Swift’s selfie with Prince William, Prince George and Princess Charlotte over the summer was a highlight in an otherwise “brutal” year
Kate Middleton and Prince William have chosen their favorite moments of 2024 — and Taylor Swift made the cut!
After a difficult year that saw both the Princess of Wales and King Charles receive cancer diagnoses, William and Kate, both 42, were able to find bright spots in a year that William called “brutal” during a visit to Cape Town, South Africa in November in support of his Earthshot Prize Awards.
A Dec. 31 post from the couple on Instagram was captioned, “2024” with a green checkmark emoji beside it, along with the words, “Happy New Year! Wishing you all a wonderful 2025.” A star emoji rounded out the post.
Chosen for the cover photos of the 2024 highlight reel were two snaps from Kate’s Sept. 9 video announcing she had completed chemotherapy — a photo of William, Kate and their kids Prince George, 11, Princess Charlotte, 9, and Prince Louis, 6, their arms wrapped around one another, and a photo of William and Kate laughing, hands interlocked, in the Norfolk countryside where the video was filmed in August by Will Warr. A long clip from the video was chosen as the next item in the carousel, showing its poignancy and importance to the couple.
Among other royal engagements undertaken this year, also chosen for the carousel are photos and a video from Prince William’s Earthshot Prize Awards in Cape Town in November; the Prince and Princess of Wales visiting Southport, England on Oct. 10 after a deadly knife attack that took place at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class there over the summer; many scenes from Kate’s Together at Christmas carol concert, held at Westminster Abbey on Dec. 6; Trooping the Colour on June 15, which marked Kate’s first public appearance of 2024 up to that point after announcing her cancer diagnosis in March; William attending the re-opening of the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris on Dec. 7; and William, George and Charlotte meeting Swift when her Eras Tour stopped at Wembley Stadium in London over the summer. The photo chosen is one of Swift taking a selfie with the three members of the Wales family backstage at the arena, overlaid over a photo of Swift in full performance mode.
Poignantly, the carousel closed with a photo of Kate hugging Liz Hatton, a photographer who William and Kate invited to take photos of an investiture at Windsor Castle on Oct. 2. Hatton, only 17, died on Nov. 27 after being diagnosed with desmoplastic small round cell tumor, a rare and aggressive form of cancer, in January. Layered on top of Kate and Hatton is a photo of William, Kate, Hatton and her family taken the same day.
The roundup closed a year that Prince William called “dreadful” in a vulnerable Nov. 7 interview: “It’s probably been the hardest year in my life,” he said.
“But I’m so proud of my wife, I’m proud of my father, for handling the things that they have done. But from a personal family point of view, it’s been, yeah, it’s been brutal,” he added.
After publicly announcing her diagnosis on March 22, the aforementioned Sept. 9 video confirmed that the Princess of Wales had finished chemotherapy treatment. King Charles’ cancer treatment — which he announced publicly on Feb. 5 — will continue into the new year, but on Dec. 20 was confirmed to be headed in a “very positive direction.”
