King Charles is known for patching rather than spending – not least for his old favorite coats. Now he is looking for an upholsterer for home textiles who can bring the rooms in his palace into shape.
The Royal Household ad admits the post – based in Windsor – will “overwhelm” the successful applicant. With a below-average annual salary of £25,000 a year, the job description says the new upholsterer will “help preserve a collection that will please future generations”.
Royal: King Charles is known for patching up rather than spending – not least on his old favorite coats
Having received the title of Knight Bachelor in the New Year’s Roll of Honor for services to music and charity, Sir Brian May, as he is now known, suggests it is high time to act accordingly.
“People aren’t really bowing enough and I don’t have a round table yet, but we’re working on it,” jokes the 75-year-old Queen guitarist, who is married to former EastEnders actress Anita Dobson, 73.
Sex Education’s Emma doesn’t get carried away…
Rising star actor Emma Mackey has some advice for aspiring actors who are at risk of overexploiting themselves to make a name for themselves in the acting industry.
“You have to protect yourself because you’re going to be very tempted to give in to those parts of you because you want to prove yourself and say, ‘I can do this and look at all the stuff I can do, I’ll do anything'” , the Sex Education star tells me at a screening in central London.
The Franco-British actress, 27, who played Emily Bronte in Emily, adds: “But keep some of it to yourself and keep it for the special ones.”
Mackey is one of five actors nominated for an EE Rising Star Award at this year’s Baftas, the only award the audience votes for.
Actors: Rising star Emma Mackey has some advice for aspiring actors who are at risk of overexploiting themselves to make a name for themselves in the acting industry
After telling his children that if he died they would get none of his estimated £320million fortune, Sting rubbed salt in the wound by telling two of them, who had gone into the music industry, that it wasn’t just it’s about making money.
Joe, whose band Fiction Plane supported The Police on their 2007-2009 reunion tour, and Eliot, who has released three albums, the 71-year-old describes his life advice: “I told them that music is always their own reward, and it’s not about having hits or selling concert tickets or having platinum records.
“They said, ‘Well, you’re fine, Dad.’
Last year Sting swelled his coffers even further by whipping up his back catalog in a deal reportedly worth £183million.
Shhh! Loyal friends are planning a big thing for Dame Viv
Despite her fame and lust for publicity, Queen of Punk lady Vivienne Westwood, who died in December, had a very low-key funeral at a small church in the Peak District, with only close friends and family scattered around.
But I can reveal that a grand high society farewell is now being organized, allowing supermodel Kate Moss and most of Dame Vivienne’s famous friends to mourn the designer at a memorial service in London.
So says one of Dame Vivienne’s best friends, famed photographer Ki Price, whose famous subjects include Johnny Depp.
“Was there a funeral at all?” he asks me at the opening of artist Ray Rossi’s exhibition at the Red Eight Gallery, Royal Exchange.
“I’ve always been loyal to Vivienne, so I don’t really want to talk about it. But now something is happening. I assume everyone will be there.’
Eddie Redmayne won an Olivier for his menacing role as Emcee in last year’s Cabaret revival at the Kit Kat Club in London’s West End.
And the 41-year-old Oscar winner prepared to perform the song Two Ladies by, um, removing all of his clothes.
Talent: Eddie Redmayne won an Olivier for his menacing role as Emcee in last year’s Cabaret revival at the Kit Kat Club in London’s West End
“When we were in rehearsals we tried to come up with ideas and it was good but a bit polite. There was a moment when we were encouraged to try something different and . . . basically I stripped almost naked to humiliate myself as much as possible.
“When you see that moment on the show, this song is like an orgy, with positions you never imagine people getting in and copies of Mein Kampf used for terribly inappropriate things.” Danger!
The intelligent set talks about… Daredevil Delphi’s 80mph Cresta Run
She turned heads before Christmas by dying her locks red, but now Delphi Primrose – the third of Lord Dalmeny’s brood of five with ex-wife Caroline – is a high-speed blur.
Tatler’s cover girl, who appears in the Storm Models books, has just smashed head first down the Cresta Run, the terrifying ice rink in St. Moritz that banned women in 1929 – a ban finally lifted in 2018.
“There was concern that they would damage their breasts on the sleds and cause breast cancer,” says a Cresta member, reminding me that experienced riders hurtle at over 80 mph.
Luckily Delphi, 19, seen celebrating her success (right), made it in one piece.
Performance: She turned heads before Christmas by dying her locks red, but now Delphi Primrose – the third of Lord Dalmeny’s brood of five with ex-wife Caroline – is a high-speed blur
The late television hero and voice of rugby Bill McLaren, who would have been in his 100th year, will be sorely missed today as the Six Nations kick off.
However, I can reveal that his family keeps his sporting influence alive. This week a life-size metal bull is being sold by the foundation set up in his name, and ‘Bull McLaren’ is hoping to attract several thousand to invest in nurturing new talent in his sport. Bull is up for grabs at a fundraiser in Edinburgh. Daughter Linda Lawson tells me, “We’re going to have a school tournament in his name in Dad’s hometown of Hawick.”