They were both normal young women who met and fell in love with Princes and found themselves living extraordinary – and very public – new lives.
Now, as Crown Princess Mary prepares to become Denmark’s new Queen, HELLO! reveals the close bond she shares with our own Princess of Wales. Royal experts tell how Australian-born Mary, who is a decade older than Kate and celebrates the 20th anniversary this year of her wedding to Crown Prince Frederik, has been an inspiration for the younger royal as they support their husbands and carve out meaningful roles for themselves on the world stage.
The two women, who met most recently when Mary welcomed Kate to Denmark on an official visit in 2022, have plenty in common. Aside from their physical similarities, both Mary, 51, and Kate, who celebrates her 42nd birthday this week, are strong, capable women from normal middle-class families, who met their husbands in everyday circumstances. They have won the hearts of the public by throwing themselves into royal duties and charity work and, as well as being loyal wives, are devoted, hands-on mothers who put their families first. And both are pictures of regal elegance, having impressively stepped into the role of future Queen.
“Mary truly is the power behind the throne and will be for decades to come – there’s no doubt about that,” Danish royal author Trine Villemann tells HELLO!
“Frederik is a lovely guy and he’s very popular, but Mary is a much better communicator and public speaker. She has great skill and enormous talent, and people in Denmark are calling her ‘King Mary’. Her approval ratings are higher than those of the rest of the royals, too,” Trine adds.
“I think Kate has learnt from Mary and looked to her for inspiration and advice, and I think Mary admires Kate and sees her as a kindred spirit. They come from similar positions in life and they’ve had to walk some of the same path to be with the man they love and get to where they are today.
“Perhaps Mary sees herself as a mentor because Kate is younger and still has small children. One of the first things Mary did after she got married was set up her own Mary Foundation, and many of the things you see Kate doing today, Mary was doing ten to 15 years ago, like her work with children and addressing issues such as bullying and loneliness,” says Trine, whose best-selling book 1015 Copenhagen K explores the dynamics of the Danish royal family.
HELLO!'s royal editor Emily Nash, who joined the two women in February 2022 at a centre in Copenhagen for women and children fleeing domestic abuse, says: “There is a lot for Kate and Mary to bond over: motherhood, coming from outside the royal family, life in the spotlight and their shared interest in sport and mental health.
“They’re both tall, elegant and well versed in media attention, and they clearly had lots in common and chatted warmly to one another. Mary was impressive, slipping effortlessly between Danish and English, and she seemed comfortable with the media.
“Like Kate, she is clearly a natural with young children, and both instinctively crouched down to chat to youngsters who were offering them posies outside. And, like Kate, Mary clearly knows her subject matter well.”
The Princess of Wales’s parents Michael and Carole Middleton were airline workers before launching a party supplies business, and Mary’s background is also distinctly down to earth.
The youngest of four children born in Hobart, Tasmania, to maths professor John Donaldson and university secretary Henrietta (who died in 1997), law graduate Mary was working as an estate agent in Sydney when a chance encounter in the Slip Inn pub – where Prince Frederik was enjoying a night out with his brother Prince Joachim, their cousin Nikolaos of Greece and Princess Märtha Louise of Norway during the 2000 Olympic Games – changed her life.
Mary, who described herself as “a T-shirt and shorts girl, known to go barefoot”, later recalled: “The first time we met, we shook hands, and I didn’t know he was the Crown Prince of Denmark. An hour or so later, someone came up to me and said: ‘Do you know who these people are?’”
As a long-distance romance blossomed, Mary turned to deportment coach Teresa Page to help prepare for her future before the couple married in Copenhagen Cathedral in May 2004.
“She has to present herself in public, she’s photographed, she meets people, she walks into rooms, greets people and builds rapport,” Teresa later said. “All of those skills require supreme confidence and can be learnt to be done in a really confident way.”
Meanwhile, Kate and Prince William met as students at the University of St Andrews in Scotland, falling in love and going on to marry at Westminster Abbey in April 2011.
Trine says: “In many ways, Kate had an easier ride. Mary went to the other side of the world and had to learn a new language and adapt to a lifestyle that was completely different. But she has managed to build a life for herself and, with enormous skill, learnt what it entails to be a royal.”
Both Kate and Mary, who love sport and have enviable athletic physiques, have become international style icons who look equally chic in day dresses, power suits or glittering ball gowns, prompting fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld to observe: “Kate is like a younger sister to Mary.”
They enjoy mixing high-end with high street fashion, too. Although Mary favours Danish brands such as Ole Yde and Cecilie Bahnsen, as well as Italian label Prada and handbags from Chanel and Hermès, she is also a fan of Zara, just like Kate, who has worn affordable pieces from H&M as well as clothes by her favourite designer, Alexander McQueen.
Meanwhile, just as Kate regularly takes Prince George, ten, Princess Charlotte, eight, and five-year-old Prince Louis to school, Mary is a hands-on mother to Prince Christian, 18, Princess Isabella, 16, and twins Prince Vincent and Princess Josephine, who turned 13 on Monday.
“Between them, Mary and Frederik always sat down with the children for breakfast and read them stories and put them to bed, and Mary has always done the school runs and gone to the cake sales, very much like Kate,” Trine says. “Family comes first.”
Perhaps the key to both women’s success is the way they have looked to past Queens for inspiration. Like Elizabeth II, Kate is a consummate diplomat with a fierce sense of duty, while Trine believes that Mary models herself on Frederik’s late grandmother Queen Ingrid, the wife of Frederik IX and the brains behind a change in Danish law that allowed Queen Margrethe to become monarch, rather than her younger brother.
“I think Mary has built her royal life on Ingrid’s approach, and Frederik and Mary’s reign will be in the down-to-earth spirit of his grandparents,” she says. “As we say in Denmark: ‘Long live King Mary!’”