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A crop of the official portrait of HRH Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall.
The photograph was taken in the gardens of Raymill, Camilla’s retreat in Lacock, Wiltshire. Photograph: Clarence House/Getty Images
The photograph was taken in the gardens of Raymill, Camilla’s retreat in Lacock, Wiltshire. Photograph: Clarence House/Getty Images

Camilla’s 75th birthday marked by official photograph

This article is more than 1 year old

Duchess of Cornwall poses with home-grown peaches in her Wiltshire garden after guest-editing Country Life magazine

An official picture has been released to mark the Duchess of Cornwall’s 75th birthday.

Camilla is pictured looking relaxed and smiling in the image released for her milestone anniversary she celebrates on Sunday, which follows a busy week for the royal.

In the image, the future Queen Consort sits at a garden table with flowers and plants in the background and a teacup and saucer before her and a bowl of peaches.

The duchess has guest-edited the latest edition of Country Life magazine and her son, food writer Tom Parker Bowles, has penned a paean to the fruit, the essential ingredient in one of his mother’s favourite desserts, peach melba.

The 75th birthday portrait of HRH Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall. Photograph: Clarence House/Getty Images

Parker Bowles writes: “My mother is a keen grower of white peaches (the subject of this month’s column was very much her idea) and they certainly don’t want for attention.”

The picture was taken last month in the gardens of Raymill, Camilla’s retreat in Lacock, Wiltshire, where the photographed peaches were grown.

She bought the six-bedroom property, 17 miles from the Prince of Wales’s Highgrove home, after her divorce from Andrew Parker Bowles in the mid-1990s.

The duchess is wearing a blue floral dress from Sophie Dundas in the photograph taken by Getty Images.

Her 75th birthday will be celebrated on Sunday with a small family dinner, Clarence House has said.

It is likely Charles will host the evening get-together and guests are likely to dine at Highgrove.

Camilla’s daughter, Laura Lopes, and son are expected, as well as the Duchess’s younger sister, Annabel Elliot, who featured in an ITV documentary following Camilla as she took the reins of the magazine.

The programme, which was screened this week, revealed that Camilla buried a young Annabel’s beloved teddy bear, known as Tiddy Bar, in the grounds of their grandparents’ home and only confessed years later.

In an interview with the Daily Mail, the duchess revealed that she has embraced the social media world of TikTok thanks to her grandchildren – while Charles reads to the youngsters and puts on all the voices.

Camilla laments how family meals are a thing of the past, and everyone is now on “their devices”.

Speaking to the newspaper, the duchess said: “Families don’t sit down any longer, do they, and have dinner?

“Because I am ancient, in the old days we all sat down (to eat). Now everyone is on their devices. It just makes me quite cross.”

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