Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more
Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more
Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more
Arise, Sir David Beckham. More than two decades after receiving an OBE for services to football – and, if the rumours are to be believed, after almost as long spent lobbying for an upgrade – the former England captain was knighted by the King at Windsor Castle on Tuesday, as his parents and wife Victoria (whose fashion brand made him a bespoke suit for the occasion). “This is without doubt my proudest moment,” he said afterwards.
The knighthood is a crowning glory for Beckham, recognising a long career in sport and extensive charity work, and will surely have been worth the wait for a star who has made no secret of his desire to secure a top title. But it is also the latest stage in a canny reputational reboot that has gone into overdrive in the last few years, burnishing his status as a national treasure (and cleverly smoothing over past controversies).
These days, it’s not uncommon to see photos of a besuited Beckham sharing a chummy joke with King Charles at various charitable events (he became an ambassador for the King’s Foundation, Charles’ project to support sustainable communities, last year). They both share a love for nature and gardening, with David’s enthusiasm for growing the perfect carrot or harvesting his homegrown honey knowing no bounds. Not for nothing have people wondered whether he is about to do a “Meghan” and launch a show that is a modern version of Richard Briers in The Good Life.
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The former England captain wore a custom-made Victoria Beckham suit for his investiture (PA)
Rewind to Becks’ Manchester United stint, and things were very different. Prince Philip was reportedly so vexed by David and Victoria’s decision to perch on gold thrones at their 1999 wedding that he later refused to sit on a similarly dazzling seat at a jubilee event (“We’d have looked like Mr and Mrs Beckham, wouldn’t we?”, he is said to have quipped). And, if Tom Bower’s 2024 biography-slash-hit-job The House of Beckham is to be believed, the then Prince Charles apparently wondered aloud, “Why do these people never wear socks?” after first meeting the couple.
But Beckham, a lifelong royalist who has happy memories of watching the Trooping the Colour parade with his grandparents, was thrilled to receive his first honour in 2003 (with his grandparents among his guests at Buckingham Palace). His work as a goodwill ambassador for children’s charity UNICEF – and high-profile friendships with Princes William and Harry – seemed to lay the groundwork for a future upgrade. Even the well-publicised allegations of an affair with PA Rebecca Loos (which Beckham has always denied, labelling them “ludicrous”) only temporarily seemed to dim his golden reputation.
His role as part of the British delegation that made the successful bid for London to host the 2012 Olympics placed him on the honours committee’s radar once again: he was reportedly first put forward for the knighthood back in 2011, when he was in his mid-thirties. However, a question mark over his tax affairs scuppered any plans to reward him. In 2013, Beckham, along with fellow footballers Wayne Rooney, Steven Gerrard and Gary Lineker, was named among the stars who had allegedly invested in the Ingenious film financing scheme; in 2017, HMRC successfully argued that this scheme had tried to use artificial losses from film investments to avoid tax; however in 2021, Ingenious won an appeal against them.
The star then appeared to have entirely blown his chances of ever becoming “Sir David” when a series of explosive emails, purportedly sent from Beckham to his publicist Simon Oliveira, emerged in the European press. The leaked messages were littered with some very choice phrases, with Beckham allegedly referring to the honours committee as “a bunch of c***s” and questioning whether other celebrities actually deserved their accolades. “For what? Singing at the rugby and going to see the troops,” was one comment apparently directed at opera star Katherine Jenkins and her OBE.
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Golden balls and green fingers: Beckham in his beloved garden (David Beckham)
The 2017 scandal inevitably acquired the nickname “Beckileaks”. Beckham’s team said that the reports were “based on outdated material taken out of context from hacked and doctored private emails from a third-party server”, and argued that they gave “a deliberately inaccurate picture”. A friend of the star, meanwhile, said that while some messages had been “doctored”, others were written “in the heat of the moment”.
