The descendants of , the late last king of Greece, may no longer officially rule, but the Greek royal family is far from dead. Who needs Greece when you preside over New York, London, St Moritz, Paris and the Bahamas? Crown Prince Pavlos and his wife, Crown Princess Marie-Chantal (MC to friends), are the king and queen of the social realm. They rule from their Upper East Side mansion in Manhattan, and three of their five children also live in New York: the two youngest – Prince Odysseas-Kimon and Prince Aristidis-Stavros and Prince Achileas-Andreas, who has just graduated from NYU.
(aka ‘Tino’, a Georgetown graduate and godson of the Prince of Wales), flits between New York and London – where he ‘always has a table’ at The Box – and is based in Notting Hill. At precisely 7.30am every day, MC leaves her Manhattan pile to walk her dog in the park, before having breakfast with the family.
She’s ‘organised, relaxed and controlled...
and doesn’t suffer any fools’, attests close friend Taki Theodoracopulos. By day, she designs her childrenswear line and later might be found dining at Eli’s wine bar and Gina La Fornarina or Balthazar. MC’s tipple? A piscine – champagne with ice cubes.
But the Greeces are truly transatlantic. The social circuit in London almost imploded in 2017 when MC and Pavlos left. Their palatial Cheyne Walk house had been the hottest dinner-party spot in town; invitations to their Cotswolds mansion have long been coveted (Valentino and Queen Maxima of the Netherlands visited for Pavlos and Olympia’s joint birthday); and the shoot at their home on the sprawling estate of Gunnerside, Yorkshire – owned by MC’s father, hedge-fund tycoon Robert Miller – remains the hot ticket (as Fritz von Westenholz and Arthur Mornington can both attest).
When they aren’t hosting, the couple are doing the royal wedding circuit across Europe, including Princess Eugenie’s in 2018. MC still catches up with her London friends, who include Beatrice Vincenzini (India Warrender’s mother), Amanda Brooks and Marianna Lemos. Or Pavlos’s brother Prince Philippos and his VistaJet heiress wife, Princess Nina.
Her hangouts: Scott’s, Chiltern Firehouse, the Hurlingham or Casa Cruz. Luckily, one of the royal brood stayed behind. NYU alum Princess Olympia has become the undisputed It girl of London.
(Her godfather is King Charles III, after all.) ‘Everyone wants her at their parties. She’s the life and soul,’ says a friend.
‘I adore her!’ says society photographer German Larkin. ‘She has that sleek, stylish look every photographer loves to portray.’ Otherwise, Olympia’s on the front row at fashion shows or holding court at 5 Hertford Street or KOKO, arm-in-arm with Ella Richards, Lady Lola Bute and Tish Weinstock.
To relax, she runs with her sausage dog, Echo, around Hyde Park. ‘She’s a terrific dog mum,’ gushes Isabel Getty. But Olympia is more than just a lady of leisure.
‘People think she doesn’t really do anything,’ says one socialite. ‘But she’s an ambassador for Aquazzura: she’s always wearing Aquazzura heels, promoting them, she loves what she does.’ Don’t forget, she’s a Louis Vuitton girl, too.
She’s not the only model in the family. Pavlos and Constantine (now dating Poppy Delevingne) have starred in a Dior campaign, shot by Nikolai von Bismarck. Then there’s the fluffy-haired heartthrob ‘Achi’, who is dating Isabella Massenet (the daughter of MC’s best friend, Natalie).
‘Fit, fit, fit’ is how one Wellington contemporary describes him. ‘In a school play [ , fittingly], he was an extra. I used to stare at him on stage in his leather jacket,’ she says.
One friend confirms he’s an aspiring professional actor. Summers are for Greek island-hopping. It’s weeks of boat trips, scuba-diving and lunching on Milos, Patmos and Spetses for this gang; and when in Athens, they recommend the Astir Palace, The Margi or the Hotel Grande Bretagne.
Come winter, the whole family jets off to Gstaad and St Moritz, where last year, Olympia was crowned the Corviglia Club’s Glamour Girl, the ultimate high-society plaudit. Looks, money, power: the Greek royal family have everything. But do they act like it? No, it seems.
‘They are a very stately family,’ says one insider. ‘They’re well raised and very polite,’ says another. That’s all down to MC’s strict position on manners.
‘In my family, manners and kindness really do matter,’ she has said. Phones at the dinner table? Not even for Instagram. They ‘have a very normal upper-class life, they don’t seek the limelight.
There are no Prince Andrews in this family,’ says Theodoracopulos. And rumour has it, Cheyne Walk may be about to get a dusting down. ‘They’ll resettle in England soon I think.
’ Make way for a new royal court..
