The Princess of Wales once went shoeless for a visit to a celebrity couple’s home in a respectful moment their son hasn’t forgotten.
Whether it's a gorgeous full-length dress for a Buckingham Palace reception or a vibrant tailored suit for a daytime engagement, the Princess of Wales is known for her impeccable sense of style. So many of her outfits feature pieces we’d love to have in our summer capsule wardrobe right now and her accessories are a key part of her looks. Slingbacks, court shoes and trainers are Kate’s go-tos but she once ditched her shoes altogether for a visit to Spandau Ballet guitarist Martin Kemp and Pepsi and Shirlie singer Shirlie Kemp’s country home.
They live in Hertfordshire and their son, presenter Roman Kemp, previously teamed up with the future Queen. This led to a special visit to the Kemps’ house in February 2023 as Kate and Roman decided to create a short film focusing on mental health as part of her Shaping Us campaign.
Coming round to discuss the project, Kate arrived at Martin and Shirlie’s home and, according to Roman, she promptly took her shoes off.
"The weirdest thing is, she took her shoes off at the door. You never really see a princess in her socks," Roman explained to The Times in a recent interview, expressing how unusual he found it.
He’d also touched on this before in a chat last year where he went on to describe her choice as "respectful" and added that it "really stuck in [his] head" because the royals are always seen in shoes in public. As gestures go, Kate going shoeless was very considerate, ensuring that no dirt from her footwear was brought inside.
It’s possible that the Princess always removes her shoes when she goes into someone’s home and perhaps this is also the case for her and her family at Adelaide Cottage.
For Roman, the whole experience of having the Princess of Wales in his parents’ home was "surreal" and he’d previously met her in a very different setting. He was reportedly asked to DJ for an "after-party to a garden party" and was briefly joined by Prince Harry on the decks "at one point".
"The only thing he said was, ‘Make sure you’ve not got the swearing edits of the rap songs’ and I was like yeah, don’t worry, you’re good’," Roman claimed.
The Princess of Wales might have met him then but she reached out personally and called him after his acclaimed Roman Kemp: Our Silent Emergency documentary aired. This explored the mental health and suicide crisis affecting young men and Roman went on to speak with the Princess over Zoom before she visited his parents’ home.
Alongside their deeply poignant work together Kate and Roman seem to have got on well and she and Shirlie have reportedly kept in touch too for a very different reason. Speaking to Express.co.uk, Roman revealed that his mum had given the future Queen some of their homemade apple juice - and it’s apparently gone down a storm with Prince George.
"My mum gave [Kate] a crate of this apple juice that they made and she obviously took it home," he said. "Because the next time I saw her she was like, 'Oh my God! Please can you say thank you to your mum and we need some more of that apple juice because George is obsessed with it. He keeps saying, 'Mum, I want the apple juice’."
