Catherine grew up in Chapel Row, a village near Newbury, Berkshire, England. She studied Art History in Scotland at the University of St Andrews, where she met the then Prince Willia
m of Wales in 2001. Their engagement was announced on 16 November 2010, and she attended many high-profile royal events before they married on 29 April 2011 at Westminster Abbey. Catherine has created a major impact upon British fashion which has been termed the “Kate Middleton effect”, and On 3 December 2012, St James’s Palace announced that the Duchess was pregnant and expecting her first child.
Catherine Elizabeth Middleton was born at Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading on 9 January 1982 and christened at St Andrew’s Bradfield, Berkshire, on 20 June 1982. She is the eldest of three children born to Carole , a former flight attendant, and Michael Middleton, who also worked as a flight attendant prior to becoming a flight dispatcher for British Airways. Her parents were married on 21 June 1980 at the Parish Church of Dorney, Buckinghamshire. In 1987, they founded and became owners of Party Pieces, a mail order company that sells party supplies and decorations. Party Pieces is a private company with an estimated worth of £30 million; Middleton has a younger sister, Pippa and a younger brother, James Middleton. The family has complained about press harassment of Pippa and Carole since Middleton’s engagement.
Middleton’s paternal ancestors were from Leeds, West Yorkshire. Her paternal great-grandmother Olive was a member of the Lupton family, who were active for generations in Leeds in commercial and municipal work.
Middleton’s maternal ancestors, the Harrisons, were working-class labourers and miners from Sunderland and County Durham.
Michael and Carole Middleton worked for British Airways in Amman, Jordan from May 1984 to September 1986. In Jordan, Middleton went to an English language nursery school before returning to their home in Berkshire. Following her return from Amman, Middleton was enrolled at St Andrew’s School near the village of Pangbourne in Berkshire, then briefly at Downe House. She attended Marlborough College, a co-educational independent boarding school in Wiltshire, and graduated from the University of St Andrews in Fife, Scotland, with an undergraduate MA in the History of Art. She supports Premier League football team Reading F.C.
In November 2006, Middleton accepted a position as an accessory buyer with the clothing chain Jigsaw. She also worked part-time until January 2011 as a catalogue photographer, webpage designer and marketing officer for her parents’ firm Party Pieces. Despite this, at one point she was nicknamed “Waity Katie” by the media for her apparent lack of work ethic and seeming lack of desire to work, in preference for awaiting a wedding proposal.
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