Where Beards Grow, Strong Feelings Follow
The New York Times
Whether on Prince William, JD Vance or Jacob Elordi, facial hair gets people talking.
As far as beards go, his is more measly than grizzly.
For the past several months, Prince William, the shiny-headed British noble, has been fostering a modest bit of scruff. The heir to the British throne debuted the beard in August, with an Instagram post congratulating Team Britain on their success at the Olympics. At that time the growth was slight, as if he had forgotten his razor over a long weekend, the strands barely connecting with his sideburns.
That version of the Prince’s patchy beard didn’t last. As he told People magazine in November, he shaved at the behest of his daughter, Princess Charlotte, who was reported to have fallen into “floods of tears” at the sight of her father’s new look.
But this past week the beard was back — fuller, if only just so — as Prince William served Christmas lunch at a charity organization in London and attended the reopening of Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris over the weekend.
At the latter event, the Prince’s appearance received high marks from at least one world leader. “He’s a good looking guy. He looked really, very handsome last night,” President-elect Donald J. Trump told the New York Post.
That publication’s gossip arm, Page Six, referred to the beard as “rugged,” though that’s likely overselling the Prince’s subdued scruff.
