Wills'n'Kate: the comic book

‘There is a kitschness to it’ . . . Kate and William in comic form.

^'I think you could definitely go down the pub with William and Kate," says Rich Johnston, who has spent the last three months reading every article he could find about the couple's lives, as research for a comic book that will, he says, faithfully chart their relationship.

Johnston, bearded, with unkempt red hair and slightly wonky glasses, is the cartoonist for the controversial Westminster blogger Guido Fawkes, as well as being the founder of the comics website Bleeding Cool. He knows the idea will strike some as tawdry, but he describes Kate and William: A Very Public Love Story as a modern-day romance. "There is a kitschness to it. But I love doing things that sound ridiculously kitsch, then surprising the audience with something deeper."

Due out in April, to coincide with the royal wedding, this "dramatic retelling" will appear in two issues, one focusing on the prince, the other on his bride, although there will be a third edition that brings the stories together, each running from opposing ends of the book and meeting in the middle.

It might sound surprising that a man who spends much of his time abusing politicians would pen such a reverential tome. After all, one of his recent cartoons, titled How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Trident, depicted Nick Clegg riding a nuclear bomb, Stetson in hand, declaring: "Feel the power between my legs!"

His purpose, though, is simply to "expose comics to a new audience. Comics have a lot to offer as a medium, but often they are dismissed as something juvenile." His hope is that everyone from the elderly to Heat magazine readers will pick up a copy with their weekly shop. And then there's the obvious market in the US, where royal-related memorabilia is snapped up.

Does he tackle Diana's death? "It's a monumental event in the life of William, so you see him at the funeral. You also see Kate, watching the funeral in a news report and being affected by it. Kate's biggest problem is that the media begin hounding her, which is what happened to Diana, so there's that idea of mortality and dangerousness being introduced into her life." Although Johnston uses some artistic licence to touch on the couple's sex lives, he adds: "There are no scenes where you see them 'at it'."

Two of the UK's best-known comics artists, Mike Collins and Gary Erskine, were given the task of representing the stories visually. "Rich has written a witty, detailed and clever script," says Collins, who has drawn the likes of Spider-Man and Batman. "Diana's involvement is surprising and well handled."

William Windsor: A Very Public Prince, drawn by Erskine, is reminiscent of defunct Boy's Own-ish titles like Commando and Roy of the Rovers. "Their staples tended to be playing sports at school and running around with tanks, aeroplanes or through trenches. Funnily enough, those are very much part of William's life story."

Kate Middleton: A Very Private Princess, drawn by Collins, employs fictional diary entries and echoes the sort of comic strips found in 1970s schoolgirl magazines. "Jackie was an inevitable touchstone," says Collins. "Just like a songwriter would evoke a certain musical sequence, we're able to draw – literally – on that styling to create an appropriate mood."

The US publishing house Bluewater has just announced a rival to this comic, called The Royals: Prince William and Kate Middleton, also due in April. Is Johnston worried? "It's being printed in America, written by Americans and drawn by Americans. The way the British relate to the monarchy is different. We understand their flaws – they kind of become part of us. Monarchist or republican, you get it by osmosis. There is a loving mockery."

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What The King's Speech can teach Prince William and Kate Middleton

Marrying kind ... Helena Bonham Carter and Colin Firth in The King's Speech

George VI's wartime newsreel appearances, we're told, were regularly interrupted by applause from cinema audiences – a phenomenon no more common now, at least for British filmgoers, than it was at the time. All the more peculiar, then, that The King's Speech – the box-office smash starring Colin Firth as the same monarch struggling to overcome his debilitating stutter – is getting the same reception. When I saw it at the Odeon Camden on Friday, there was a spontaneous ovation at the end. A quick straw poll of friends and a click around Google makes clear that this is happening at many screenings. So what's going on?

The most straightforward answer is that it's a very good film, telling the well-filmed, well-acted story of a sympathetic character overcoming a daunting challenge. But other films match or better this accomplishment without stirring such a visceral response. My guess is that The King's Speech taps into something more deeply, resonantly British, something that speaks to culturally ingrained notions of shared adversity and earned deference around the royal family.

