Kate and Wills slammed as 'royal robots'

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have been slammed by the British tabloid media for being "royal robots" in "mumsy dresses and dad-trousers" during their US visit.

But other commentators were more charitable, saying the royals' wardrobe showed the couple as a united front and reflected a deliberate downmarket repositioning of the British monarchy.

Britain's traditionally royalist Daily Mail said on Thursday the glamour had evaporated just four years after William and Kate's fairytale wedding, describing the pair as "dull as Windsor moat water".

"There isn't an occasion they can't live down to and they almost always fail to exhibit the sense of grandeur and dignity that the monarchy demands," the tabloid said, adding that they had become a "Mr and Mrs Bland who trundle around the world in mumsy dresses and dad-trousers, saying not very much at all".

The newspaper was commenting on the royals' three-day visit to the US, a trip BBC royal correspondent Nicholas Witchell said showed the couple avoiding the "competition that existed between Prince William's father and mother when they were fulfilling engagements".

"Instead there is a realistic awareness of each other's ability to command column inches and a desire to work together to achieve the maximum impact," Witchell said.

It was a point taken up by The New York Times, which said the couple's clothes, "in their absolute boringness, made a serious statement".

It said the trip showed William and Kate engaged in the "repositioning of the royal family as normalish folks, in touch with the proverbial 'real life', which has been going on since they woke up and smelled the popular dissatisfaction at the turn of the millennium."