The inner circle William keeps out of the spotlight
One of the few things widely known about the private life of Prince William is that he is a lifelong supporter of Aston Villa. As such, a football match is one of the few places you’ll find him in the company of a good friend from his Eton years or his time at university. His team won their first major trophy in 30 years in Istanbul this week, where the Prince of Wales was photographed cheering, crying and throwing his arms around his friends in the box at the Besiktas Park stadium.
“It was a quirky thing to see,” says royal commentator Richard Fitzwilliams. If there was ever a place that the heir to the throne is able to let loose, this would be it – he was even snapped at the afterparty in a photo shared on Instagram and captioned “going off the rails” – but Fitzwilliams cannot overstate how unusual it is to see William in public in the company of his closest friends. “The absolutely essential part of this is the need for strictest confidentiality and privacy,” he explains: William seems to prefer it that his friends appear in the news “as little as possible” and it is no wonder that they rarely speak to the press about their ties to the Royal family.
William celebrates Aston Villa’s win in Istanbul with Ben Dawes (left) and Jake van Cutsem (right) - Mark Enfield/IPS/Shutterstock
How on earth does a royal maintain a healthy circle of friends, in that case? The heir to the throne can’t simply pop out for a quick one after work with a mate. “They don’t drop in on each other, because it might not be convenient – they make appointments,” says Dickie Arbiter, who was press secretary to the late Queen. “They don’t live in the same proximity, and because they’re scattered, they meet occasionally,” Arbiter says. Royal socialising happens under a strict code of confidence. The members of the Royal family “maintain friendships, but in a very different way from everyone else”.
They may never speak out on their friendships with Prince William or their meetings with other members of the family, but who exactly are the Prince’s closest friends?
Thomas van Straubenzee
The pair met at Ludgrove preparatory school, Berkshire, in the 1980s - Max Mumby/Indigo
No royal has a “best friend”, publicly speaking: “They tend to hold friendships fairly equally,” says Arbiter. But Thomas van Straubenzee, seen at the match in Istanbul looking every bit as cheerful as William, might be thought of as the closest it gets. He and William met at Ludgrove preparatory school in Berkshire, in the 1980s. In his autobiography Spare, Prince Harry, who was – formally speaking – William’s best man at his marriage to Catherine Middleton, described him as one of the two actually filling that role. Along with James Meade, van Straubenzee gave the best man’s speech at their wedding reception, the younger royal claims.
The van Straubenzees are, more generally, a sort of second family to both princes. Thomas van Straubenzee and his brother Charlie were ushers at Prince Harry’s wedding to Meghan in 2018, and Harry was Charlie’s best man at his wedding to Daisy Jenks the same year. These familial relationships are typical of royal social life, Arbiter explains, in the same way that Queen Elizabeth maintained friendships largely “with her cousins, and friends of cousins”. The best way to ensure privacy, it seems, is to befriend those whose own parents have already won the royal seal of trust.
James Meade
Meade and the Prince met at school at Eton College in 2000 - Max Mumby/Indigo
Meade is another in William’s circle whose connections to the Royal family go back far before his birth. His father, Richard Meade, “was one of the leading [equestrians] in the country,” Arbiter says, and “there was [once] a lot of talk that he and Princess Anne were having an affair”.
Prince William met the younger Meade at Eton in 2000. These days he and his wife live near Anmer Hall, which is William and Catherine’s county home in Norfolk, and, like van Straubenzee, Meade is godfather to Princess Charlotte. He is one of those friends whose connections to William “really go so far back, now that he is 43”, Fitzwilliams says, and he’s “part of the Turnip Toff set, so to speak”, a collection of aristocrats who are understood to be close friends of the Princess of Wales.
Oliver Baker
Baker lived in a houseshare with the now Prince and Princess of Wales in their university years at St Andrews - Max Mumby/Indigo
Oliver Baker is a friend of William and Catherine’s from St Andrews, their alma mater. Baker lived in a houseshare with the now Prince and Princess of Wales in their university years. The three of them were at the core of a social group that called themselves the “Sallies”, named after the St Salvator’s student halls where they met. He was primarily William’s friend rather than Catherine’s, Fitzwilliams says, and he is also “a grandson maternally of Sir Michael Bonallack, once the chief executive of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club at St Andrews”.
