Prince and Princess of Wales revisit charity supported by wedding gift fund

Fifteen years after asking wedding guests to give to charity instead of bringing presents, the Prince and Princess of Wales marked their anniversary by returning to one of the charities that benefited from that request. On Wednesday, April 29, 2026, the couple made an unannounced visit to IntoUniversity’s Walworth center in south east London, where Year 5 students from Victory Primary School joined them for an astronomy lesson, team challenges and a creative design exercise about living in space.

The visit pointed back to the Royal Wedding Charitable Gift Fund, announced on March 16, 2011 ahead of the couple’s wedding at Westminster Abbey. The fund was created so guests who wanted to mark the marriage could donate to charity instead of giving gifts, and it ultimately supported 26 charities personally chosen by Prince William and Catherine. Official royal wedding records put the total raised at £1,058,367.

IntoUniversity was one of those 26 charities, and the organization says the money arrived at a pivotal moment. Around the time of the wedding, it operated only six centers in London. Today it runs 45 centers and extension projects across 28 towns and cities in England and Scotland, and says it has supported more than 250,000 students since 2002. That is the kind of gift that outlives the day it was given: not an object on a shelf, but a line of support that can change how a charity grows.

Rachel Carr, the charity’s co-founder and chief executive, has said the fund gave IntoUniversity both practical support and confidence to expand. The anniversary appearance made that legacy visible in a way a traditional present never could. Instead of a dinner service or a piece of jewelry, the couple revisited a project that has grown for more than a decade with help from the wedding fund they created for their guests.

The anniversary itself was marked more personally elsewhere, with a new family photo featuring Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis released earlier in the day. William had also visited a Royal Air Force base in Wales the day before, adding another layer of family and service to the week’s milestones. Together, the choices suggested a particular kind of anniversary giving: one part private, one part public, and one part enduring legacy.