Fergie Skips Nieces Big Day, Friends Confused

The mystery of Sarah Ferguson’s whereabouts deepens.

I can disclose that the former surprised friends and family members by failing to attend the wedding of her beloved niece.

Fergie’s absence was even more striking because the wedding reception was held at the Hampshire farm where she grew up.

‘Sarah would have been surrounded by love, had she turned up,’ a friend tells me. ‘She could have kept a low profile without too many problems.’

Heidi Luedecke, the daughter of Sarah’s sister Jane Ferguson, exchanged vows with art consultant Ben Collinson at church, Dummer, and their wedding reception took place at Dummer Down Farm.

When I disclosed that Heidi, who works at the Tate Gallery in , had become engaged to Ben in 2023, Sarah told me: ‘She is my golden niece whom I love so much. I’m devoted to lovely Ben and Heidi.’

It was held on the same day as the wedding of Peter Phillips and Harriet Sperling, which Sarah’s daughters, Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie, chose to attend instead.

They are cousins of Peter by their father, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, and of Heidi by their mother. Peter’s wedding was attended by his mother, Princess Anne, and senior royals including the King and Queen.

Fergie, 66, who was stripped of her title last year due to her links to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, has been seen in public only once in nine months since the Epstein Files were made public by the US Department of Justice.

The trove of documents revealed damning emails between her and the financier.

Sarah was photographed in April walking to a people carrier from a chalet at a luxury ski resort in the Austrian Alps.

Andrew’s ex-wife carried a teal tote bag and hid beneath a white baseball cap.

A spokesman for the former duchess declines to comment.

Swimwear queen blasts Khan’s lawless London

Swimwear designer Melissa Odabash, whose customers include the Kardashians and Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie, has revealed she’s too scared to go out in London wearing jewels after close calls with thieves riding bicycles.

‘They’ve tried – they’ve flown past me,’ she says. ‘I’ve now got straps on my phone and I don’t wear jewellery.’

She’s so angry about the increase in such crime under Labour Mayor Sadiq Khan that she’s considering standing against him.

‘I should be Mayor of London,’ the New York-raised designer tells me at the Fragrance Foundation UK Awards at Grosvenor House hotel in Mayfair. ‘This is the best city in the world, but there are things we need to change. It offers everything – pubs, installations, art, museums, culture.

‘But thieves on bikes are scary. We need to make London great again.’ There’s a slogan...

Poor Wes and a tale of misspent youth

Wannabe prime minister Wes Streeting has trumpeted his plans for ‘a wealth tax that works’ in a bid to win support from hard-Left Labour members.

But how far can the former health secretary be trusted with the nation’s finances? Readers may be surprised to learn that the very first mention of Streeting in the national Press came when he complained of having run up debts on his credit card. In 2006, a 22-year-old Wes admitted to The Mail on Sunday that he had foolishly used a credit card to pay for his day-to-day living expenses.

As a result of high interest on the card, he’d failed to make minimum monthly payments and was hit with £20 late-payment fees.

Then a final-year history student at Selwyn College, Cambridge, he posed for photos wearing glasses, his hair rigid with gel.

Furious Livia cancels Gwynnie visit over ‘disgusting’ advert

Oscar winner Colin Firth’s ex-wife, Livia Giuggioli, has taken the extraordinary step of cancelling Gwyneth Paltrow’s forthcoming visit to her farm in Italy.

Eco activist Livia, 56, is furious with the Hollywood star, 53, over her decision to star in an advertising campaign for an Israeli property company.

Livia campaigns for a boycott of Israel due to its military action in Gaza and Lebanon.

‘I just cancelled Gwyneth Paltrow,’ the Italian declared online. ‘She was supposed to come to the farm in a couple of weeks’ time on a tour, a soil-to-fork farm experience, and we just cancelled her because what she did is completely unacceptable.’

Livia, who was married to The King’s Speech star Colin for 22 years until 2019, runs Quintosapore, a sustainable farm on the Tuscan-Umbrian border that she co-founded with her twin brothers, Alessandro and Nicola.

Colin, with whom Gwyneth starred in the Oscar-winning film Shakespeare in Love, remains closely tied to the farm.

‘Making an ad for a luxury condo is as disgusting as it can be for someone [with] privilege,’ Livia added. ‘How detached are you from reality? You’re either so detached that you need to be cancelled, because you live in another world. Or you’re actually a really, really nasty person. Or you are stupid. Which are you, Gwyneth Paltrow?’

 Still time to snap up Petra’s £29million family pad in LA!

Formula 1 heiress Petra Ecclestone’s husband, Sam Palmer, may be an estate agent, but they are having to rethink their strategy of offloading their Los Angeles mansion after failing to secure a buyer.

The couple quietly cut the asking price of the 13,500 sq ft Brentwood property earlier this year from $41.95million (£31million) to $39.5million (£29 million)after relocating to Dubai with their children. Sam admits they may abandon plans to sell altogether – at least for now. ‘Where’s taken a big hit is the west side of LA, where my house is located, because of the Palisades Fire and Malibu [fires],’ he explains. ‘Most people moved to the west side of LA because of the

Palisades, and it’s not there.

‘We’re considering renting it out for a couple of years, let the Palisades rebuild, and then my house will be worth even more money.

‘So it’s an even better deal for me.’

 Wheeler girls’ Tangier soiree

Their nearest neighbour is the King, but that’s not why the bash being given in two weeks’ time by Jacquetta Wheeler, model daughter of late spread-betting tycoon Stuart Wheeler, and her sister, Charlotte Claydon, promises to be the party of the season.

After all, who else can offer guests three acres of lush, many-tiered gardens to saunter through, under lime trees, past papyrus and ‘lily ponds buzzing with frogs, dragonflies and butterflies’ as one bewitched visitor put it?

And who, other than the girls – and their older sister Sarah – have been weaned on parties like mother’s milk? Their father, who died in 2020, was celebrated for those he hosted at Chilham – the Kent castle he spent millions restoring.

But Jacquetta and Charlotte’s night of fun will be 1,500 miles from Chilham. It will, instead, be held overlooking the bay of Tangier – the King in question is Mohammed VI of Morocco – at the house built by their great-grandfather 100 years ago and inherited by their late, beloved mother, photographer Tessa Codrington. Locals are expecting to glimpse Dame Kristin Scott Thomas – now married to the girls’ first cousin, Bloomberg boss John Micklethwait – but not Nigel Farage or Lord [Michael] Howard, both regulars at Chilham in Stuart’s day.

Being chief executive of the only organisation of which Princes William and Harry are both still active supporters sounds complicated.

Tessy Ojo runs the Diana Award, which honours inspirational young people, but the brothers haven’t attended any event together since Harry and Meghan quit royal duties six years ago.

‘It is a privilege to still have both of them involved,’ Tessy tells me.

‘I spoke to Prince William last Wednesday at the event in Shoreditch, and I saw Prince Harry a few weeks ago. I’m not going to say where I saw him.’ Intriguing…

 Turn your bloody phone off, Amanda tells theatregoers

 (Very) modern manners

Aged 80, he could be forgiven for taking life easier. But that’s not in keeping with the Duke of Wellington’s fighting spirit.

Despite being axed from the Lords by Sir Keir Starmer – along with all other remaining hereditary peers – he’s returned to duty after securing a life peerage.

This required him to take the oath as Baron Wellington of Stratfield Saye, of Stratfield Saye in the County of Hampshire and of Colmonell in the County of Ayrshire.

A bit of a mouthful – and lacking the cachet of his Dutch and Belgian title: His Serene Highness, 9th Prince of Waterloo...