The current period of economic hardship had barely begun before comparisons were being made to the spirit of the Blitz and stiff-upper-lip perseverance. The outstanding example is probably the revival of the second world war "Keep Calm and Carry On"" poster, of which much of the publicity for The King's Speech is strongly reminiscent. And cannily so: the folk memory of the king and queen staying in London throughout the war remains the benchmark of respectful popular affection for the house of Windsor.

Of course, 70 years ago there was no question that such affection was conditional on vicarious intimacy with the royals themselves. Diana and celebrity culture changed all that, and The King's Speech lets us get to know the private Bertie rather than the public George – and crucially to feel his pain, to see the emotional struggle behind the stiffest upper lip in history. Like Helen Mirren's Elizabeth, not to mention Diana's entire public life, Firth's Bertie opens up an imaginative space in which royalty is something that happens to human beings.

However successful such enterprises might be in fostering good feeling, they do not, of course, offer actual access to the royals. Applause is how the faceless crowd communicates with them. When it applauded George VI after his speech at the outbreak of war, it was confirming they had struck the right tone. When it applauded Earl Spencer's eulogy for his sister in 1997, it was telling them they hadn't. What does the applause for The King's Speech signify? Perhaps you've heard it yourself and have an idea. I wonder if it expresses an appetite for leadership – for a figurehead able to convince us that he or she is a sympathetic human being who feels our pain and will offer principled guidance in times of adversity.

Take this alongside the extraordinary popular excitement that the engagement of Prince William and Kate Middleton is already generating and you'd be excused for thinking the Windsor PR machine is looking at an open goal. It is presumably aware of the potency of the memory of the royals in times of hardship and austerity. (Is it coincidence that the Royal Collection referred to "austere times" in its announcement that it wouldabsorb the VAT rise on wedding memorabilia?) The current climate seems to have stoked affection rather than resentment towards the royals – perhaps because they offer reassuring consistency at a time of upheaval, when the government is disappointing even its own supporters and the opposition is all but invisible.

Quite an opportunity, then. Wills and Kate currently have next to no public identity and a minimal public role. We have little idea of their personalities – especially compared to that of Wills's parents at the same age. It's hardly surprising that they have no appetite to cultivate the kind of celebrity persona associated with Diana. But the response to their engagement suggests huge reservoirs of public interest in the royal family, and the response to The King's Speech suggests a readiness to root for and salute them if they are seen to be ready to do their duty as national figureheads, willing to make sacrifices and able to rally the nation. If Wills and Kate can convince enough of us they are helping to make people's lives better (through charitable work, perhaps?), the royal family might earn itself a generation of ovations.

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Royal wedding details announced

Prince William and Kate Middleton will marry in April at Westminster Abbey. 

Clarence House has revealed further details of April's royal wedding between Prince William and Kate Middleton.

It was not entirely unexpected news – the couple having already ruled out a beach party, a country hotel or a register office – that Middleton will be driven by car to Westminster Abbey along the traditional processional route of the Mall, Horse Guards Parade, Whitehall and Parliament Square.

The service, at 11am on 29 April, will be conducted by the dean of the abbey, the Very Rev John Hall. The archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, will marry the couple and the Right Rev Richard Chartres, the bishop of London and a longstanding friend of the royal family, will give the address.

The couple will return along the same route, but this time in a carriage procession.

The Queen, who has a larger pad than the Middletons, is laying on a reception for the couple's "official and private" guests. In the evening, when the VIPs have gone and granny and grandad have retired to bed, Prince Charles will host a private dinner followed by dancing for close friends and family.

The reception is being funded by the royal family with the Middletons, who are wealthy from their business in children's party accessories, chipping in. The state will bear the cost of security and the troops on parade will be drawn from detachments already on duty in London

.

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William & Kate: The Love Story

Illustration for the Guardian by Neal Fox

When Catherine Middleton tightly held the arm of William Wales, the only man she had ever truly loved, as they posed for their engagement photographs, the world was gripped by the greatest love story since Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer had announced their betrothal some 30 years earlier. So it was fitting that William had presented his commoner bride, who had worked in the mines before pulling herself up by her bootstraps to go to Marlborough College, with his mother's engagement ring. As they gazed into each others' eyes, William whispered exclusively to me, "My mother and father's marriage worked out OK, so it seemed like a good omen. And it was bloody cheap!

