Unpacking the Royal Family’s Wild, Whirlwind Year – E! Online

It isn’t a coincidence that Prince William picked this year—which he has called the hardest in his life—to grow a beard.

While it was undeniably a strong move aesthetically, the 42-year-old getting high marks (except from 9-year-old daughter Princess Charlotte) for his rugged new look, beards are known to symbolize maturity, status and formidability.

All of which is expected of the future king whether he’s ready or not.

While the Prince of Wales has known grief—and the royal family is no stranger to scandal, tragedy, schisms and other palace-rattling events—the last 12 months have been a lot for the descendants of Queen Elizabeth II, whose mostly hale 70 years on the throne set what quickly proved to be an inimitable precedent.

With both King Charles III, 76, and his daughter-in-law Kate Middleton, 42, undergoing cancer treatment in 2024, never in recent memory has the literal health of the institution seemed so in peril. (Even the most robust royal in the land, 74-year-old Princess Anne, was briefly hospitalized with a head injury that her doctors deemed consistent with an impact from a horse.)

“Trying to get through everything else and keep everything on track has been really difficult,” William told reporters during his visit to Cape Town, South Africa, to award the fourth annual Earthshot Prize in November. “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 brutal.”