Princess Kate's Awkward Reunion With Ex-Boyfriend Turns Heads at Royal Wedding
The Princess came face-to-face with her ex-boyfriend Rupert Finch over the weekend at the wedding of Peter Phillips and Harriet Sperling.
While Princess Kate and Prince William are widely seen as global relationship goals, the Princess of Wales had a life before becoming a royal. The latter had a few notable romances before marrying Prince William. In fact, she just had a run-in with one of them when the Princess came face-to-face with her ex-boyfriend Rupert Finch over the weekend at the wedding of Peter Phillips and Harriet Sperling.
The Prince and Princess of Wales attended the nuptials together in support of Phillips, William's cousin, while Finch was accompanied by his wife, Lady Natasha Rufus Isaacs. While a run-in with an ex at a wedding usually sounds like a recipe for social awkwardness, this reunion was likely anything but. Finch has remained part of the wider royal social circle over the years, making this high-profile reunion less of a surprise and more of a standard affair.
As it turns out, this was not exactly the first time the former couple had found themselves at the same celebration. Finch and Isaacs were both invited to Kate and William's wedding in 2011, and Kate later attended their wedding in 2013. In other words, the two couples have crossed paths before and appear to have remained on perfectly friendly terms over the years. Still, the reunion has inevitably got people talking about Kate and Finch's brief romance before she met William.
Kate and Finch briefly dated in 2001 while they were both students at the University of St. Andrews. The relationship happened before William entered the picture and long before she became one of the most famous women in the world. In fact, Finch was reportedly still in the picture when Kate made her now-iconic 2002 university fashion show appearance—walking the runway in the sheer dress that famously caught Prince William's eye. Though her romance with Finch was brief, it remains one of the most talked-about chapters of her pre-royal life.
According to Tatler, Finch was reportedly Kate's "casual boyfriend" at the time and was described as a tall, dark, and handsome aspiring lawyer in his fourth year at St. Andrews. Moreover, the romance was even recreated in the sixth and final season of The Crown, with Oli Green taking on the role of Finch opposite Meg Bellamy's portrayal of the Princess of Wales.
Anyone looking for scandalous details about their university days will be disappointed, though, as the former couple has kept their past strictly private. Finch himself firmly closed the book on the subject years ago, stating, "It's not something I'll ever talk about. It's between Kate and me and was a long time ago."