He had proposed to his commoner fiancee some weeks earlier, a story I had exclusively revealed in the News of the World every three months for the best part of eight years, and finally Kate, who had never put a foot wrong throughout their courtship despite being so horribly common, was no longer his princess-in-waiting.

It is impossible to overstate just how common Kate is. Only half her friends had titles or double-barrelled surnames and her parents even had to buy some of their own furniture, but nevertheless she is a shining example of what common people can achieve if they work hard. I can also exclusively reveal – having undertaken my own internal examination – that she is a girl of the highest morals and was indeed virgo intacta before her love for William was properly consummated in a barn round the back of Balmoral.

William's chinless features and receding hairline had of course made him the poster boy of his generation and, with the lusty droit de seigneur of his father, he had healthily satiated his appetites on Jecca, Arabella, Isabella and every other posh girl who had thrown herself at him. Common Kate was more reserved and their romance flourished when they shared a house at St Andrews while William was nursing a broken heart after Carly Binky-Binkerton had told him there was no way she was going to shag him, even if he was a prince. It is a tribute to Kate's many qualities and commonness that he was able to survive this tricky period.

It didn't take long for both Charles and the Queen to realise what a steadying influence Common Kate was, and after, as I exclusively revealed at the time, the Queen invited her to sit 10 seats behind her in the royal box at Ascot, marriage was an inevitability. There were tricky times ahead, though, for both these very modern youngsters, once they left the sanctuary of St Andrews. With his brilliant first-class masters degree, William had Sandhurst at his beck and call, while his common girlfriend was rushed off her feet working two hours a week for Jigsaw. Often they only had time to meet in Boujis and understandably, cracks began to show in their relationship after I exclusively revealed William was having second thoughts about going out with someone so common when he was papped for the umpteenth time falling out of a taxi with his tongue halfway down a mystery blonde's throat.

Common Kate's loyalty never wavered, although, as Bunny Anstruther-Tyrrell-deCustem exclusively told me at the time, she was "pretty hacked off about the situation". William's behaviour, completely understandable in such an obviously heterosexual member of the royal family, merely stiffened her resolve as she resigned her demanding job at Jigsaw to concentrate on becoming his bride. I can also exclusively reveal that Charles, an often misunderstood man who cares deeply for his children, intervened. "Stop being such a silly arse," he told his son. "You can still shag around when you're married. So just get on with it and put that fool Jobson out of his misery."

His efforts were not in vain. Last November William persuaded Archie Duckworth-Chad to pay for him and Kate to go on holiday to Kenya and there he offered to make his commoner a princess. The country wishes them well, though I can exclusively reveal that if the marriage does go pear-shaped, I'll be the first to write a book about their divorce.

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Royal engagement coin offers unflattering view of Kate Middleton

Commemorative coin issued by the Royal Mint to mark the royal engagement. 

Kate Middleton has experienced the first harsh reality of her looming royal status – having to endure the unflattering likeness.

As the Royal Mint unveiled its official commemorative £5 coin to mark Prince William's engagement, his bride-to-be may well have wondered who would be walking up the aisleof Westminster Abbey in April.

Rather than a fresh, slim, chisel-nosed Middleton, it seems a heavier, older interloper with the flattened features of a pugilist would be stepping into her bridal shoes.

For while William's profile bears a slight likeness, his fiancee is nigh-on unrecognisable.

The inspiration for the design came, apparently, from photographs of the couple at a sporting event, and had been approved by the Queen and William.

It's long been the Queen's fate to suffer the worst excesses of artistic licence with dignity. Witness her silence at Lucian Freud's robust depiction of her with – to paraphrase one critic – a chin sporting a six-o'clock shadow and a neck like a rugby prop forward.

Prince Philip, predictably, was less diplomatic over the efforts of portrait painter Stuart Pearson Wright, showing him bare-chested, with a bluebottle on one shoulder and seedlings growing out of his index finger. "Gadzooks!" he exclaimed before demanding, "why have you given me a great schonk?"

Justifying the portrayal of Middleton, a Royal Mint spokesman insisted the design had been through a "rigorous approval process". The discouraging news for Middleton is it's just the first of many.

Meanwhile, in her Christmas Day speech tomorrow, the Queen extols the role of sports in building communities, developing social skills and "providing a different perspective on life".

