Prince George at one: style icon, globetrotter, 'toddler with the best hair'
|
Version 0 of 1. Twelve months after his arrival sparked a Twitter meltdown and rendered the panicked assault on primogeniture a little premature, Prince George mania is thriving once again as the third-in-line celebrates his first birthday on Tuesday. From a specially-minted commemorative £5 coin – yours for a mere £80 – to myriad magazine covers, via a frenzy of online baby paraphernalia advertorials, the anniversary is sure to set cash registers ringing out across a nation in celebration. Since his birth "the George effect" has been evident across the globe, and not just in sales of stripey dungarees – another pair of which feature prominently in new pictures released by Kensington Palace to mark his first birthday, taken earlier this month at the Sensational Butterflies exhibition at London's Natural History Museum. Indeed, such is George's media clout, Vanity Fair's latest cover is given over to "the media star, style icon and PR triumph" that is George Alexander Louis of Cambridge. He is the People magazine cover star, too, and tops the Tatler List at No 1 in their "People Who Really Matter" league table. That is way above David Cameron, at 25, and Lupo, the Cambridges' pet cocker spaniel, who has sadly plummeted from 50th to 297th place. Uncle Harry and Great Granny the Queen come in a respectable second and third respectively. George's top billing is unsurprising given what is now known about him, which is mainly that he likes sweet potatoes (and clearly butterflies), won't eat greens unless they are hidden, has at least five teeth, is walking and likes to steal other children's toys. Such achievements have spawned thousands of words over the last 12 months – even more than those devoted to his Auntie Pippa's posterior. He's been seen holidaying on the Caribbean island of Mustique, thanks to the paparazzi and a Hello! magazine chequebook. He's undertaken a royal tour of New Zealand and Australia – with official engagements at a Wellington playgroup, and the bilby enclosure at Sydney's Taronga Zoo. To cap off a tremendous first year, he's even overthrown republicanism down under. A recent Newspoll survey found that, following George's Australian tour in April, support for a republic dropped to 40%, its lowest for 20 years, and among 18-34-year-olds was just 17%. That is some achievement, almost overshadowing his crowning by a hair products website poll as "toddler with the best hair", trouncing Beyoncé and Jay-Z's daughter, Blue Ivy Carter, and North West, the daughter of Kayne West and Kim Kardashian. Kensington Palace is being coy about plans for the big day, said to be private. Handily, Grandma and Grandpa Middleton run a mail order children's party goods business, while uncle James dispatches birthday cake kits. So, all is set for a fun family get-together at one of the Cambridges' two homes, Kensington Palace or Norfolk's Anmer Hall. If the Cambridges take Pippa's advice – as posted on the Middleton family's Party Pieces website – it will be a modest affair. "Your one-year-old will feel most at ease with people they know well, so keep their first birthday party familiar and intimate," she cautions. Gifts, no doubt, will be plentiful; he does have two nurseries to fill with toys, after all. As with anything he is seen wearing or playing with, expect a run on sales. According to Claire Irvin, editor-in-chief of Mother & Baby magazine: "Prince George is only one, yet he's had as profound an effect on baby fashion and clothes sales as his mother." Most recently, the £39.99 red-and-white striped dungarees he wore to watch his dad play polo at Cirencester on Father's Day sold out in seconds, as did the £75 sail boat dungarees he wore in New Zealand, and a furry kangaroo backpack given to him in Sydney. Daniel Price, of My 1st Years, a personalised baby gifts website, said: "What's astonishing is that this little man has given everyone a taste of the feel-good factor, and if he's spotted wearing or doing anything then it becomes a sellout or a new trend every mum and dad wants a part of. "We've had products sell out in days after he was photographed wearing something similar. Not even Blue Ivy, North West or Harper Beckham can come close to that kind of power." The website has has done its own research on George's first year. In summary, it estimates that by 22 July, the infant prince will have drunk 2,901 litres of milk, been burped 4,092 times and worked his way through 2,735 nappies. George will also have managed to shuffle, crawl and walk more than 30 miles and spent a total of 232.2 of his 365 days, two thirds of his life, sleeping. |