Claire Ptak, renowned for crafting the organic lemon, elderflower, and buttercream cake for Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s wedding, and later their daughter Lilibet’s first birthday, now finds herself in a challenging situation.

Despite the high-profile endorsement from the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, Ptak’s bakery, Violet Cakes, located in Dalston, East London, is struggling due to financial pressures faced by many UK businesses under the current Labour Government led by Sir Keir Starmer.

The esteemed pastry chef has reached out to the public for support to keep her California-style bakery from closing. This plea comes amid soaring business rates, a situation that has sparked frustration among pub landlords across the nation, leading to a ban on Labour MPs in numerous establishments.

While the Government has rolled out a rebate for pubs, other businesses have not received similar relief.

Claire Ptak with the Sussexes’ wedding cake. The baker has made a public appeal for financial support

Ptak has taken to the internet to express her predicament. “We are really struggling in silence with the same issues pubs are voicing and are truly in trouble,” she confesses.

She continues, “I’m determined to save my business for myself, my daughter, and my 20 wonderful employees, not to mention all of you. I’m considering options like crowdfunding or seeking investments. What are your thoughts? Would you support a crowdfunding campaign?”

Claire, who also baked a wedding cake for pop star Charli XCX last summer, trained as a pastry chef in her native California before moving to London, where she wrote six recipe books.

Meghan chose her for her wedding, having previously interviewed her for her lifestyle blog, The Tig.

The wedding cake took five days to prepare and some of the ingredients, including the elderflower syrup, were sourced from the Royal Family’s Sandringham estate in Norfolk.

David Walliams caught out on film

Performing as perverted children’s entertainer Des Kaye on his Little Britain live tour, David Walliams used to invite young male audience members on stage before trying to pull down their underwear in a game he called ‘Hide the Sausage’.

Now, Walliams has claimed: ‘We did that sketch at 250 shows… and not a single person ever complained.’ However, a 2007 BBC documentary shows him reading a letter from a fan, who writes: ‘For me, this was not a joke… it went too far, I was molested when I was very young.’

Jack Whitehall and Roxy have dress rehearsal for their big day 

Model Roxy Horner is so eager to tell comedian Jack Whitehall ‘I do’ that she’s already road-testing bridal looks on her nights out.

The model turned a Burns Night dinner into a dress rehearsal for their wedding, wearing a white sheer lace gown that cost £615. ‘I’m in my bridal era,’ she tells me at the Singleton Whisky event at Rosewood London. ‘This is from Nadine Merabi’s wedding collection. I had to try it as I’m testing the waters. I’m going crazy and trying every style you can think of.’

Roxy Horner in her white sheer lace gown

Jack Whitehall has been in a relationship with Roxy since 2020. They have one child together

Roxy, 34, says 37-year-old Whitehall will be ‘pleasantly surprised’ by her choice on the big day.

Vegetarian Roxy skipped the lamb and haggis pie but did treat herself to a wee tipple.

Racing genius who died at just 53 leaves fortune

One of his obituaries described him as ‘horse racing’s last great gentleman’, much in the same way that his father, who predeceased him by four years, had rightly been called Britain’s ‘last great gentleman bookseller’.

But if Joe Saumarez Smith, who died of cancer last year aged 53, matched his father John in easy charm and unassuming intellect, he eclipsed him – with his Midas touch. His will, just published, discloses that he left a fortune of £52million – amassed entirely through his own acumen and instinctive brilliance.

At Bristol University his winnings caused his local branch of William Hill to close early, while later triumphs included scooping £125,000 on Kicking King’s victory in the 2005 Cheltenham Gold Cup.

Appointed chair of the British Horseracing Association in 2022, he left everything to his beloved wife, Wanda, with whom he had two children.

A grandson for £6bn Earl

George Cadogan and his wife Davina have had their first child together

The couple, who have been together since they were teenagers, have named their son Henry

Her husband is the heir to a £6billion fortune, including nearly 100 acres of prime real estate in west London. Yet Viscountess Chelsea now has something far more precious: a healthy baby son.

Davina, 29, who is social editor of Tatler magazine, has given birth to her first child. ‘Our beautiful boy,’ she writes online next to this photograph which she has shared with her thousands of followers.

She and her husband, George, 30, whose father is the 9th Earl Cadogan, have named their baby Henry. The couple have been sweethearts since they were teenagers.

Having stepped down from Bake Off, Dame Prue Leith has one last showbiz ambition to fulfil. She has written eight novels and wants one of them to be turned into a Hollywood film.

‘I, egotistically and perhaps not realistically, think that a couple of my novels would make wonderful films,’ blushes Dame Prue, 85. ‘So that’s what I’d like to see before I die.’

Lady Mary’s malaria fears

Lady Mary Charteris has been left seriously ill following a recent holiday in Kenya with her husband, musician Robbie Furze, and their five-year-old daughter, Wilde.

‘Do I have malaria or do I have the flu?’ the DJ and socialite asks on social media from her London home. ‘I haven’t been able to get out of bed, haven’t been able to eat, sleep, breathe.’

The Earl of Wemyss’s daughter, 38, admits: ‘Taking malaria medication didn’t even cross my mind… It didn’t even come up, even when I applied for the visa.’