"In the parks of towns and cities and on village greens up and down the country, countless thousands of people every week give up their time to participate in sport and exercise of all sorts, or simply encourage others to do so," she says in an excerpt released by Buckingham Palace.

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William, Kate and the strange law of promogeniture

Reforming the Act of Succession may mean that if the first child of Prince William and Kate Middleton is a daughter, she will automatically become queen. 

There's no respect for age any more. Last week the chairman of the home affairs select committee, Keith Vaz, introduced a Commons motion to tackle the venerable 300-year-old Act of Succession: that's the one that says that if William and Kate have a daughter first, then a son, the throne will pass to the boy in preference to the girl. The usual policy, as those familiar with their British history will know, is that anyone ought to be better at ruling our great nation than a girl, even if they're mad, bedridden, dangerously stupid, or five years old.

But instead those mischievous MPs want to replace it under some sort of anti-discrimination clause that insists that a woman should have equal rights to a man. Luckily, the prime minister has recognised that this is a matter of the deepest seriousness that – unlike, say, dismantling the university system, or handing the NHS over to GPs – requires years to fully debate. It is, said his spokesman, "a complex and difficult matter that requires careful and thoughtful consideration", which is true, not least because you could easily mistake primogeniture for one of those face creams they sell at Boots.

Of course, it's nice that we no longer threaten to behead people like Vaz for high treason/blasphemy for effectively challenging the headship and thus the divinity of the crown.

But what's perhaps most notable about this latest attempt to drag themonarchy into the 21st century is that it really doesn't even make it past the 18th. It's the constitutional equivalent of making a computer out of cardboard.

Vaz may have tackled the sexism, but what about the ageism? Why should the eldest be the one to automatically get the job? If we really want a monarchy that's contemporarily relevant, surely it's about time all candidates – anyone in line to the throne – were sent off to Sir Alan for an Apprentice Special. That would be a real royal knockout.

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Kate and William return to St Andrews

Prince William and Kate Middleton, accompanied by Sir Menzies Campbell (right), during a visit to St Andrews University. 

Prince William and his fiancee, Kate Middleton, have returned to the Scottish university where they first met to launch its 600th anniversary celebrations.

The event at the University of St Andrews was the couple's first official engagement in Scotland and followed a visit on Thursday to Anglesey, north Wales.

Their romance blossomed when they were students there between 2001 and 2005. To mark their wedding the university announced it would establish a £70,000 scholarship open to applicants of all nationalities.

A flypast by three aircraft from RAF Leuchars and a choir performance helped mark the institution's 600th anniversary. Prince William and Middleton met staff and students before unveiling a plaque. They also viewed the Papal Bull, a historic document issued by Pope Benedict XIII to found the university in the 15th century.

Prince William addressed 600 students and staff as patron of the university's 600th anniversary appeal.

Later, the couple spent half an hour speaking to members of the public.

Abigail Pearson, a 22-year-old student from Staffordshire said she had offered her best wishes to Middleton for her wedding. "She [Kate] replied 'Thank you so much, it does feel a little weird coming back here but it is very nice'," she said.

Alice Dow, 75, who was born in St Andrews, stood for several hours in cold, blustery conditions to see the royal visitors. She said the town was proud to have a link with them.

In a speech, Louise Richardson, principal and vice-chancellor of St Andrews, said the university wished them "a life of love, health and happiness together".

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Royal wedding website: like reading Hello! on an iPad

The official royal wedding website: 'If your computer screen has been thirsting for blog updates on the wedding china, it will thirst no more.'

"Splitting the difference" is a phrase that in American politics has unfortunate connotations of awkward compromises and dissatisfaction.

But across the ocean, a new generation of royals see it as the way forward, possibly because it is unlikely one learns too much about the mistakes of President Lyndon Johnson on the Eton syllabus.

Throughout their engagement, Prince William and Catherine-the-artist-formerly-known-as-Kate have attempted to, if not quite split the difference, then at least have it halfway both ways: the formal and the informal portrait photos by Mario Testino; the designer dress at the announcement and the high street dress in the photos; long-term relationship but girlfriend still remaining as silent as a chattel.

Now we come to the next stage on the happy couple's path to the bliss of kinda modern marriage, the launch of their website, which is a little reading Hello! magazine on an iPad: the vessel is modern but the content is defiantly retro. If your computer screen has been thirsting for blog updates on the official royal wedding china, it will thirst no more. Amazingly, more than 3000 have already expressed a Facebook "Like" for the opportunity to look at more photos of Kate and Wills standing next to various ships, although it is not clear how many of those likes came from outside the gates of Clarence House.

