Princess of Wales steps out on world stage — and sends signals for Royal Family — in solo sojourn to Italy

In the years leading up to the Princess of cambria’s see to italia this yesteryear week, much attention focused on the fact that it would be her first official overseas trip in more than three years — and the first such outing since her diagnosis and treatment for cancer.

But the two-day solo sojourn to a historic city in the northern region of the country also sent signals both for Catherine herself and her role within the Royal Family on the world stage.

Catherine spent much of Wednesday and Thursday in Reggio Emilia, focusing particularly on its internationally recognized approach to education for young children.

“I love that you put children and childhood at the heart of the community, and I’m really fascinated to learn more about it,” she said as she arrived at one of the city’s preschools on Wednesday. 

In the focus and destination of the trip, there was a sense it was in many ways an attempt to reinforce and advance the interest she has had for several years in early childhood development.

“That is very clearly what she is setting out as her long-term main focus,” Judith Rowbotham, a social and cultural scholar and visiting research professor at the University of Plymouth in southwestern England, said in an interview.

There was a time some decades ago, certainly in the U.K., Rowbotham said, when a child’s early years — from birth to age five or so — weren’t seen as mattering that much. Not so anymore, she suggested.

“The arguments now are that in fact childhood experiences shape one irretrievably, and that therefore it is extremely important to make that a priority, because if you want a healthy citizenry, that health — both physical and mental — is developed from childhood,” said Rowbotham.

“That is the thinking that the princess clearly has in mind.”

Education — whether it is early childhood or university — is “very much a hot potato politically” right now, Rowbotham said, and as a royal, there’s no way Catherine can get actively involved in the debate.

“What she can do is encourage a broad understanding … a sharing of information about early childhood development, which is clearly a personal passion.”

That sharing of information has been catching the eye of Audrey Symes, a longtime volunteer and advocate for early childhood development in New York City.

Symes said in an interview that she has been interested in Catherine’s work “because there really is no other public figure that is consistently championing this cause.”

That’s important, she said, because it’s a critical, long-term, global issue and one which Catherine is uniquely positioned to pursue, unlike politicians who have voting constituents and term limits. She also, Symes noted, garners an “immense” amount of media interest.

“As a very non-intimidating, warm figure, I think she's … the perfect person to do this, because she's not pedagogical, she's not a professor,” Symes said. 

“If she can take what she learns here and figure out how to disseminate it for a consumer audience, I think that would be an incredible … achievement.”

Catherine was diagnosed with an undisclosed form of cancer in 2024 and underwent preventative chemotherapy treatment. In January 2025, she said she was in remission. Since then, she has been making a gradual and measured return to public duties, but has not ventured out of the U.K. On official royal business until now.

She had been making more appearances in the U.K., but what is more interesting about the trip to Italy, said Chandrika Kaul, a professor of modern history at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, is the fact that she was doing it on her own.

Kaul noted that Catherine’s husband, Prince William, was also on his own at a high-profile event in recent days — the 100th birthday celebration for nature documentarian David Attenborough.

“Both of these instances coming so soon after each other is probably trying to signal the fact that the Royal Family is looking at them in terms of individuals as opposed to always as a couple and … giving them that platform,” Kaul said.

In Catherine’s case, Kaul sees an additional component.

“I see this very much as giving Catherine her own international profile, but in a measured way.”

The Italian host city and its traditional, genteel surroundings were likely to provide a warm welcome to the visiting royal, Kaul suggested.

“She's unlikely to receive, for example, hecklers demanding what the Royal Family is doing about the former prince Andrew.”

And it was indeed a warm welcome, with crowds cheering as they gathered for a glimpse of her.

The visit seemed to make its mark on her, too.

"I have had such a deeply moving and unforgettable time here," she said in a statement, according to a BBC report. "Thank you to the people of Reggio Emilia for welcoming me into a culture of care with such warmth and generosity." 

Catherine’s visit to Italy comes two weeks after her father-in-law, King Charles, made a high-profile overseas visit to the United States.

“Any trip at the moment involving the Royal Family internationally is bound to be seen in the light of the rather unfortunate international exposure given by other members of the Royal Family,” Kaul said.

The Royal Family knows Catherine’s popularity would “ensure wide coverage internationally,” Kaul said, and it might hope that her trip would serve as public and positive international messaging for the House of Windsor itself.

“It's almost like another step in terms of her coming into her own as a serious member of the Royal Family who is capable of and is entrusted with carrying the baton of British hopes and expectations on an international level and that she is trusted to fly solo.”

As far as royal agendas go, King Charles’s has seemed rather jam-packed of late — and in that there may be signals of how he sees his reign.

After his visit to the U.S. With Queen Camilla two weeks ago, Charles jetted off on his own to Bermuda. One day during that visit — his first as monarch to a British Overseas Territory — he carried out eight engagements. 

