Pippa Middleton Appreciation Society

Pippa Middleton's engagement ring is impossible to ignore. It's enormous - a sumptuous three-carat diamond surrounded by 12 smaller stones. Every time she moves her hand and it catches the light, the effect is dazzling.



We meet in a suite of a discreet hotel in the shadow of Kensington Palace where she has agreed to give her first major newspaper interview to talk about her new charity cookery book, Heartfelt, produced to raise money for the British Heart Foundation.



The flipside of her celebrity status has seen her the target of social media abuse and a drip, drip, drip of gossip that would destroy the most confident of social butterflies.

'I have had a few years of being in the public eye and I have developed something of a thick skin,' she says. 'But managing it all on my own has been quite hard. I have quite a lot thrown at me, such as being followed by people hiding behind cars and jumping out with cameras. It can be unnerving.'



Unlike her sister, she doesn't have any security guards or media minders. 'There's always something cropping up and that has to be managed on my own. It's been a real eye-opener for James. There have been quite a few hurdles to negotiate,' she says carefully.

'I guess it's become the new normal for us. It means there are factors we have to weigh up and think about, but we try not to let it affect us. I try not to be too sensitive about things because it's just a bit of life I have to deal with. But I would be lying if I said it didn't affect me.'