And speaking of, should one wish to read more about "Background", you will be directed to the frankly adorable Twitter page for Clarence House which – and there's no way of putting this respectfully – sounds like the voice of Clarence House's former resident, the Queen Mother, speaking from beyond the grave: "Signs of Spring are starting to show in Green Park. Happy St David's Day!" a tweet trills. Truly, we are on the cutting edge here.

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Kate Middleton launches a boat, then walks about

Kate Middleton was introduced to the staples of lifelong royal employment when she launched her first boat and undertook her first walkabout.

Aides may have chosen a deliberately low-key venue for her initiation: an RNLI station on Anglesey, north Wales, where she and Prince William live in a secluded rented farmhouse.

But the 2,000-strong crowd gathered in a chill wind at Trearddur Bay for the couple's first official joint engagement since their wedding was announced, it demonstrated what she can expect as a full-time member of "The Firm".

She smiled; they cheered. She sang the Welsh national anthem in Welsh; they shouted their approval. She poured champagne on the bow of the new lifeboat Hereford Endeavour; they cheered.

She shook hands, accepted posies, cards, drawings, framed photographs and numerous congratulations on her forthcoming wedding; they shivered but continued to clamour for more.

"She's fallen into it well," said David Frost, on holiday from Bolton with his wife and their six-year-old grandson, Cameron.

All in all, royal advisers will undoubtedly agree, it was a triumph.

In planning Middleton's induction, aides have been anxious not to repeat past mistakes. Diana's introduction to Wales was an arduous three-day official tour on the royal train after her honeymoon, an ordeal which, though she smiled throughout publicly, reduced her to tears in private and pleas to her husband she could not face another crowd.

Charles's arrival for a nine-week stint at the University of Wales, before his 1969 investiture as prince of Wales at Caernarvon, was greeted with Welsh and Scottish nationalists clamouring for "home rule" and waving placards in Welsh reading "Go Home Charlie".

But Middleton has been living part of each week on the island since William's stationing at nearby RAF Valley as a search and rescue pilot.

"She is a local now. We've heard she was in Argos the other day," said Megan Dixon, 10, from the Trearddur Bay village, who with her mother Liz, and friend Nathan Morris, 13, waited for more than four hours for the couple. "Is he the ginger prince?" inquired Nathan.

"Oh, no. I know the one," he added. "He's often in the burger bar at Valley."

After bidding the crowd "prynhawn da" – good afternoon – William introduced his fiancee in a brief speech as "someone who is not only about to join the family, but is also about to become an "Anglesonian". This elicited more cheers, but bemusement for some members of the crowd unfamiliar with the term. "No such word, absolutely not," insisted Dafydd Thomas, in the crowd.

"Never heard of it," said Kalleen Gulliford, another islander. "Mind you, lovely they both sang the anthem in Welsh. Just lovely. I said to her 'Croeso i Sir Fon' [Welcome to Anglesey]. But I don't think she understood. She just smiled."

It seemed most of the 2,000-strong village had turned out, with the event also attracting veteran royal watchers from all over Britain. There was Colin Edwards, 70, a familiar face during Diana's engagements, who gave Middleton a framed photograph of the late princess with a young William and Harry taken in 1989, with the boys wearing green short trousers. "Oh my goodness. Look at his knees. Fantastic," said Middleton as Edwards, from Denbighshire, stooped to kiss her hand.

Winning over Wales has long been a major issue for royalty ever since Edward I invested his son as the first British monarchy's Prince of Wales in 1301.

Eager to cement the relationship, Middleton, who may on Charles's accession become Princess of Wales, wore a Welch Fusiliers badge in the designer beret she chose for the occasion.

After watching the launch of the Atlantic 85 lifeboat, supping tea and tucking into bara brith fruitcake supplied by the local Ladies' Guild, she stopped to show it to the crowd.

Welsh nationalists may refer to Middleton as a "future Queen of England", but the nearest the vast media pack got to any dissent was when local resident Wyn Roberts admitted he did not know the royal couple were coming, and, what's more he didn't much care. It's the start of long journey for Middleton.

