Royal Marilyn Moments, a weighty matter

To weight or not to weight, that's the question. After the Duchess of Cambridge came close to a Marilyn Moment when a breeze caught her Emilia Wickstead dress on day two of Royal Visit India, there are questions again about whether Kate needs to gain some weights.

It's happened again - Kate has had another Marilyn Moment, this time during her tour of India

It's been a well known royal fact for decades that senior royal ladies sew weights into the hems of their skirts and dresses to make sure the bottoms stay where they are meant to be and no one gets to see the royal underwear. But the Duchess of Cambridge appears not to be following that royal tradition.

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On this occasion, the weather did its worst just as Kate was about to take part in one of the most solemn moments of the royal tour. She and William were getting ready to lay their wreath at India Gate when her mid length skirt made a break for the skies. It was all smoothed over rather quickly but in this world of 100 photos a second, it was caught forever and shared immediately.

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And of course it has happened to Kate several times before. Her last big royal tour, to Australia and New Zealand, featured a duchess juggling a baby and trying to keep her red skirt in check as she left the plane on arrival in Wellington.

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There was another just a few days later during the trip to Australia but the most famous is perhaps the one that happened on an airfield in Calgary during her tour of Canada in 2011 when a primrose yellow dress battled in vain against the strong currents swirling around the place.

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  So is it a Kate problem or a modern problem? The Duchess of Cambridge certainly isn't the only royal fashion icon to have been hit by Marilyn moments. Letizia of Spain, while still Princess of Asturias, encountered her own fair share including one in Barcelona on the same day that Kate was keeping that red skirt under control in Wellington.  

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It was nowhere near the issue it had been several years earlier when she chose a pleated white chiffon skirt for an engagement and found it making an escape towards her blue jacket. She fought it back into place but not before there had been a photo she'd rather not have had taken.  Even Queen Maxima has been caught out - she had to quickly battle an errant hemline while in Normandy for an event commemorating the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landings in 2014.

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And at Princess Charlotte's christening, the Duchess of Cornwall found the light Norfolk breezes of July aren't really compatible with chiffon on her way out of the service.

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It might be that modern royal dressing doesn't suit weights but then modern royal life needs them - when royals are on show more than ever before and catching an image takes a matter of moments then even the lightest gust mixed with the lightest skirt can cause problems. Kate will be hoping the rest of her dresses stay put as Royal Tour India continues otherwise she risks making Marilyn Moments all her very own.