Meet Lady Mary Charteris, the posh wild child who parties with Rita Ora, left Kate Moss jealous with rage and has caught the eye of David Beckham
SHE’S the party-loving, wild-child socialite who exists in a permanent state of semi-undress.
So it is no wonder Victoria Beckham is not happy about husband David’s growing closeness to Lady Mary Charteris.
But who is the hedonistic fashionista — who started smoking at 11, carried bottles of wine in her school bag and wore a shockingly revealing dress on her wedding day — and is Posh right to be worried?
We reported yesterday that the former Spice Girl, 43, is at loggerheads with Becks over his late-night partying with Mary, 30.
The pair met at Glastonbury and have developed a close relationship. Becks, 42, is said to have told a bloke who tried to chat her up at London’s Chiltern Firehouse: “She’s with me.”
Even supermodel Kate Moss once considered Mary, who is the daughter of an earl, a rival.
Kate, 43, became so angry with her alleged flirting with then-husband Jamie Hince that she pushed her into a pool during a party in 2013.
Kate and Jamie, 48, split two years later, with a friend claiming that Kate was “beyond jealous about his female friends”.
Mary describes herself as a model/DJ/jewellery designer — but she devotes most of her life to having fun. Her pals include Cara and Poppy Delevingne, Daisy Lowe, Rita Ora, Alexa Chung and Jaime Winstone.
At her £20,000-a-year all-girl Francis Holland School, in London’s ritzy Sloane Square, classmates remember a born-and-bred party girl who was smoking by age 11 and carted a bottle of wine around in her bag.
One said: “Mary was always keen to only have cool friends and do cool things and would never read a book.
“She was really popular with boys. All the guys from Eton and Harrow used to be in love with her. She’d sneak off to boys’ boarding schools to drink vodka and smoke.”
Another recalled a music lesson where Mary said she “didn’t know how to play much piano” but Jools Holland had come over to her house that weekend and “taught her how to play something”.
It was a typical insight into family life as the daughter of James Charteris, the 13th Earl of Wemyss and the 9th Earl of March, at a Jacobean mansion in Gloucestershire.
Supermodels including Naomi Campbell would often float around the estate, invited for fashion shoots by neighbour Isabella Blow, the outlandish tastemaker credited with discovering model Sophie Dahl and fashion designer Alexander McQueen.
Mary’s dad divorced her mum, Catherine Guinness — who used to work for Andy Warhol — when Mary was only three months old.
He later married Amanda Feilding, who runs a foundation championing the use of drugs such as MDMA to help in psychotherapy.
When Mary was nine, he whisked her off to Egypt where he underwent trepanning — a process of drilling into the skull to achieve a higher consciousness.
Mary said: “My stepmum filmed the whole thing and it was amazing. It makes you more perceptive, he says.
“It’s meant to be a childlike state, or something. I don’t really notice a difference, but I hope there is a difference so there’s a point to it.” Mary’s mother remarried but her second husband, Robert Hesketh, died aged 48 from an accidental overdose of heroin and cocaine at an 18th birthday party in 2004.
Mary is touchy about her privileged background, insisting that a title, bags of money and impeccable connections have had nothing to do with her current occupation of a carefree It Girl.
“What’s interesting about my title?” she pouted. “For me it’s nothing. There is a stigma attached to it and people make assumptions. Of course, I’ve had a charmed life, but I’m not given any handouts.
“Maybe it’s just naive of me, but I don’t feel like it’s opened doors.”
Cynics would say that Mary may not have landed modelling jobs for Louis Vuitton, Gucci and Nike if she was just any old blonde with a lip ring.
And her wedding to Robbie Furze, from little-known electronic rock band The Big Pink, may not have attracted quite so much attention. As it is, the lavish bash in 2012 was hailed as the society wedding of the year.
Keira Knightley was a guest, John Lennon’s son Sean took the pictures and Florence Welch sang as they signed the register.
Mary wore a dress so daring that one bridesmaid broke down crying because she hated it so much.
But dad James did not bat an eyelid when he realised he was going to be walking his daughter down the aisle with her belly button — and a lot else — on show.
Mary said: “He loved it. He said, ‘Is it going to be sexy?’. I said, ‘Yes, it’s going to be sexy, don’t worry’. And he said, ‘Good’.”
The wedding was planned to feel more like a festival, according to Mary, and was described as “wild, wonderful, magical mayhem” by close pal Poppy Delevingne. After hours of dancing, when the newlyweds eventually called it a night, they found friends already passed out on their bed.
So they spent their first night as man and wife in a single bed down the hall.
One dubious rumour even claims they were joined by a famous model for a threesome.
Today, Mary is officially part of her husband’s band.
And despite sources saying they are spending increasing time apart, last month she posted a gushing Instagram wedding anniversary tribute to him.
She wrote: “We are one of a kind and you’re my kind of one. Always and forever.”
Victoria Beckham will be hoping Mary keeps her attentions with her own husband.
After all, there’s only room for one Posh girl in Brand Beckham.