Michelle Obama and former POTUS, Barack Obama, visited the Queen during a state visit back in 2009 and now new details are being revealed. During a visit to Buckingham Palace, Michelle Obama put her arm around the Queen and now the Queen's dressmaker and close confidant, Angela Kelly, explains that the monarch actually welcomed the warm gesture.
Angela Kelly shares feelings about the Queen
Hello! exclusively shared an excerpt of Angela Kelly's book, The Other Side of the Coin: The Queen, the Dresser and the Wardrobe: "The Queen has the ability to make everyone feel so relaxed that sometimes it feels instinctive to be tactile with her, just as Michelle Obama demonstrated during the State Visit with her husband, President Obama, in 2009," she wrote.
She continued, "much has been made about the meeting between Michelle and her Majesty when an instant and mutual warmth was shared between these two remarkable women, and protocol was abandoned as they stood closely with their arms around each other’s backs." She then went on to say that the Queen always welcomes human kindness and that is exactly what Michelle Obama showed her.
Michelle Obama Feels the same way
Kelly has echoed what Michelle herself wrote in her 2018 memoir Becoming about the particular situation at Buckingham Palace. She said, "If I hadn’t done the proper thing at Buckingham Palace, I had at least done the human thing. I daresay that the Queen was okay with it, too, because when I touched her, she only pulled closer, resting a gloved hand lightly on the small of my back."