Baker and his wife, Melissa, are often spotted at royal events and family gatherings, and are known to sit with the Royal family at Ascot and other racing events. The Royal couple attended the Bakers’ wedding in 2010. “He’s sometimes referred to as ‘zipper-lips Baker’,” Fitzwilliams says, earning his position in the Royal couple’s life with his discretion.
Baker has remained close with the family despite his comparatively modest corporate station as a strategic sourcing manager, becoming godfather to Prince George in 2013, as part of William’s efforts to ensure his children were able to be in touch with friends from the “normal” parts of their lives rather than only royal-adjacent individuals.
Edward van Cutsem
Van Cutsem’s father, Hugh, is the King’s best friend from his time at the University of Cambridge - Max Mumby/Indigo
Edward van Cutsem is another of William’s friends whose own family is closely interlinked with the King. Van’s father, Hugh van Cutsem Sr, is the King’s best friend from his time at the University of Cambridge. Van Cutsem is Charles’ godson, and was a pageboy at his marriage to Princess Diana in 1981; in 2004, when he married Tamara Grosvenor, he had William as an usher. So important are the van Cutsems to the royals that this lavish wedding was attended by the late Queen.
It’s no wonder that they are so close, given that van Cutsem, now a banker, grew up on the Sandringham estate in Norfolk and so would have had ample time to play with William when they were children, and get to know the heir to the throne before his public duties as a working royal would obscure his personality.
Van Cutsem was snapped smiling at the match in Istanbul as William cheered, with his son Jake’s arm around his shoulders and his own arm pulling in van Straubenzee for a hug. Van Cutsem and the Prince clearly share a love of football: he accompanied William to watch Aston Villa play in Birmingham in January last year.
Ben Dawes
Dawes and William – often described as ‘old friends’ – cheer at Besiktas Park, Istanbul, last weekend - Martin Rickett
Ben Dawes is close enough to William that he’s sometimes referred to in print as “Dawesey”. It was Dawes that William turned to to cheer at the match. He is an entrepreneur, having founded a wine business with his wife, Pip. Dawes and William are often described as “old friends”, though exactly where they met is not publicly known.
This reflects that, despite their high-profile friendships, many friends of William’s are too discreet as to ever build any fame of their own – and there are probably many more friends of his, from his time at Sandhurst or the East Anglian Ambulance Service, who fly under the radar even more.
Hugh Grosvenor
The King is Grosvenor’s godfather, and Grosvenor is in turn godfather to Prince George - Max Mumby/Indigo
It is no surprise that a key friend of William’s is Hugh Grosvenor, the seventh Duke of Westminster and one of Britain’s wealthiest men. The King is Grosvenor’s godfather, and Grosvenor is in turn godfather to Prince George, while William is godfather to Grosvenor’s daughter, Cosima. William was an usher at Grosvenor’s elaborate wedding in 2024, despite already having taken on the title of Prince of Wales by that time.
Whether this is truly a close friendship, or one that’s a matter of station and family connections, is hard to discern. “In this respect William is a master at keeping us guessing when it comes to the details,” says Fitzwilliams.
Guy Pelly
Pelly met William while fox hunting in 2001, and even organised his stag do at Hartland Abbey in Devon - Dave Benett
Even a Prince needs a stag do before his big day, and it was Guy Pelly who came in to organise the royal romp: a private weekend-long affair with 20 guests at Hartland Abbey in Devon, which is understood to have featured clay pigeon shooting, surfing, and drinking games. Pelly met William while fox hunting in 2001. “He’s a part of the St Andrews set,” Fitzwilliams explains, “and he comes across as being a sort of colourful, lively character”.
Curiously, though Pelly has been known to be a nightclub owner in recent years, he has remained as tight-lipped about his friendships with both William and Harry as any of the young royals. He is now godfather to Prince Louis. “There’s no doubt that he’s been a close fellow for years and years now,” Fitzwilliams says.
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