Princess Kate’s gesture left presenter “in disbelief”

Roman Kemp still remembers his meeting with Princess Kate.

It happened during filming for a mental-health project tied to the Princess of Wales’ Shaping Us campaign.

Roman Kemp told The Sun that his first encounter with Princess Kate came via a Zoom call while he was working on a mental-health initiative.

Expecting to speak with palace staff, he was stunned to see it was “just me and her.” When Kate suggested filming at his home, he steered her toward his parents’ place instead.

His mother rushed to prepare, and soon the Princess of Wales was sitting with Kemp’s parents over tea and biscuits.

Shoes off

What caught him most off guard, however, was Kate’s instinctive politeness when she arrived.

Seeing that everyone else had removed their shoes, she immediately offered to take hers off.

“I remember when she arrived, she could see everyone else had taken their shoes off, so she offered to take hers off,” Kemp recalled. “It was surreal. Somehow, you never expect to see a member of the royal family in their socks!”

Kemp said his parents gifted her bottles of apple juice pressed in their garden.

Weeks later, they received a handwritten letter thanking them and sharing that Prince George had loved it, along with a request for more.

“She wrote a lovely letter… saying that Prince George loved the juice,” Kemp said. His own thank-you note from Kate is now framed on his wall.

Shared advocacy

Kemp has become a supporter of the Princess’ early-childhood campaign through The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood.

He said Kate first contacted him after seeing his BBC documentary Roman Kemp: Our Silent Emergency, which explored young men’s mental health following the suicide of his friend and producer Joe Lyons.

Sources: The Sun, The Times