Why Queen Camilla's Family Nicknamed Her ‘Lorraine’ (King Charles Didn't Like It!)

Mar. 15, 2025

King Charles and Queen Camilla at their coronation on May 6, 2023.Photo:P van Katwijk/Getty

P van Katwijk/Getty

Queen Camilla’s playful nickname from family members was fit for a queen.

While the term amused the then-Duchess of Cornwall, it reportedly did not land as lightly with the then-Prince of Wales, nowKing Charles, according to theDaily Mail.

“She always saw the funny side of that — even if Prince Charles did not,” a friend says in royal biographer Robert Hardman’s new book,The Making of a King: King Charles III and the Modern Monarchy(out Jan. 18), serialized in theDaily Mailon Monday.

The debate over Camilla’s title persisted for nearly two decades, with initial statements indicating she would use the title “HRH the Princess Consort” upon Charles’s ascension. However, in a strategic move in February 2022,Queen Elizabethpubliclyendorsed Camilla as Queen Consortin her Platinum Jubilee message, a pivotal moment that shifted the narrative.

On the day of King Charles’ coronation, Buckingham Palace adopted “the Queen” over “Queen Consort” in their reference to Camilla, cementing her elevated status in the monarchy.

Hardman also noted that Camilla underwent a period of adjustment in comprehending her newfound role, gradually realizing that references to “Her Majesty” pertained to her.

“Obviously, she takes her role very seriously, but we were brought up not to be centre-stage and whatever. So I think that is very much part of what makes her what she is,” Camilla’s younger sister Annabel Elliot says in the book.

King Charles III and Queen Camilla.Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

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“For the rest of the family, sometimes it seems totally surreal. But she has, thank goodness, her own downtime,” Elliot continues. “She’s a wonderful mother and grandmother. She’s very, very hands on. All our children have grown up very much together. It’s almost like one family, so she’s back to being her normal self when she’s with all of us. I mean, she wouldn’t get away with it otherwise!

“There’s quite a bit of irreverence: ‘You’re not the Queen to us’, and so on. There’s quite a lot of all that — thank God.”

source: people.com