William and his fiancee next return to St Andrews University where they met, and where the prince will launch the University's 600th anniversary appeal. It was 10 years ago that William arrived as an awkward freshman, awed by the large media presence. "I'm only going to university. It's not like I'm getting married, though that is what it feels like sometimes," he said at the time.

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Royal wedding: William and Kate invite 1,900 of their closest friends

Royal wedding: Prince William and Kate Middleton will tie the knot on 29 April at Westminster Abbey. 

So, you know how it is: there are people you have to invite, like the relatives you've always disliked, but whose fragile feelings you don't want to trample over. There are those others you feel you ought to have along, such as the folks from Australia you've never met.

Should you invite the people at No 10? And how about the couple you bonded with on holiday? Extrapolate those problems to fill Westminster Abbey, which seats nearly 2,000, and you have the guest list for theroyal wedding on 29 April.

Chances are that if a buff envelope containing the stiff, embossed card from the Queen hasn't dropped through your letterbox by now it never will, since they were all posted out in the middle of last week.

"It won't be a celebrity-filled wedding," a royal spokesman said. "In general terms, the vast bulk of those invited are friends and family from all walks of life. People who have shared their lives, as children, at university. Just like any other wedding."

The invitations are triple-tiered. About 1,300 guests are invited to Westminster Abbey, swelled by a further 600 who will attend the Queen's lunchtime reception at Buckingham Palace. A fortunate 300 will rub shoulders at dinner at Buckingham Palace, hosted by Prince Charles after Her Majesty has gone to bed.

St James's Palace is not confirming exactly who will be coming, but it is unlikely many will turn down the invitation due to other commitments. Weekend speculation has centred on possible invitations for soccer royalty in the shape of David and Victoria Beckham, TV presenter Ben Fogle and Tom Bradby, ITN's former royal correspondent and now political editor.

Sources close to Ed Miliband have confirmed that the Labour leader has been invited to the abbey. David Cameron goes one step further by being included on the reception list. George Osborne and Nick Clegg will also be at the abbey as part of the six-strong delegation of cabinet ministers..

Among foreign heads of state who have been invited to hold the date free are the king of Bahrain – an invitation criticised by the anti-monarchy group Republic, given the current turmoil in his country – the Crown Prince of Oman, the sultans of Oman and Brunei, kings of Saudi Arabia, Thailand and Tonga, the Emperor of Japan and the royal families of Europe, including the perpetual hanger-on King Constantine of Greece, who has not ruled anywhere for the last nearly 40 years.

More interesting are those apparently not on the list. They include Sarah Ferguson, former wife of William's uncle Prince Andrew, who has been frozen out by the royals, though the couple's daughters Beatrice and Eugenie have been invited.

The Obamas have not made the cut, though as William is only second in line to the throne they don't customarily merit an invitation, apparently. They will however be making a state visit and staying at the palace three weeks later. Middleton's uncle Gary Goldsmith, who was exposed by the News of the World boasting his royal connections while apparently cutting up a piece of cocaine, has received an invitation, but only to the abbey, not the palace.

Meanwhile, the brides' parents, Michael and Carole Middleton, whose family business, Party Pieces, sells mail order accessories, have been accused of cashing-in on the royal wedding by planning to sell "British Street Party" bunting and decorations, including corgi-themed cake toppers and red, white and blue bowler hats.

The royal website directs inquiries concerning Kate Middleton to palace press officers, but a royal spokesman said, with just a hint of asperity: "It's not for us to comment. We do not represent Party Pieces. They are a private company."

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Fireworks and feathers as Daniella Helayel's Issa label keeps it curvy

Designer Daniella Issa Helayel with her models after the show of her collection Issa, as part of London fashion week. 

Issa designer Daniella Helayel has been in the international fashion spotlight ever since Kate Middleton chose to wear one of her draped dresses for the announcement of her engagement to Prince William in November. Yesterday's show – called Celebration – was the first new work shown by the designer since last year's big publicity boost, and Helayel didn't disappoint.

The Brazilian-born designer says her clothes are for real women who are, like herself, "full of curves". Voluptuous fans will be pleased with the variations on the classic flattering Issa dresses lined up for autumn/winter 2011, though this season's version was shorter than normal.

