It’s no secret that the Spanish royal family attracts attention beyond Spain’s borders. Letizia has been a leading figure in international fashion media for years, and that attention has now extended to her daughters.
But what I found interesting this week was reading the impressions of Stephanie Bridger-Linning, director of the British magazine Tatler and a royalty expert, who spoke about Leonor in an interview with Vanity Fair. Someone who follows European monarchies from the inside and has a well-formed opinion about the Spanish heiress.
Bridger-Linning recalls that her first significant experience covering Leonor was the public speech she delivered in October 2018, at the age of 13. “I was impressed, as were the readers, by her composure, even under the pressure of the spotlight,” she wrote.
Then came the decision to study at UWC Atlantic College in Wales, the same boarding school attended by Princess Elisabeth of Belgium. The director summed it up humorously: “Future queens at a Welsh boarding school!” It felt like the plot of a popular young adult novel.
She even mentioned a WhatsApp group that included several future European queens. That kind of detail reveals a lot about how they perceive each other from an outsider’s perspective.
Leonor is now in her third and final year of military training, this time at the General Air and Space Academy in San Javier, Murcia. Before that, she attended Zaragoza and the Naval School of Marín, from where she embarked on the Juan Sebastián de Elcano for several months.
A new phase begins in September, which experts predict will be at the university level. A gap year is out of the question. It remains unclear where or what she will study, but if she follows Felipe VI’s path, a combination of Law and Political Science or International Relations seems the most likely option.
What becomes clear from reading Bridger-Linning is that Leonor is not just news in Spain. The generation of heiresses taking over in Europe has a name and a face, and the Spanish heiress is among those garnering the most attention.