But it wasn’t just this sprinkling of bad language that risked damaging Brand Beckham. After all, four-letter words are, in their way, very English. Instead, it was the apparent sense of entitlement that sprang from the alleged messages, the feeling that his elevation to the knighthood was a foregone conclusion – “It’s a disgrace to be honest and if I was American I would [have] got something like this 10 years ago” – that threatened to throw Beckham’s carefully curated man of the people image into question.
If Beckham really wanted that sword tap, he knew he’d have to put the work in to change his reputation. He and his family set up residence in the Cotswolds and started to embrace country life with open arms. In 2021, his finances were reportedly given the all clear by HMRC, making him eligible once more for an honour. Then, after the death of Queen Elizabeth II in 2022, Beckham dutifully joined hundreds of thousands of mourners in the queue to see her lying in state in Westminster Hall.
Dressed in a low-key flat cap and sober dark jacket, he ended up chatting to fellow well-wishers and snacking on Pringles during his 13-hour wait, before being captured on the video livestream wiping away a tear when he finally reached the coffin. “It’s a sad day, but it’s a day for us to remember the incredible legacy that she’s left,” he told the press, before waxing lyrical about his happy memories of singing “God Save the Queen” before kick-off during his England years.
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Beckham’s 13-hour stint in the queue for Queen Elizabeth II’s lying in state helped reaffirm his royalist credentials (AFP/Getty)
Whether it was a genuine gesture, a canny PR move, or some combination of the two, Beckham’s queue cameo was certainly well-timed. Not only did he get to burnish his royalist credentials and mingle with the common folk, he also inadvertently positioned himself as the polar opposite to celebrities who’d seemingly used their status to dodge a half-day wait (remember the furore when then This Morning hosts Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield appeared to have jumped the line?)
More recently, Beckham and the King have bonded over an unlikely hobby: beekeeping. The footballer started making his own honey during the coronavirus lockdown, and in 2023, he brought along a jar of “D’Beez Sticky Stuff” to an event celebrating British fashion, so that Charles, a long-time apiarist, could try some. The gift went down well with the King, who reportedly suggested that they would “have to do a swap”.
Whether it was a genuine gesture, a canny PR move, or some combination of the two, Beckham’s queue cameo was certainly well-timed
Clearly, the fruits of his labour impressed the King, who invited him to a private meeting at his Highgrove residence the following year, to discuss Beckham becoming an ambassador for his foundation. Official photos released to mark his appointment showed the pair laughing, and in a statement confirming his new gig, Beckham said that it had been “inspiring to hear from the King about the work of His Majesty’s foundation”, and, of course, to “compare beekeeping tips”.
The bond between the Beckhams and the Windsors only seems to have become tighter since then. In December, David and Victoria attended a Buckingham Palace banquet to mark the Qatari state visit; just a few months later, they were on the guest list for a dinner at Highgrove celebrating Anglo-Italian relations.
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The Beckhams have attended high-profile royal events in recent months (Getty)
On both occasions, the ever-photogenic couple were impeccably turned out: although Beckham has certainly courted this royal connection, he and his wife also confer a level of glamour and visibility upon palace events that, say, a relatively anonymous foreign dignitary just can’t offer. Brand Beckham, it seems, can prove useful to the palace. A few years before Beckham’s involvement, the King’s Foundation was mired in reports of a cash-for-honours scandal; safe to say it was in need of some positive publicity.
Back in May, Beckham and the King had another high-profile encounter at the Chelsea Flower Show, where the monarch appeared to allude to the birthday present he’d sent to his new pal. “You got it, didn’t you?” the royal asked. Just a few weeks later, another, more momentous gift from King to subject was revealed, when Beckham’s impending knighthood was announced as part of the annual Birthday Honours.
After Tuesday’s investiture, Beckham was effusive. “I’ve been very obviously lucky in my career to have won what I’ve won and done what I’ve done, but to receive an honour like this, of a knight, is beyond anything that I ever thought I would receive,” he told the press. His waiting game – and years of schmoozing – have certainly paid off. But he is not the only winner here: right now, the monarchy needs his star power, too.
