i do.

[ i am not engaged. that would be ridiculous. but they are. ]

I know you know this, have heard this, have seen this a million times over and are now probably at this minute simultaneously questioning my self-declared Anglophilia, post-mission adjustment rates and pop-culture knowledge in general. Which is fine; I think those are logical conclusions really anyone could come to, and I'm not offended, really I'm not, because who's to say I am adjusted and what is normal, anyway, and besides all that here is the main point: I know you know this, I know you know that Will and Kate are finally, officially WillandKate. But did you know I think this engagement photo is possibly perfection? That I think it's not just the very height of classy and colour combination but a lot like love? Well. I do.

And I bet you didn't know the Royals had a Flickr account, either. A Royal Engagement Set, even. Well. They do.

This is our dear Duke of York marrying Princess Victoria Mary of Teck, 1893. Cozy, no? And below, the Elizabeth's 1947 engagement to Lt Philip Mountbatten, notable for both genuine smiles and the divine drape of that dress. Issa's good, but post-war glamour? That's style.

All in all, good. England. Love. Castles and their respective princesses. I like them all. But this I love:

 

The light, the dress, the mirror, the stance. The asymmetrical symmetry of it all, the engagement photo elevated to art. Which I think is what a lot of people are trying to do these days, which is what I appreciated in WillandKate's version (that they didn't try, thank goodness), which is what this Prince Albert and his Lady Elizabeth Bowes Lyon did so effortlessly. To which I say: dead cert dynamite, old chap. Truly top-notch.