Even though they never got the chance to meet, Kate Middleton reportedly has a lot in common with her late mother-in-law, Princess Diana.
Former royal butler Grant Harrold, who is busy promoting his upcoming book The Royal Butler: My Remarkable Life of Royal Service, recently revealed his personal impressions of Kate, who he met a number of times during his seven-year tenure as a butler for members of the royal family, primarily working for King Charles.
Even though Kate was still in her early twenties at the time, Harrold says it was clear from the start that she was future Queen material.
“That girl was a Queen in waiting in every aspect," he told The Mirror. "She is the perfect Queen material and you can so obviously see that. Everything about her—the way she carried herself, the way she spoke, the way she interacted with people, her kindness, her beauty—she was, if I can say, the modern day Princess Diana.”
Former royal butler Grant Harrold called Kate Middleton "the modern day Princess Diana.”
Harrold's comparisons between the current and former Princesses of Wales didn't stop there, however. He went on cite some more specific similarities between Kate and Diana, who he describes as behaving similarly even in private moments.
“Diana used to do things at Sandringham to make the staff laugh by poking her head out the window and pulling faces, and Kate was doing the same kind of thing," he explained. "She is everything you can imagine, she is a beautiful and intelligent woman.”
In his book, Harrold also touches on Kate's close relationship with her brother-in-law, Prince Harry, which the former butler witnessed firsthand during his time working for the royal family.
“He used to go out with Kate. William would be away, and Kate and Harry would be off doing stuff together," Harrold writes in his book, according to an excerpt published by The Telegraph on Monday, Aug. 18, in which he explains that the pair were known to “go shopping” and “go to pubs” together.
“I think when people say, ‘Oh he was left out,’ he really wasn’t. But also, he was with Chelsy," Harrold writes, referring to Harry's ex-girlfriend, Chelsy Davy, who he dated off and on from 2004 through 2011. "Chelsy was always around. And Chelsy and Kate got on really well.”