In this month's "Not Your Typical Royal Event" news... The Elephant Parade must be one of the most curious charitable events I've ever heard of. Artists put their own mark on elephant sculptures, which are then put on display and are later auctioned off to benefit endangered elephants. I have so many questions about this.
Who buys these elephants? Is there a whole rash of London gardens filled with oversize pachyderm sculptures? And how did so many royals get involved?
Actually, I know the answer to that last question. Camilla's brother, sister and daughter are all involved with the Elephant Family charity, as is the Duchess of York and Lady Annabel Goldsmith (dear friend of Princess Michael of Kent). So, naturally, a whole mess of royals showed up to parade themselves for the good of the elephants; and bless them, they made sure to match the curiousness of their outfits to the curiousness of the elephants on parade. An elephant trend has run amok through the Windsor family. So very many questions:
Charles, did you pose by the shiny black elephant just so your tux wouldn't look so out of place? Better showing than the rest of the family, I suppose....
Are we channeling the elephant's natural habitat here, with the Asian-inspired getup? Usually I like
these outfits on Camilla, but I think she might have forgotten to take the wind into consideration here. This makes me nervous, as does....
This. Talk about a wardrobe malfunction waiting to happen. Eugenie, are you afraid to stand up straight, lest you reveal uncoordinated underpants? Have you decided to rely on the photographer's sense of decency to preserve your dignity? Because that is not going to work out for you. Neither are those shoes. And Beatrice, those yellow strings (ribbons?) on the front of your dress - why? This confuses me.
Of course, Eugenie is equally capable of confusing me, as at the launch party for the event back in March she saw fit to throw a random flower into her hair to cap off an otherwise biker babe ensemble. Why? Though I suppose if there was any event for which a leather princess outfit would have been appropriate it would have been the one at which this occurred.....
Presented without comment.
Princess Michael, of course, had to prove herself the most puzzling of them all:
Are those elastic pants, or just pants designed to look like they might have an elastic waist? And which case is worse? Also, we're just coming off this gem of an outfit:
Seen in Zurich, and apparently attributed to the weather there. So now the weather in London is also at fault? I can't imagine what sort of meteorological condition prompts one to dress up like the second coming of Madame Cleo, so I have to ask - are we entering a fortune teller phase of dress? (I really,
really hope we are, friends. Oh, what fun we'll have.)
Photos: Pool/Indigo/Getty Images/WPA Pool/Fiona Hanson/Daniel Demme/Wenn.com/Belga/Stuart Wilson/Dave M. Benett
