Despite holding the title of Prince of Wales for only a couple of years so far, Prince William has already shown that he is determined to do things his own way.
The future King has had to face some serious challenges as he settled into his new role, with his wife Princess Kate, and his father King Charles both undergoing cancer treatment in the last year.
These major personal challenges came alongside figuring out what he wanted his role as heir-in-waiting to look like, and how he wanted to approach his official duties – and the Prince of Wales has already made it clear that he is going to forge his own path in many ways.
Speaking in South Africa in November – where he had travelled for the Earthshot Prize, an award he launched to find much-needed solutions to the climate crisis – William said his approach was “royal with a small r” and indicated he wanted to do away with some of the formalities associated with the monarchy. He has also said he wants to focus on making an “impact” as opposed to attaching his name to dozens of charities and initiatives, only for his influence to be diluted.
This is a major break from King Charles and the late Queen, both of whom have held hundreds of patronages over the last few decades.
William has also maintained a family first approach to his work-life balance, ensuring that his three children Prince George, 11, Princess Charlotte, nine, and Prince Louis, six, have stayed at the top of his priority list despite his new duties.
However, despite all the ways in which he is showing he will be his own man, there is one particular aspect of his father Charles’s approach to his duties that William will likely try to “emulate” a royal expert has claimed.
Huw Thomas – a royal author and broadcaster for the BBC – explained to The Sun’s Royal Exclusive Show that William will probably mirror much of his father’s approach to holding the title of Prince of Wales, and developing strong ties with the country itself, as well as Welsh culture.
In all of British history, Charles was the person to hold the title of Prince of Wales the longest. It was first bestowed upon him by the late Queen Elizabeth in 1959 when he was just nine years old, and he held it until 2022 when he took the throne – over 64 years later.
In that time, Charles made huge investments into Welsh culture and was committed to maintaining a good relationship with the country, even learning Welsh for nine weeks at the University of Aberystwyth before his investiture in 1969, so he could give a speech in the language during the ceremony.
The expert praised Charles for his efforts as Prince of Wales and added that William couldn’t go too far wrong trying to “emulate” some aspects of Charles’s approach, saying: “I think Charles did have a really good crack at it.
“I think even his detractors would say he didn’t really put a foot wrong in Wales, in terms of any gaffes and that sort of thing. And it’s up to William to sort of emulate, at least that that pattern, if not, you follow him in all the different different bits of interest that he had.”
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