Queen Elizabeth had seen a lot by 2003 but was apparently quite puzzled by a so-called “vodka luge”—an elephant-shaped ice sculpture—at grandson Prince William’s 21st birthday party, party planner Johnny Roxburgh recalled. (Some of us just had shots at our favorite college bar for our 21st; when you’re heir to the throne, apparently you get a vodka luge.)
William celebrated his milestone birthday at Windsor Castle with an “out of Africa”-themed bash 20 years ago, and, per The Daily Mail, Her late Majesty (who would have been 77 at the time) saw the luge as someone was pouring vodka into the elephant’s head, prompting her to ask what it was.
“I remember when it was William’s 21st, [it] was a jungle theme,” Roxburgh said on Channel 5’s The Royal Borough: Kensington and Chelsea. “And we have an enormous vodka luge, which was made in the shape of an elephant’s head. And she looked at me and said, ‘What is that?’”
And, in words that had to be surreal to say to the late Queen, Roxburgh replied “And I said, ‘Ma’am, it’s a vodka luge,’” he said. “I could have said it was a tin of Brasso, because she just looked at me confused and said, ‘Hmmm…’”
Roxburgh previously told Tatler that William was “wonderful to work with” and “charming beyond belief” as they planned the fancy dress-themed bash. “We created an African jungle at Windsor Castle with full-size elephants made from palm husk, table centers that would shame a Lion King headdress, a giant ice vodka luge in the shape of an elephant’s head,” he told Tatler in 2018. “I realized then that our future king is a very cool young man.”
For the party, the Shakarimba band from Botswana was flown in to provide entertainment for the 300 guests, which included the then Camilla Parker-Bowles (she would marry Prince Charles two years later, in 2005), actor Rowan Atkinson, and late socialite Tara Palmer-Tomkinson. In 2003, William was a student at the University of St. Andrews, where he met his future wife, Kate Middleton; it’s unclear if she was in attendance at the party, though the two would have reportedly been dating by that time.
One can imagine, by the way, there was not anything resembling a vodka luge at the then Princess Elizabeth’s own 21st birthday fete in 1947.
