The man who gave Diana glamor and Camilla confidence

Make no mistake, it will be the dress of your life. The dress Camilla wears when she is crowned alongside King Charles in Westminster Abbey on May 6 will define her like no other outfit she has yet, or will therefore.

So perhaps it’s understandable that the news that the queen consort has chosen one of Diana’s favorite designers, Bruce Oldfield, to create her coronation gown has caused some surprise. Wearing the dress of a man so indelibly associated with her husband’s late ex-wife on such a historic day could be seen as a risky move.

I, however, feel exactly the opposite. Bruce, whom I have known for many years, is the perfect match for Camilla.

Rather than being the ideal craftsman for such an occasion in terms of style and dress skills, he is the dream man for such a high-pressure occasion. The kind of designer who puts a woman in a gown and gasps along with her, as excited as she is by the result, will be as involved as Camilla was in her coronation robes.

And forget about the possibility of it looking as bad on you as Meghan’s wedding dress, or as flattened as Diana’s Emanuel-designed wedding dress when she stepped out of her fairytale carriage. If I know Bruce, he’ll be there that day, fixing Camilla to utter perfection until the very last moment. Camilla simply couldn’t be in better hands.

As she well knows. Despite all of his past association with Diana, Bruce, 72, has been dressing Camilla, 75, with great success for a decade, and they hit it off like a house on fire. After all, choosing a designer you’ve never worked with for such an important occasion would be like using a hairdresser for the first time on your wedding day. As he himself says: ‘She’s a good egg. We get along really good.

But there is much more to Camilla’s choice of Bruce than his genius in constructing underbust corsets, ideal for middle-aged figures, or the fact that he is British, a vital consideration for an occasion of such national importance. Camilla could have easily walked away from him so as not to invite the comparison to Diana. But I feel like he shows that he no longer avoids comparisons to Diana, because that battle is finally over.

And on coronation day he will prove it. With an almost unrecognizable confidence compared to the early days of her relationship with Charles after Diana’s death, Camilla no longer needs to overanalyze her options. She can be herself.

Perhaps there’s a chance that her choice of Bruce is even a subconscious nod to the late princess, an olive branch of sorts. Surely, despite all the pain of the past, Diana’s children will appreciate her choice on the day, this recognition of her mother in some way. And really, considering that both women loved Charles so much, is it any wonder Bruce won their hearts as well?

Bruce has a lot in common with both women: wonderfully warm and with fabulous natural empathy, he has as good a sense of humor as Diana, and as Camilla certainly does.

Nowadays, it’s understandable that Bruce is tight-lipped about the Coronation. But he has spoken about his relationship with both royal women, saying: “I gave Diana her glamor and Camilla her confidence.”

After meeting Diana in 1980, when she asked him to do something for her to turn on the Christmas lights on Oxford Street, he steered her away from Sloane Ranger style and towards something much more elegant. She was, he has said, ‘the perfect client’. He once wrote to her admitting that she was her ‘number 1 fan’.

In those days, I worked alongside Bruce in Knightsbridge, in the Beauchamp Place store. Bruce’s dresses were the best. Anything But Foam The antithesis of the Emanuels, Bruce exemplified great structure and femininity. The business flourished for him. Celebrities like Joan Collins, the ultimate fashionista of the 1980s, and Faye Dunaway adored it.

Then came the 1990s and the royal divorce, after which Diana left Bruce. Her new life as her maiden meant she didn’t have as much need for her formal wear. She was a casualty in a war that was largely not her fault. ‘Oh no, I don’t need to go to Ascot anymore. She hated him anyway,’ she apparently told her.

The loss of his patronage, in favor of European designers like Versace, whom he understandably sought out in his post-divorce reinvention, was a blow.

“We were rejected,” he has said in previous interviews. “We were pissed off, I can tell you. It wasn’t good. It means that everyone looks at you as if to say, “You’re trash. We are not going to buy you more”. ‘

In fact, the recession that hit in the 1990s saw Bruce sell his flat and use the money to prop up his business. A deeper cut came for him when Diana, again, understandably, simplified his charity commitments in 1996 after her divorce.

Among the charities that lost out was Barnardo’s, of which she had been president. This was a cause close to Bruce’s heart. Born in London to a young half-Irish girl and a Jamaican boxer, he was given up for adoption shortly after he was born. His adoptive seamstress mother in County Durham taught him to sew and developed a love of fashion and clothing.

Described as ‘uncontrollable’, Bruce was placed in Barnardo’s home in Yorkshire when he was 11 years old. However, that did not stop him from passing the exams to attend Ripon Elementary School. He first trained as a teacher, but when he was in his early 20s he moved to London and was the star pupil in his year at Central Saint Martins. Today, he is still a vice president of Barnardo’s.

Speaking of the split with Diana, he once commented: “We were more angry about the Barnardo connection.” Losing his president in such a visible way upset us quite a bit.

Today, in another strange echo, Camilla is Barnardo’s patron.

Bruce, when talking about the queen consort, is clearly smitten: “She’s fabulous,” he told an interviewer several years ago. “I am very glad that people are reaching out to her. In the United States it was quite difficult, because the people were very professional. . . Someone else [Diana]. But it’s 20 years ago, you know? Please!’

It seems a testament to Bruce’s talent that he can make women of such divergent styles: Diana, a fashion icon at the end of her life; Camilla, much more traditional, looks so elegant. The willowy slenderness of the late Princess of Wales would seem easier to dress than Camilla’s 5ft 6in stature. But there are similarities. She is uniquely understated in her clothing, preferring block color rather than patterns, and suits ruffles.

No doubt Camilla and Bruce are completely on the same page as they ponder which shades suit her best. Just witness the creations that he has already created for her. The pale turquoise skinny dress with lace she made for him for a tour of Sri Lanka in 2013. That dazzling white gown at the state inauguration of parliament in 2015 and 2016. He elevates her to the kind of regal elegance the late queen knew . for. It seems certain that Camila will choose something pale for the Coronation, and she will do so carefully.

I am lucky to have only met Camilla once. Our families are friendly and I know her sister Annabel well from her. And the sisters are known to be a lot of fun. They both have a wonderful sense of style: clean, uncomplicated lines, with no fuss or unnecessary frills.

But where Bruce will stand out is the trust Camilla already has in him. Over 50, all a woman wants from a dress is confidence. And yes, some of his detractors might say that Bruce is a bit of a ‘mother of the bride,’ but there’s a certainty about him that Camilla sorely needs on this biggest day of all. She will be able to wobble in front of him and know that she is in good hands.

An interviewer asked if Camilla ever told him about Diana. The response was so lovingly and wonderfully Bruce: ‘I don’t get many clients who talk to me about their husbands’ previous wives. It just doesn’t happen. Forward! I think Camilla has become more relaxed and what’s the word? – sure. When dealing with me, she is much more accepting of what I propose to her, you know? Trust, that’s the word.