Issa also used a diverse range of models for the show, from curvy Dutch model Doutzen Kroes to 46-year-old Yasmin Le Bon. Helayel's friend Andrea Dellal closed the show in a floor-length, plunge-neck red jersey dress. Dellal was a famous model in the 1960s and is the mother of model Alice Dellal and fashion designer Charlotte Dellal.

Helayel is known for her vibrant prints and this season's most eye-catching included a firework design incorporating elements of her best-known prints. The other main motif was the pheasant feather, seen on skirts, kaftans and in pillbox hats.

More Issa designs can be seen in the forthcoming film about Wallis Simpson, W.E., the latest directorial effort by Madonna. The singer asked Helayel to create some dresses for the film as she's such a fan of the Issa label.

It was easy to imagine Simpson – or indeed Kate Middleton – in some of this season's eveningwear, such as a deep V-necked beaded chiffon gown, a jersey-silk halterneck dress and a floor-length raspberry coloured gown with a side split.

Issa clothes are not only being seen on normal-sized bottoms and hips but are also relatively affordable, with dresses starting at around £300. Her work may not push the boundaries of fashion, but it's pleasing to see clothes for real women getting such attention.

London fashion week continues with shows by Matthew Williamson and Vivienne Westwood Red Label.

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Prince William and Kate Middleton to visit Canada

Prince William and Kate Middleton will visit Quebec, Ottawa, Alberta and the Arctic northwest. 

The first official overseas tour by Prince William and Kate Middletonfollowing their marriage will be to Canada at the end of June, Clarence House has announced.

As the Queen is Canada's head of state, the prince is also a prince of the country. The couple will spend a week crossing from Quebec and Ottawa to Alberta and the Arctic northwest territories.

The itinerary is likely to include the usual set pieces of official banquets, welcoming ceremonies involving guards of honour, and walkabouts.

It is thought the couple will take part in Canada Day celebrations in Ottawa on 1 July.

A spokesman for St James's Palace said: "Prince William was pleased to accept an invitation on his and Miss Middleton's behalf from the government of Canada.

"Prince William was keen to be able to visit Canada for himself as an adult, and to be able to show his wife a country that is close to his family's heart."

William visited the Commonwealth country in 1998 aged 15, touring Vancouver with his father the Prince of Wales and brother Prince Harry.

Meanwhile, it is thought that the couple have chosen photographer Hugo Burnand to take their official photographs.

Burnand, who previous sitters have included Michael Jackson, Lucian Freud and Lady Thatcher, took the photographs at Prince Charles's wedding to Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall, in 2005.

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Prince William picks Prince Harry as best man at royal wedding

Prince Harry will have the job of arranging his brother Prince William's stag do before the royal wedding. 

In possibly the least unexpected announcement in advance of April'sroyal wedding, Clarence House has announced that Prince Harry is to be the best man at his older brother Prince William's marriage service and Kate Middleton has asked her younger sister Philippa - known to her family as Pippa - to be her maid of honour.

The couple have also asked young relatives, assorted godchildren and friends' offspring to be bridesmaids and page boys for the ceremony at Westminster Abbey on 29 April.

They are: Lady Louise Windsor, the seven-year-old daughter of Prince Edward and the Countess of Wessex; the Hon Margarita Armstrong-Jones, eight, daughter of Viscount and Viscountess Linley; Grace van Cutsem, three-year-old daughter of Hugh and Rose van Cutsem, friends of the couple; Eliza Lopes, also three, the Duchess of Cornwall's granddaughter; Billy Lowther-Pinkerton, the 10-year-old son of Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton, the former SAS officer who is William and Harry's private secretary; and eight-year-old Tom Pettifer, son of William's former nanny, Tiggy Legge-Bourke. Grace van Cutsem and Tom Pettifer are godchildren of Prince William.

Bridegrooms in royal weddings traditionally chose a "supporter" instead of a best man. The Prince of Wales chose his brother Prince Andrew to be his supporter when he married Diana at St Paul's Cathedral in 1981. Prince William has opted to call his brother his "best man", rather than a supporter.

Prince Harry had welcomed the couple's engagement. In a statement following the announcement, Harry said: "I am delighted that my brother has popped the question! It means I get a sister, which I have always wanted." Harry, who is training to fly Apache attack helicopters, will have the role of planning William's stag do.

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