The Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh recently celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary. But it wasn’t an easy adjustment for Sophie, who previously revealed her struggle at joining the royal family
It’s been more than 25 years since the Duchess of Edinburgh officially joined the royal family. A former PR professional, she became a fully fledged member of the Firm when she married Prince Edward in June 1999 – but it wasn’t without its issues.
Sophie is now a respected and treasured member of The Firm, who found herself at the very heart of the late Queen’s inner circle. Furthermore, she has a close relationship with Prince William and Princess Kate and is considered a ‘secret weapon’ when it comes to the future of the monarchy. But by her own admission, she felt ‘frustrated’ in the early days of her marriage to Edward.
Sophie came from a middle-class family; her mother was a secretary and her father a sales director for a tyre company. Sophie, meanwhile, was a successful PR, who worked for Capital Radio before launching her own public relations agency, RJH Public Relations, in 1996, which she ran with her business partner Murray Harkin for five years.
Speaking about her transition from ‘career girl’ to a full working royal, Sophie previously admitted: “Certainly it took me a while to find my feet. The frustration was I had to reduce my expectations of what I could actually do. I couldn’t turn up at a charity and go, ‘Right, I think you should be doing this’, because that’s what I was used to doing in my working life.
“I had to take a really big step back and go, OK, they want you to be the icing on the cake, the person to come in to thank their volunteers and funders, not necessarily to tell them how to run their communications plan.”
Despite having to suppress her natural tendency to offer business advice, Sophie has emerged as a vital member of The Firm. As a mother to Lady Louise Windsor, 21, and James, Viscount Severn, 17, she balances her parenting responsibilities with official duties and charity work – a load which has only increased in the years since Prince Andrew, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle stepped back from royal life.
Royal commentator Ingrid Seward previously praised the Duchess for her effectiveness as a royal, stating: “With Sophie, it’s not all about her. She was one of the first ‘outsiders’ who came into the royal family and realised it’s about all of ‘them’ working together as a team. She really gets that and doesn’t want praise heaped on her.”
Edward and Sophie reportedly first met in the late 1980s while he was dating one of her friends. A few years later, in 1993, the pair crossed paths while Sophie was at a promotion shoot for the Prince Edward Summer Challenge.
The pair started dating shortly afterwards but it would be another five years before the prince popped the question. He got down on one knee while on holiday in the Bahamas, in December 1998, presenting Sophie with a two-carat oval diamond flanked by two heart-shaped gemstones set in 18-carat white gold.
The couple’s successful marriage was a source of personal joy for the Queen; Edward is the only one of her four children to have not divorced. Just last year the Duke and Duchess celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary.