Lady Louise Windsor Joins Royal Family for Sunday Service at Balmoral in Rare Public Appearance

Lady Louise Windsor, 22, joined King Charles and Queen Camilla for a Sunday morning church service at Crathie Kirk near the Balmoral estate, making one of her infrequent public appearances alongside the wider royal family.

The family arrived at the Aberdeenshire church in a fleet of cars on Sunday, 23 August. The first car carried the monarch; the second held the Prince and Princess of Wales and their three children — Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis. Troops from the Balaklava Company, 5th Battalion Royal Regiment of Scotland provided a guard of honour for the party Hello! Magazine.

Lady Louise, the elder child of the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh, wore a baby pink coat with her blonde hair curled. She prefers to stay out of the spotlight and is rarely seen outside family events, making each appearance a quiet but notable one. She is also described by royal watchers as the late Queen Elizabeth's "favourite grandchild" Hello! Magazine.

The outing follows a milestone year. Lady Louise recently completed her studies at the University of St Andrews, the same institution where the Prince and Princess of Wales first met. During her time there she began a relationship with fellow student Felix da Silva-Clamp, who was featured on the Royal Family's official Instagram for the first time when he accompanied Lady Louise as she received her Duke of Edinburgh Gold Award at the Palace of Holyroodhouse Hello! Magazine.

The Gold Award is the highest level of the Duke of Edinburgh's Award scheme, a youth programme founded by Lady Louise's grandfather, the late Prince Philip, which recognises achievement in volunteering, physical fitness, skills and expedition.

Earlier this summer, Lady Louise competed in the Pol Roger Meet of the British Driving Society on the fourth day of the Royal Windsor Horse Show, continuing the carriage-driving discipline she has pursued for years — a passion inherited from Prince Philip, who drove competitively well into his nineties. She also skipped Trooping the Colour in June 2026, consistent with her long-standing pattern of declining ceremonial balcony appearances Town & Country.

Crathie Kirk, the parish church the royal family has used since Queen Victoria's reign, has long been the spiritual anchor of the Balmoral summer — the annual August retreat where the late Queen Elizabeth was said to feel most relaxed. This year's gathering carries the same tradition forward under King Charles, with three generations of the family filing through the same kirk doors.

For a young woman who spent part of a previous summer working at a garden centre, the contrast between ordinary student life and the Crathie motorcade is striking. Her younger brother, James, Earl of Wessex, 18, has likewise been keeping things grounded: he took on an unexpected summer job at a royal property this year People.

The Edinburgh children appear to be navigating the same balance their mother, the Duchess of Edinburgh, has long championed — a private education and working life, punctuated by the occasional Sunday at a Scottish kirk when the family comes together.