other words, they are a lot less scandalous and no one in their right mind would believe that QM2 abdicated due to her son’s behavior. No one where I am takes that story seriously at all.
Old, in ill health, wanting to decouple becoming a monarch from grieving a parent, modernization…all of these are genuinely excellent reasons for QM2 to step down and she’s telling us this herself.
@art historian Looks like Margarethe is taking after her mother Ingrid and her Swedish side.
Gustav V (her maternal great grandfather) was 92, his brothers were in their 80s and 90s
Gustav Adolf (her maternal grandfather) was 90, his brother William was 80 (and his son 95)
Ingrid was 90, 2 of her 4 brothers were in their 90s and 1 in his 80s. (The other died in an accident.)
It’s a serious formal event let’s see how they act at a more casual event if things are frosty still then we can talk. Her best bet is to get them in marriage counseling and tell her son to keep it in his pants.
Instead of leaking to force Marge to abdicate; could the tabloid Casanova leak be about making Marge stay? Did someone know she wanted to leave so they exposed Frederik?
Or did a man who has been the heir to the throne his entire life walk about in Spain openly with a single woman and stay over at her apartment. The last rumors about him claimed that he had his own apartment years ago where he hooked up with women. Why would he walk around so openly now? Made no sense. If they were just friends they could have just said that. Not her him.
Or nearly his entire life. I wonder when Prince Christian will become a working royal, full time after college and during armed forces training I would imagine. I expect to see him more though.
I don’t understand why we’re acting like the Fail is suddenly a decent source of information?
When Kate copies this dress, she’ll have all the tiny buttons turned into large buttons.
What buttons?
There’s a row of them from her neck to under her arm.
If this is true, it sounds like they’re just the Danish version of William and Kate.
Then you have opinions that Mary does most of the work while Frederik does sports. I think back and Fred is usually doing a sport. I think little brother does more actually Work Work.
If this was William and Kate people would say Frederik never stopped auditioning for a second wife.
Fred’s little brother has a job but most likely only got it because his employer was leaned on and doesn’t have to pay his salary. The Danish taxpayers do! Joachim did less than Kate when he was royaling.
Joachim did less than Kate? Ridiculous and untrue!
Completely shallow comment but, I do love the colour of her dress. IMHO Mary is one of the few royals who actually looks wrong without her tiara. She wears them so regally to the point I think she looks ‘incomplete’ without one. As I said completely shallow comment! :blush:
Maxima too, imo. She really rocks all the Queen looks-the dresses, the jewels.
So the Fail does have the word frosty in their vocabulary. I was beginning to wonder because being frosty toward one’s spouse is par for the course for William, the Prince of Wales, along with eye-rolling, scowling, and generally pretending Kate isn’t there.
Eh, it’s a formal event and we know the DM will put any narrative they like against their choice of photos. There’s always a ‘source’ to back it up.
Do I think their marriage is in a great place? No. Do I think the rota are desperate to talk about WanKs awful marriage by proxy and have column inches filled with royal stuff that’s not Andrew/Epstein? Yes.
It seems like the British tabloid press is more invested in pushing the narrative that the abdication was a move to save their marriage more than anyone in Denmark is…..gee, wonder why. It really feels like the DM et al are trying to talk about the Waleses without talking about them, or want their readers to draw their own conclusions when the tabloids also say that Charles should abdicate.
The DM is desperate to talk this way about W and K who are obviously frosty to each other all the time. That wedding in Jordan was hard to deny and so the DM just ignored it.
This abdication in Denmark is their best chance to discuss what they want without fear of being shut down.
Whatever. The DM’s hyper focus on Mary and Frederick is because they have no information about Harry and Meghan and they refuse to properly scrutinise Andrew and the rest of the British Royal Family.
Ditto! The cupboards are really bare. Harry and Meghan has really effectively frozen the out; and most people aren’t buying their lies any longer about the the couple. The Fail is des.per.rate.
I hope Queen Margarethe enjoys her retirement. I know she has many interests. I always liked her.
I think Mary will make an excellent Queen Consort if she so chooses. If the rumors are true, I’d have some soul searching and negotiating on my mind if I was her.
Fred has some serious decisions to make about his personal relationships and how those relationships will shape his reign.
She recently did the costume design for the film Ehrengard. It is on Netflix in Europe. She is an artist, designer and translator besides being Monarch.
My fave fact about her: She’s a big Tolkien fan, wrote fan mail to him in the 1970s and illustrated an edition of LoT under the pseudonym of Ingahild Grathmer.
