Prince George is learning to be an artist, and the artist who gave him the idea for his latest piece has given him high marks. Prince William and Kate Middleton surprised their social media followers on Christmas by posting a watercolor that their 9-year-old son had painted. "Happy holidays! from George, "read the caption of the picture of a reindeer in the snow with birds on its antlers.
Fans soon thought that George's watercolor was based on a Wrendale Designs greeting card that had a snowy stag and red-bellied robins sitting in the same places. The art is on the U.K. greeting card and gift company's "Five Friends" Stag Luxury Boxed Christmas cards, which sell for about $12. One of the cards may have been sent to Adelaide Cottage, where the Wales family lives. Prince George might put it on the kitchen table to get ideas for his art. Hannah Dale, the founder of Wrendale Designs and the artist behind the stag cards, told Hello! that seeing George's art, which was apparently based on her own, was a "surprise Christmas gift" she didn't expect.
"It was a Christmas surprise I didn't expect," she said of the link. "It was a really nice Christmas surprise to see it. I saw the post because it showed up on my Twitter feed. I recognized it right away. I think the angle of the ears and the little robins will tell you." Dale said that she doesn't know how Prince George could have gotten the Christmas card, but that she would love to know. The artist, who started her business in 2012, said she bets that the Prince and Princess of Wales, who are both 40, are "proud" of their young son's artistic talent, which makes sense. "He's clearly good at what he does. He has a good sense of shape and color, "Dale told the news station. "I think the fact that he likes animals and nature is something that may have caught his attention. That gives me a lot of hope. It's a real honor to get a child interested in drawing or painting. It was a really nice thing to say."
The artist has met members of the royal family before. According to her bio, she received a Queen's Award for Enterprise in 2019 and accepted it at Buckingham Palace. After Queen Elizabeth II died in September, Dale even made a piece as a memorial to her.
Selena Mattei