A royal wedding in all but name, when Hugh Grosvenor, 7th Duke of Westminster, marries gourmet food firm executive Olivia Henson in June, the ancient pews of Chester Cathedral will be crammed with the cream of the British aristocracy.
The groom’s godfather, King Charles, along with Camilla are expected to be guests, while the Prince of Wales is rumoured to be best man and Prince George – who is the 32-year-old Duke’s godson – is likely to be a pageboy
Though, as with many weddings, there has already been a hitch, with headlines earlier this month saying ‘Harry and Meghan excluded from Duke of Westminster’s wedding in fresh blow in feud between Harry and William’.
Here we reveal everything you need to know about the nuptials of the billionaire Duke and his English rose
Hugh’s father Gerald, who died aged 64 from a heart attack in 2016 just before he was due to host a party to mark the start of the grouse shooting season, described his son as having been ‘born with the longest silver spoon anyone can have’.
The family’s fortune dates back to the Norman Conquest and is now estimated to be worth £9.8billion. Its Grosvenor Group owns 300 acres in the wealthiest postcodes in central London, such as Mayfair and Belgravia, as well as vast country estates in Cheshire and Lancashire, and an art portfolio that includes works by Velazquez, Rembrandt and Lucian Freud.
Hugh is even said to have more land than the King.
Built in the style of a French chateau and set in magnificent parkland, the family seat, Eaton Hall, is located near the village of Eccleston in Cheshire.
The 10,872-acre estate includes three villages of 435 houses and 15 farms. The family also owns the 96,000-acre Reay Forest Estate in Scotland, the 23,500-acre Abbeystead Estate in Lancashire and the 37,000-acre La Gargantua estate in Cordoba, Spain.
The daughter of stockbroker Rupert Henson and his wife Caroline, 31-year-old Olivia and her siblings Jasper, 29, and Emilia, 26, are descended from John Manners, the 5th Duke of Rutland, and distant cousins of the Manners sisters Lady Violet, Lady Alice and Lady Eliza who were known as the ‘bad-Manners sisters’ for their frequent appearances in the tabloid press.
Olivia studied at the Princess of Wales’s alma mater, Marlborough College, where fees are £15,665 a term. She was a contemporary of Prince Andrew’s daughter, Princess Eugenie.
She graduated with a 2:1 in hispanic studies and Italian from Trinity College, Dublin, then worked for a botanical drinks firm and juice company before moving to the ethical food business Belazu.
It sources ‘loved and trusted chef-grade ingredients’ from the Middle East and Mediterranean for products such as truffle and artichoke pesto ‘for chefs, food lovers and friends’.
Hugh was one of the aristocrats who led the procession at King Charles’s Coronation.
Having been badly bullied himself at Harrow School, his father, the 6th Duke, kept his own children closer to home, sending Hugh to a local primary school before putting him in the private co-ed Ellesmere College, in Shropshire, where he was a day pupil and captain of the football team.
He graduated from Newcastle University with a degree in countryside management and then joined the family firm, the Grosvenor Group, working in the UK, San Francisco and Hong Kong, as well as overseeing donations through its charitable arm, the Westminster Foundation.
A keen skeet shooter, he has represented Team GB at competitions.
Dowager Duchess Natalia Grosvenor (who is known as ‘Tally’), 64, is a descendent of Tsar Nicholas I of Russia and the House of Romanov as well as the Russian poet Alexander Pushkin.
The duchess is Prince William’s godmother and owns a vineyard in Portofino, north-western Italy, described as a ‘corner of paradise’, which produces £32 bottles of white vermentino wine.
Her grandmother, Lady Zia Wernher, whose family seat was Luton Hoo, was a great friend of Queen Elizabeth II.
The couple met through friends in London and dated for two years before Hugh proposed in April.
‘The Duke of Westminster and Miss Olivia Henson are delighted to announce they are engaged to be married,’ a spokesman for the Grosvenor family revealed in a statement. ‘Members of both their families are absolutely delighted with the news.’
Chester Cathedral’s long association with the Grosvenor family means it was an obvious choice to stage the wedding.
It is said to have the ‘finest medieval choir stalls in existence’ and the ‘best pre-Raphaelite mosaics in the country’.
The groom’s sister, Lady Tamara, married there, too, with guests arriving by private jet, helicopter and chauffeured limousine.
It was the first cathedral in the north of England to install solar panels on its ancient monastic building.
The Diocese of Chester announced in 2021 that it was working towards becoming an eco diocese.
