All About the Dress

(Originally posted 4/28/2011 New York Press Club Blog)

Poor Kate. She's not just trying to keep the groom from seeing the dress before the wedding, but the entire world!

The night before the Royal Wedding, Kate Middleton is staying at the Goring Hotel in London. The UK Press Association reports a canopy has been put up over the front of the hotel to make sure no one sees her dress before she arrives at Westminster Abbey Friday.
As you can see here, people and press are trying to get as close as they can to the hotel, despite barricades and street closures.

My interest in this part of the Royal Wedding stems back to my early days as a reporter (when quite honestly I made a screaming fool of myself.)
In 1997 I was an early morning anchor/producer at USA Radio Network News in Dallas. For what seemed like months, we were running this story promoting Princess Diana's dress collection touring US museums. I was a fairly new journalism graduate full of ideals of what should be news and frankly I was sick of hearing about Diana's dresses. I would rant why that story wouldn't be in my newscasts.

As I walked into the news room to start my early morning shift on August 31st 1997, I asked out loud, "what's our lead story?"
I thought the answer, simply "Princess Diana," was a joke, so I started my rant again of how she wouldn't be in my newscasts that day. I saw terror on my colleagues faces and then quietly began my shift that spanned into the announcement she had died.

Ever since the engagement was announced, I've seen Kate's outfits compared to Diana's. Even when I walked into work with a new white coat, someone said, "that's like Kate's! Everyone wants a white coat!"
How had I missed that? After a google, whew. Mine didn't have black buttons.

However, Kate is now a leader. Which also makes her a fashion icon. If those magazines are selling to the masses- and they're buying- it shows respect for the new royal. People are looking for leadership and why should someone like me dismiss clothes as part of the big picture.

Outside the chaos of central London, here is a residential street that I'm told could echo much of the country. On the eve of the wedding, a quaint display of national pride and respect.