It is also on Netflix in the US and a fun film. However there is a companion documentary about the set design and costume design. It was very interesting. She is very talented.
@barb mill thanks for reminding me about the companion documentary, I’ve forgotten about it. Will have to watch, her costumes were great
I loved that she did craft videos for the public during Covid. She really is an interesting person with a ton of interests.
Really?!? Is one of them on decoupage? I’ve seen photos of her creations and I’ve been thinking about trying it out.
They don’t appear frosty at all. They have had to make a huge adjustment in their lives and appear to be serious and very aware of new expectations.
Congratulations to Fred and Mary. I believe they have been chosen as the next couple to be stalked and reported on ad nauseum because they aren’t allowed to report on the true nature of the relationship between William and Kate.
If anything, they look bored, which isn’t a good look. However, does anyone know what the Danish tabs are reporting? Daily Mail sounds like they are listening to the same sources in their heads. Are Mary and Frederick the newest victims of the RR projections?
Some of the Danish tabloids have had articles on the gossip – but I haven’t read them. They aren’t really taken seriously – they don’t blend into the legitimate press like in the UK. These are colourful weeklies like their American counterparts.
It was a formal event, so them be smiling and jokey etc would have been highly inappropriate. I don’t care about the state of their marriage tbh. Mary seems to have a much better handle on who she married than some other royal women. Also- MOST of these monarchs cheat. I don’t get why everyone is suddenly pearl-clutching about it lol. Back in the day they OPENLY cheated. Gave their mistresses whole estates and titles and had whole a$$ second families with them.
Well, after the abdication announcement, Kate Middleton started a whole new PR campaign, by letting us know that she’s just like Mary. Maybe we missed a clue: Kate was trying to tell us something about her own marriage to William.
Proud Mary, interesting thought–if not KHate, then it’s the bm that are trying to get the message across.
KHate needs to choose someone who doesn’t work and have something to show for it. She will not compare well with Mary any better than with Meghan.
Lord, Mary and Fred are the gift that keep on giving. When the BRF fails to deliver any relevant drama, who knew the Danes would step up so spectacularly? They haven’t been this timely since Hamlet.
I gotta admit, I am dying to see where this goes. I am not sure if I see Mary sticking this out for years and years. She’s a relatively young woman and she may have 20 plus years as queen consort. But then again, Fred continously looks like an unmade bed-both he and Robin Thicke have that permalook of having stumbled out of a strip club at 2am.
My point being, I’m not sure that Fred has his mother’s longevity genes. And what the fuck does he do? I always see Mary doing engagements, but old boy doesn’t seem to do shit. He might be worse than Peggy.
Either way, the Danes are starting to be messy, messy and I love it.
Haha yes I also wondered what Fred does, the focus is always on his wife, she seems to be the one doing the engagements and holding the marriage together.
I’m liking the focus on some other “royals” for a change. The Australian press has started picking holes into the story of how they met which is interesting, they have previously always stuck with the official story (accidental meeting at a bar, Mary having no clue he was a prince). I think Mary worked too hard to get where she is and will stay with him as long as he’s more discreet in future.
They do look serious here in these few photos and from what I understand it was a serious and formal event. Are things frosty too behind closed doors? Maybe, I wouldn’t be surprised. She left earlier than Frederik with a few of the kids to see her family in Australia before Christmas and was posting things about loneliness on Instagram so they could be having issues. Only time will tell if Mary decides to stick it out but given everything I’ve learned about her, I don’t think she and Frederik will get divorced.
It’s hard to get divorced when you’re King and Queen.
Do they look frosty? Sometimes. Do I find his openly walking around with a woman a month or two before his mother abdicates suspicious? Yes. It seems her waiting a year until they were less awkward it would have been more focused on her reign and less about their marriage. It probably would have been better for her son too. His face is long. They’re usually much more relaxed. Could he be somber on becoming King? Yeah. Queen Margarethe was never thought of as an involved mother. I think she’d doing what she thinks is best for the monarchy not him. Let’s see how it goes. The Queen herself and many others have less than ideal marriages she may expect him to deal with his. Could the Queen be abdicating because of her health? Of course, but I do wonder. I hope she’s retiring in decent health to spend more time in France painting and lives longer than her mother.
Mary is Australia’s biggest export.
The British media are in a rampage likening Princess Mary to Kate. Nope. Mary is way far better than Kate. I saw her interviews and she’s very interesting and intelligent in her responses. Her responses are well-thought of and insightful. Too bad UK’s got Kate who’s never given a full-length interview lest she be ridiculed. The UK press knows their princess is substandard. Sorry not sorry.