Back in the U.K., he’s read the King’s Speech for the state opening of Parliament, taken a look at cutting-edge cancer research at a London hospital and attended a star-studded celebration for the 50th anniversary of his youth charity. 

On Thursday, in a show of support for the Jewish community, he met victims of last month’s stabbings in the Golders Green neighbourhood of London.

“He is a man on a mission,” Rowbotham said.

“He is aware that regardless of his health or anything like that, quite simply his age means that his reign is likely to be short.”

Rowbotham said Charles is determined that his reign “will be more than just a footnote.”

The American visit, coming as it did amid the strain in relations between the U.S. And U.K., has been seen in the U.K. as a success for Charles, particularly because of the speech he delivered to the U.S. Congress.

“This in a way helped to cement Charles as King in his own right on a very high-profile international stage,” Kaul said.

Rowbotham said it’s plain that Queen Camilla “is doing her best” to make sure her 77-year-old husband regulates his daily activities.

“But he is enthusiastically taking up the opportunity to undertake domestic engagements, to undertake overseas engagements, in a way that gives him the opportunities to demonstrate his personal style of rule.”

Another royal baby is on the way, with word the other day that Princess Eugenie and her husband, Jack Brooksbank, are expecting their third child this summer.

“His Majesty the King has been informed and is delighted with the news,” said the official announcement from Buckingham Palace.

Eugenie also took to Instagram to share the news, saying “Baby Brooksbank due in 2026!” 

The child, who will be a younger sibling to brothers August, 5, and Ernest, 2, will be 15th in the line of succession, and the fifth grandchild for Eugenie’s parents, former prince Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and Sarah Ferguson.

Scandal and controversy have swirled around Andrew in connection with his friendship with the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. He has denied wrongdoing. 

Some media reports noted that the official announcement of the pending birth did not reference the families of Eugenie and Brooksbank, as happened in previous similar announcements.

“The announcement was made because it would have been something of a constitutional crisis to have broken the habit of announcing the [upcoming] arrival of a new child to somebody … in the top 20 to 30 in the line of succession,” Rowbotham said, calling it a “very low key” recognition of the news that came without further personal comment from other royals.

The fact that the announcement came from the palace is significant, Kaul said.

“It sends out the signals that family matters and the children … or the grandchildren are not going to pay the price for the sins” of others.

A royal who has made regular visits to Ottawa was back in the city of her birth the other day.

Princess Margriet of the Netherlands and her husband, Pieter van Vollenhoven, were on hand to highlight the friendship between Canada and her home country. 

They also opened the Canadian Tulip Festival, which marks the liberation of the Netherlands during the Second World War and Margriet's 1943 birth in an Ottawa hospital while her family sought refuge here during the Nazi occupation of their country. 

A federal proclamation declared the maternity ward of Ottawa Civic Hospital extraterritorial, ensuring the new princess would only be a Dutch — and not also a Canadian — citizen. 

Princess Margriet comes to Ottawa

After the family returned to the Netherlands, Margriet's mother, Queen Juliana, and the Dutch government sent 100,000 tulip bulbs to Canada as thanks for both the refuge offered to them and the role of Canadians in the country's liberation in 1945. 

Margriet has visited Ottawa several times for the Tulip Festival.

"It is a rare privilege to celebrate a century of life. But it is rarer still when that person has transformed the way we see the only home that we have — Planet Earth."

— Prince William, in a speech to mark nature documentarian David Attenborough’s 100th birthday.

In a birthday card to Attenborough, King Charles said: “Over those decades you have revealed the beauty and wonders of nature to audiences around the world in new and marvellous ways. In so doing, you have shared my determination to highlight the urgent need to protect and preserve this precious planet of ours — and all life on Earth — for future generations.”

Charles also featured in a birthday tribute to the centenarian, taking part in a film that included a cast of wild animals helping relay the congratulatory card, the Guardian reported.

The Prince of Wales is one of the biggest taxpayers in the United Kingdom, a new report has revealed. Prince William pays up to £7 million ($13 million Cdn) in income tax a year, according to the Sunday Times. [The Standard]

A man has pleaded not guilty to using threatening or abusive behaviour toward Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. [ITV]

The U.K. Charity Commission has opened a case into Princess Eugenie's charity, Anti-Slavery Collective, over concerns relating to its spending. [BBC]

Once again, Prince Harry has shown he's no longer prepared to stay silent. [ITV]

New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s suggestion that King Charles should return the Koh-i-noor diamond to India has reopened old wounds. [The Guardian]

Queen Camilla bonded with the Princess of Wales’s dog-loving brother at a reception honouring life-saving pooches. [Daily Mail]

The Prince and Princess of Wales shared a new photo of their daughter Charlotte walking in a field of daisies as they marked her 11th birthday. [ITV]

William and Catherine hosted a royal garden party on behalf of King Charles at Buckingham Palace. There will be six such gatherings in 2026, with more than 30,000 people typically invited to such events each year. [Daily Mail]

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