Christmas might be seen as the most wonderful time of the year by many, but for Princess Diana, it was a season fraught with tension and sadness—especially after her 1992 separation from Prince Charles. Even before their split, Diana hated going to Sandringham for the holiday season, and once she left Charles, the late princess didn't feel comfortable celebrating with the "frosty" Royal Family.
She attended the royal celebrations in Norfolk in 1993 and 1994, but didn't arrive until Christmas Eve and left before lunch. A friend told the Daily Mail's Richard Kay that Diana "went home alone to Kensington Palace and spent the rest of the day there" before leaving the country to visit friends.
The source said that Diana "felt she was given a 'frosty' reception by the other royals" and chose not to attend in 1995 or 1996—especially after her controversial BBC Panorama interview aired.
In an interview with French magazine Gala (via the Mirror), former royal chef Darren McGrady shared how Princess Diana spent her final Christmas before her August 1997 death. "It was always pretty sad when you worked with the Princess on Christmas Eve," he shared. "William and Harry were going to Sandringham and Princess Diana was there, alone."
"She insisted that the staff spend time with their families for Christmas and that we leave the food in the refrigerator," McGrady said. The chef added that he cooked meals for Diana that she could reheat while the staff enjoyed Christmas at home.
Although she could have gone to Sandringham, a source told Kay that "Diana didn't feel welcome at all. She could see how her being there just made everyone so tense and uneasy. She'd joined them for the boys' sake, but it wasn't working."
In any case, Diana had never been a fan of the Royal Family's "silly" Christmas traditions, such as buying gag gifts. "It was highly fraught," she told biographer Andrew Morton in his book Diana: Her True Story—In Her Own Words.
She described being at Sandringham as "terrifying and so disappointing. No boisterous behaviour, lots of tension, silly behaviour, silly jokes that outsiders would find odd, but insiders understood. I sure was [an outsider]."
In 2024, Diana's former butler, Paul Burrell, told Marie Claire that prior to 1995, the late princess would dread going to Norfolk for the holidays. "It’s like a pressure cooker, Sandringham at Christmas, of people and emotion," Burrell said. "Some can stand it, some can’t. Diana couldn’t stand it."
"Unfortunately, she had very sad Christmases," he added. "It’s not a day she really relished or looked forward to because she didn’t have anyone with her to enjoy that day with."
