Meet Lady Kitty Spencer, Princess Diana’s Niece and Aspiring Royal Newsmaker

It’s safe to say that royal families across the pond are far more enticing right now than our First Family-to-be. Even Netflix’s new series The Crown makes a convincing case that royal drama has always been the juiciest of them all. Lucky for us, we have Princess Diana’s niece, Lady Kitty Spencer, to keep things interesting. Not only does the 25-year-old have a name uniquely built for eye-catching headlines, but she’s also active both on social media and the London social scene.

Lady Kitty is the oldest of the four children Princess Diana’s brother Charles Spencer, the Ninth Earl Spencer, had with his first wife, Victoria Lockwood, a British former fashion model, who once covered Tatler. Her two sisters, Lady Eliza and Lady Amelia, are only one year younger and can often be found by her side at events in London. And her brother, Louis, Viscount Althorp, is only 22-years-old, but made headlines when he jokingly asked Nicki Minaj to marry him backstage at a concert she gave in 2015. As we know though, Minaj does not need a title to live royally.

Born in London, Lady Kitty actually grew up in South Africa, as her mother struggled with an eating disorder and drug and alcohol abuse and the family wanted to remain far from media attention as possible. In 1997, her parents divorced, but she and her siblings remained in South Africa with their mother through their teenage years, with Lady Kitty eventually enrolling at the University of Cape Town, where she studied psychology, politics, and English literature.

In 2007, Lady Kitty made her first public appearance in London at a memorial service for Princess Diana, marking ten years since her tragic death, when she had been only six years old. Following her public debut though, she followed in her mother’s footsteps when Tatler named her “one of the most eligible girls in Britain.”

Lady Kitty then went on to get a masters in Luxury Brand Management from Regent’s University London, which perhaps explains what led her to become so head-over-heels for fashion. She can now be spotted front row at London and Paris Fashion Week, attending shows like Topshop and Dior alongside British pseudo-royalty, Lottie Moss.

Today, Lady Kitty spencer balances her social engagements with charitable ones, primarily as an ambassador for Centrepoint, an organization that supports homeless youth, which Prince William is also heavily involved with. However, she caused a stir recently when she told The Times of London that homeless youth, “know exactly what they want to do and what their talents are,” and that she “envies” them for that. This, of course, was then spun into a story in which Lady Kitty envies the homeless.

On her Instagram account, in addition to selfies and photos flaunting her latest fashion finds, Lady Kitty was as political as a young British royal scion was expected to be about the American election, posting memes including one of Joe Biden telling President Obama that he refuses to give Donald Trump the White House wifi password. And another at the Democratic Convention that reads: “I just want someone who looks at me the same way Bill and Hillary look at balloons.”

As for her romantic life, Lady Kitty is has an on-again-off-again relationship with a 40-something-year-old Italian man named Niccolo Barattieri di San Pietro, who is the chief executive of the finance and property investment firm Northacre. So, between her presence in the London dating scene and a very public Instagram profile, it’s safe to say that Lady Kitty has our attention, and will continue to captivate us for the foreseeable future.