Ellie Goulding was rumored to have dated Prince Harry for a while before he finally met his future wife, Meghan Markle. The singer is getting married next month, and reports say she has invited the royal family, except her ex-boyfriend and his wife.
According to Metro, Goulding's wedding to art dealer fiancé Caspar Jopling will be quite lavish, and it will happen at Castle Howard. Some 300 guests are expected at the event, which will include Prince Harry's cousins Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie and their mother, the Duchess of York, Sarah Ferguson.
According to Mirror, even Prince William and Kate Middleton have been invited to Goulding's wedding, where guests will be treated to a "festival style" atmosphere. Incidentally, Goulding and Prince Harry met during the wedding of Prince William and Kate in 2011, where the singer rendered a couple of songs.
Prince Harry and Goulding have remained good friends following that meeting and flirted with each other for a while until they dated for two years. Despite the end of their relationship, the two have remained friends and the Duke of Sussex even watched Goulding star in a stage play in 2017. At that time, he was already with Duchess Meghan.
It's not clear why Goulding has not invited her former boyfriend and his wife. According to Honey, Goulding was also not at the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan in 2018.
Some speculate that the exes may be trying to avoid an awkward situation. Others say, however, Prince Harry will have a busy engagement in August before he and Meghan leave for their two-week sojourn in South Africa.
Meanwhile, amid all the news and noise about the Sussex royal couple, a royal expert said that Prince Harry failed Meghan for not properly explaining to her just how intense the royal spotlight would be. Tim Ewart said in his podcast that while Meghan is used to the attention as an actress, she wasn't being "hunted by the paparazzi" before she became a royal.
"This Royal Family is beyond anything she could ever have expected, and it will be very, very difficult for Harry, as it was with William and Kate, to explain just how intense that is," Ewart said, per The Sun. His comments came in light of the fact that Meghan is struggling with the negative press surrounding her.
Ewart said that Meghan's every word and action is being heavily scrutinized. Every single person has their smartphones up when it comes to this royal family.
