Kate Middleton's toned down outfit sends a message of 'substance over style' as she dons high street polo neck and trousers for National Portrait Gallery visit

The Princess of Wales arrived at the National Portrait Gallery in London with a group of children from a local primary school. She was there to launch a new project from The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood, of which she has been patron since 2011. The End. So completes our report on... What, no mention of her wardrobe? But who designed her blazer? Where can you buy her earrings? You've been looking for a pair just like those for months.

From now on, you may well have to look a bit harder. For Kate has had a rebrand – one that has nothing to do with clothes. 'There is an absolute feeling that it is not about what the princess is wearing. She wants the focus to be on the really important issues, the people and the causes she is spotlighting,' a Palace source was reported to have said over the weekend. 'Do we need to be officially always saying what she is wearing? No. The style is there, but it's about the substance.' Back in the dark ages, some people – usually men – subscribed to the notion that style and substance couldn't co-exist.

If you were interested in clothes, you were frivolous. If you had a towering intellect, meanwhile, you didn't care what you wore, your mind being preoccupied with far more worthy things. But clothes are important. They semaphore who you are, and what you want to say. They can be the cherry on an otherwise dry cake, driving interest not only in the wearer, but in whatever else they might want to convey, from their current mood to their charities.

The Princess of Wales launched a new project from The Royal Foundation Centre for Early Childhood, of which she has been patron since 2011 on Tuesday. Re-reading the first sentences of this story, they sound as flat and dreary as a brogue. How much more compelling they'd be if they contained a description of Kate's clothes. Admittedly, yesterday's outfit wasn't among the most scintillating. But this only further proves the point that clothes can speak volumes. This was the first public engagement Kate had undertaken since Kensington Palace's new 'substance over style' diktat.

Presumably, it would have been deemed hypocritical to rock up in the latest Alexander McQueen. That the princess was, in fact, dressed in a chocolate brown blazer by designer Petar Petrov, a chic polo neck by Reiss, Jigsaw trousers, Sezane 'Bruna' earrings and an £150 Halcyon Days 'Salamander' Torque gold bangle, are not details provided by the Palace. But nor did they need to be. In 2025, we no longer need to rely on official channels. (The Palace still shares Kate's outfit choices for significant occasions but not for routine engagements.) The details behind Kate's look right down to which foundation she wears (Bobbi Brown) can be gathered far faster online.

Kate arrived at the National Portrait Gallery in London with a group of children from a local primary schoolwearing a very toned-down outfit. And for the outing Kate dressed in a chocolate brown blazer by designer Petar Petrov, a chic polo neck by Reiss, Jigsaw trousers, Sezane 'Bruna' earrings and an £150 Halcyon Days 'Salamander' Torque gold bangle. Instagram accounts are dedicated to tracking her style, identifying the provenance of her clothes with impressive speed and accuracy.

Instagram accounts are dedicated to tracking her style, identifying the provenance of her clothes with impressive speed and accuracy. But even a quick Google Image search, or similar, can usually yield a positive ID. The Palace knows this, just as it surely knows people will continue to be curious her wardrobe. It may be able to control what it says about Kate's style, but it can't control the public's interest.