He’s been dubbed the ‘bad boy’ royal, but Cassius Taylor has opened up on a much more serious issue in his latest interview – mental health.
29-year-old Taylor, the grandson of Prince Edward, Duke of Kent, the late Queen Elizabeth’s first cousin, was awarded the nickname thanks to his work as a DJ, which takes him to many exclusive London events.
Speaking to Hello last week, however, Taylor revealed that it’s not all parties and glamour and he has himself grappled with mental health issues in the past.
He told the magazine that he supports Rave to Save, a fundraiser for men’s suicide prevention, and Suicide&Co, a charity helping individuals with suicide-related grief, because of his own experiences.
‘I’ve had my struggles. I think most people have. And if I can help give back, then I will,’ Taylor said.
When explaining the logic behind his skeleton arm tattoo, he once again touched on the topic of mental health, saying: ‘At the time, I was going through quite a lot of emotional changes and a good bit of self-realisation.
‘[There were] differences in how I felt at times. When I was up, I was up and when I was down, I was down, and I learned a lot from it.’
Cassius also told how he’s worked with the Royal Marsden Cancer Charity, where his mother, Lady Helen Taylor, is a trustee after his father, Timothy Taylor, was treated at the Royal Marsden Hospital for Hodgkin lymphoma, a form of blood cancer.
Elsewhere in the interview, Taylor revealed his ultimate ‘end goal’ of having a family of his own.
Taylor, like other more distant members of the royal family, was allowed to grow up away from the spotlight.
He would make rare public appearances as a child, including on the Buckingham Palace balcony for Trooping the Colour.
The second out of four children, Cassius grew up close with his brother Columbus, 31, and his younger sisters Eloise, 23 and Estella, 21.
He was educated at Wellington College in Berkshire, which costs £35,775-a-year, before heading to Goldsmiths, where he got a degree in art management.
He caught the creative bug from his parents, who are both renowned art dealers, saying: ‘I was constantly being dragged to galleries as a child.’
After graduating, he worked for his father’s London gallery before joining the PR agency Purple, where he dabbled in the events business, organising glitzy receptions at Somerset House.
He eventually left Purple PR and set up his own events company, named ‘Telltale.’
The royal has since curated his own show, which took place at the Painting Rooms of Flitcroft Street in Soho, and celebrated the work of painter Armen Eloyan as part of Frieze.
In his free time, Cassius has been a big fan of immersive theatre, especially an event called Punch Drunk, where guests are invited to put on VR headsets in an abandoned warehouse, with actors moving around participants.
He also shares a glimpse into his artsy life on Instagram, where snaps show him DJing with friends or hanging out with his glamorous cousins, Lady Amelia Windsor and Flora Vesterberg (granddaughter of Princess Alexandra, the Duke of Kent’s sister).
Cassius has previously joked that he is the ‘annoying’ child and added he took some time to settle into a career, unable to decide which genre he wanted to dedicate himself to.
He told Tatler: ‘I always knew I’d end up in the creative industries in some capacity, due to my upbringing, similar to everyone in my family.’
He was crowned one of the UK’s most eligible bachelors by the magazine, and luckily for single ladies, it is understood that he is currently romantically unattached.
