The Royal Family appears thinner than slimmed down this week, following the equestrian accident that confined Princess Anne to hospital.
But never underestimate ‘The Firm’.
I can reveal that he managed to secure a very appropriate newcomer for Tuesday night’s State Banquet, held in the ballroom of Buckingham Palace in honor of Emperor Naruhito and Empress Masako of Japan.
Although both Anne and the Princess of Wales were inevitably absent, a 27-year-old potter was among the 170 guests who joined the King and Queen; not an ordinary potter, but one who just last year served as an apprentice. with the ‘master of porcelain’ Yagi Akira in Japan and who, in addition, is also the grandnephew of the late Queen Elizabeth.
I am referring, of course, to Sam Chatto, the eldest of the two children born to Princess Margaret’s daughter, Lady Sarah Armstrong-Jones, after her marriage to actor-turned-entertainer Daniel Chatto.
Special guest: Sam Chatto, the eldest of two sons born to Princess Margaret’s daughter Lady Sarah Armstrong-Jones after her marriage to actor-turned-artist Daniel Chatto.
Sam pictured with his parents Daniel and Lady Sarah Chatto (right)
While his younger brother Arthur, 25, who has been blessed with family strength, is an officer in the Royal Marines, Sam has inherited the artistic DNA of his father and mother, who trained at the School of Camberwell art and exhibit regularly at the Royal Academy. Summer Exhibition.
Sam’s talents are arguably most similar to those of his uncle David, now Lord Snowdon.
After graduating in Art History at Edinburgh, Sam spent three months in the commercial art market, an experience which he said left him “completely uninspired”, prompting him to build a wood-burning kiln in his garden in Sussex and try your hand as a potter.
It has proven to be his calling, leading him to undertake an apprenticeship last year in Japan, where he learned strictly traditional Japanese techniques that were often completely opposite to those he had previously mastered at home.
Some of his porcelains are part of a current exhibition in Somerset, mounted by Hauser & Wirth, the Swiss art gallery of which Sam’s second cousin, Princess Eugenie, is associate director.
Sam considers the tea set to be “the perfect combination of form and function”, so I hope he was able to cope with it on Tuesday night.
There was no tea, just Scottish prawns, Cornish turbot and Bombe Glacé Melba, all accompanied by English sparkling wine from Coates and Seely in Hampshire, a New Zealand chardonnay and, from France, a claret and a splash of Laurent Perrier champagne.