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Lady Violet Manners marries her ‘Caledonian cowboy' in the society wedding of the year
It's been dubbed one of the society weddings of the year, and when Lady Violet Manners tied the knot to William James Lindesay-Bethune on Saturday at her family seat Belvoir Castle, the event lived up to the hype.
Wearing a gown with a high, ruffled neckline and puffed sleeves, the sheer panel across her décolletage was embroidered with stars. The skirt was a cascade of ruffles. Violet's hair was styled up to better show off her headpiece – the grand Rutland tiara, which has been in her family since the 18th century.
The groom, of Scottish descent, wore a kilt in the Lindsay family tartan, complete with a tasselled sporran. The bridesmaids – dressed in violet, naturally – included the other two Manners sisters, Eliza and Alice, as well as Devisha Kumari Singh. The mother of the bride, Emma Manners, looked resplendent in a pale pink jacquard coat featuring bows at the sleeves, completed by an angled, wide-brimmed hat.
Guests included Lady Tatiana Mountbatten, Lady Sabrina Percy and Princess Alexandra's granddaughter Flora Vesterberg. With a decadent 360 rooms, there was plenty of space for everyone at the 16,000-acre Leicestershire stately home – a location grand enough to pass for Windsor Castle in the Netflix show The Crown.
Violet, 31, is the eldest of the 11th Duke of Rutland's five children and one third of what society magazine Tatler dubbed high society's 'most glamorous set of sisters' – a group whose party-girl reputations once earned them the lighthearted nickname 'the bad-manners sisters.'
Often likened to the Kardashians for their fondness for sharing their lifestyles on social media, Violet's marriage to Bill, 34, son of the 16th Earl of Lindsay (also known as Viscount Garnock), unites two storied families in what Tatler called a 'family line as illustrious as it is complex.'
The Manners family history dates back to 1066 and includes 36 successive generations of Dukes and Duchesses. The title of Earl of Lindsay has been part of the Scottish peerage since 1633, but the family's aristocratic roots stretch back to the Norman Conquest.
'The wedding of Lady Violet Manners to Viscount Garnock officially kicks off high society wedding season,' says Tatler features director Eilidh Hargreaves. 'To be followed by Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez's Venice nuptials and Zac Goldsmith and Hum Fleming's Cotswolds wedding later this summer […] Just like Zac and Hum, this marks the coming together of two dynasties.'
The nuptials, announced last July, came as a 'surprise' to many, says one insider, who revealed that many of Lady Violet's friends had yet to meet Bill before their engagement was announced via Instagram. Featuring a picture of the pair in front of Colorado's Rocky Mountains, with a ring on Lady Violet's engagement finger, her caption read: 'I said 'yes' to my Caledonian Cowboy.'
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While at the time Violet's mother, Emma, Duchess of Rutland, 61, said she was 'over the moon' at the news, David, the 66-year-old Duke of Rutland, told diarist Richard Eden only that he had 'met him [Bill] a couple of times.'
The three Manners sisters have been regulars on the London scene. Prior to dating Bill, Lord Garnock; former Dolce & Gabbana model Lady Violet was in a relationship with Old Etonian banker Ted Morrison, which reportedly ended in 2022 – the same year her sister Alice, 30, split from Otis Ferry, son of rock star Bryan Ferry. Eliza, 27, the youngest Manners daughter, has been linked to Max Odey, son of millionaire hedge fund boss Crispin Odey.
Despite being heralded by Tatler as one of the most eligible bachelors in the world, 24-year-old Charles – who will eventually inherit the Belvoir estate by virtue of male primogeniture, even though all his sisters are older – and his brother Hugo, 21, are less often in the public eye.
The Duchess of Rutland has certainly been on board with Violet's wedding preparations, using social media to document accompanying her eldest on a mother-daughter pre-wedding trip to the island of Formentera at the start of the month and running a daily countdown to the estate's forthcoming celebrations on her Instagram account, including a spot of mother-of-the-bride dress shopping in the capital.
Entrepreneurial Lady Violet recently launched HeritageXplore, a digital platform facilitating access to Britain's independently run stately homes and historic houses. For his part, Lord Garnock graduated from the University of Alabama in 2014 and left behind a job in the American drinks industry to return to his family seat, the Jacobean Lahill House in Fife, founding the luxury non-alcoholic botanical spirit brand Feragaia – stocked in Fenwicks, Harrods and elsewhere.
One can expect drinks of all denominations to be flowing freely at Belvoir into the early hours of tomorrow morning, as both the family – and the venue – possess immaculate party-throwing pedigree. The nightclub known as 'Dadabells,' found in the dining room, has hosted several celebrations with disco balls and DJ booths, including the 2022 'three-day bacchanal' wedding of Vogue beauty editor Tish Weinstock to Tom Guinness, with guests including Kate and Lila Moss, Sabine and Ivy Getty and the Manners sisters themselves.
'Parties at Belvoir are legendary,' confirms Hargreaves. 'There are tales of disco balls in the Old Kitchen, saxophonists and DJ sets rolling on until 8am. And, having won the 'best silverware' category in Tatler 's Country House Awards, the wedding breakfast will surely sparkle.'
The sisters especially love leaning into a theme.
'Lady Violet's Wild West–themed hen do was a case in point, inspired by her fiancé's nickname 'Caledonian Cowboy',' says Hargreaves. ''Vi's Last Rodeo,' as it was called, was hosted at Moscar Lodge in Sheffield (another of the Duke and Duchess of Rutland's properties) and featured chandeliers, tartan gowns, cowboy hats, spa treatments […] and a health workshop with crystals. This is how the modern gentry roll.'
So far, so modern – although Violet is expected to take her husband's surname, having previously told The Telegraph of her 'enormous respect for tradition' and her loathing of the word 'woke,' adding, 'For me, the old tradition of taking your husband's surname still rings true.'
'Everyone grows up with this image […]' Lady Violet told Town & Country magazine earlier this year, when asked whether her life in a castle was like a fairytale. 'We all put on the princess dresses when we're younger, we all love the Disney movies, and we were no different. [But growing up at Belvoir] was actually quite scary.'
It seems that now, though, Lady Violet has found her prince.
