Queen Mathilde of Belgium is celebrating her 50th birthday on January 20th.
Born Mathilde Marie Christine Ghislaine d’Udekem d’Acoz on 20 January 1973, she was the oldest of five children born to Count and Countess Patrick d’Udekem d’Acoz in Uccles, Belgium.
Her early schooling saw her study in Bastogne and Brussels, and her later studies saw her receive a diploma in speech therapy from Haute École Léonard de Vinci and a master’s psychology degree from the Université Catholique de Louvain.
With a gift for languages, she speaks French, Dutch, English and Italian and can speak some Spanish. Despite her mother’s Polish nationality, she does not speak Polish.
In 1999, this quiet and unassuming young woman shocked Belgium and the world with the announcement that she was set to marry Belgium’s quiet heir, Prince Philippe. So quiet was their relationship that the press never picked up on the fact that they were dating, and when their engagement was publicly announced, the press didn’t have an available, up-to-date photograph of their future queen to run in the papers.
Queen Mathilde married the future king on 4 December 1999 in Brussels in a custom-designed Édouard Vermeulen wedding gown. Upon marriage, she became known as Princess Mathilde, Duchess of Brabant. Her marriage set her on a path to becoming Belgium’s first Belgian-born queen consort.
Queen Mathilde is mother to four children, including Princess Elisabeth, Duchess of Brabant; Prince Gabriel; Prince Emmanuel; and Princess Eléonore, born in 2001, 2003, 2005 and 2008, respectively.
Much of Queen Mathilde’s royal work revolves around families and young people and ameliorating their conditions. These include working with charitable organisations devoted to ending poverty, reducing debt and creating better financial awareness, physical health, mental health and women’s causes.
She works with global organisations like the United Nations in support of its programmes, like the Sustainable Development Goals and UNICEF and the World Health Organisation in support of children’s health and vaccinations.
On 21 July 2013, then-reigning King Albert II abdicated his position, making his son King Philippe of the Belgians, and Mathilde became Queen Consort. Much of her royal work still consists of the same patronages, though now she represents Belgium on the world stage much more frequently, joining her husband for official state business as needed and hosting events such as the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition and annual concert.
In a retrospective interview for their 20th wedding anniversary, King Philippe remarked about his wife: “After 20 years of marriage, that the job my wife does… I really want to say this now, to thank you for all you have done. People don’t realise it fully, but it’s been an immense amount of work. At the time I couldn’t know yet what it would be like. Of course, I knew the young girl back then, and I told myself: I think she’s got a lot in her stride. But she’s proven capable of so much more.”
