The journey towards national treasure status tends to be accompanied by a fast track to the palace, as Victoria and David Beckham, who rose up the ranks as cultural bellwethers in the ’90s and have since been awarded OBEs for their services to fashion and football, respectively, can attest. While meeting Queen Elizabeth II at royal gala performances was once a novelty for the girl band of the moment to tell their parents about, ever closer ties with The Firm soon saw Victoria deployed to South Africa with Prince Charles, for example, to help boost media attention around state visits. Invitations to the most significant royal weddings followed, as Posh and Becks brought a dash of glamour to traditional celebrations at Westminster Abbey (Kate and Wills circa 2011), and Windsor Castle (Harry and Meghan some seven years later). While pictures of third and fourth generation royals in ill-fitting fascinators are prime paparazzi fodder to some, nothing quite beats David and Victoria smizing at the nation while backdropped by beefeaters.
Throughout her time hobnobbing with heads of state, one thing has remained constant in Victoria’s royal-adjacent image: her tailoring. Even back in the ’90s, it was as if VB knew that one day she would look back on these photos and never regret a classic suit – even one rendered in Tippex white, or chocolate-brown satin. Yes, there were the LBDs, which she accessorised with razor-sharp bobs and girl-power peace signs, but that was basically her compulsory uniform when zig-a-zig-ah-ing her way from Top of the Pops to the palace gates. And, in comparison to her bandmates in Kappa trackies and sequined showgirl bodysuits, Posh escaped lightly. There’s nothing really to regret about a plain black spaghetti-strapped mini, is there?
By the early Noughties, when David received his OBE, Victoria was beginning to plot her graduation from pop diva to designer in the making. She knew how to work the royal set, attending her husband’s investiture ceremony in a fantastical piece of headwear that could have been a Stephen Jones confection, but came rendered in sensible black to avoid totally outshining the man of the moment – or, indeed, any of the hosts. When the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s nuptials rolled around, she swapped noir for navy, which, she’ll have learnt from her time on outdoor fashion sets, looks softer in the glare of the cameras. Black can be entirely unforgiving in Britain’s inclement weather.
Upon receiving her own OBE in 2011, three years after the launch of her eponymous brand at New York Fashion Week, Beckham, by now a fully fledged businesswoman, had done away with the awkward headwear that tradition seems to dictate, and leaned into the idea of an artfully undone messy bun. The platforms (once a Spice Girl, always a Spice Girl), too, had been traded for vertiginous, point-toe stilettos that lent her louche draped dresses added polish, while subtly skirting palace protocol. I mean, how else was she supposed to shake Prince William’s hand when she famously can’t concentrate in flats?
Victoria’s learnings from years inside these hallowed halls came to fruition this week at a Buckingham Palace reception for the Emir of Qatar. Wearing a form-fitting liquid silk satin gown of her own design that had Balenciaga-like proportions (think Isabelle Huppert on the red carpet and you’re basically there), Beckham commanded her brief spell in the spotlight with the poise of a public figure who has been doing this for decades and the nous of a now-acclaimed creative director who knows what works for her. That slimline silhouette and sheeny fabrication were certainly more daring than we have seen from her at royal engagements in the past, but with fresh skin and scraped-back hair, it skewed businessy rather than bold.
One might have assumed Victoria’s royal transformation to be more dramatic (this is the person whose lavish country pile was nicknamed Beckingham Palace, as my colleague Daniel Rodgers recently reminded us), but Beckham has always understood that less is always more on occasions that are about playing the supporting, rather than the starring role. In terms of nailing the brief, Victoria Beckham has never stepped an Alaïa-clad foot out of line. In fact, she has politely used each invitation to discreetly shine a spotlight on her own personal brand – one that was made in Britain and has now gone global thanks, in part, to the opportunities she’s had to show it off.
