Britain’s Prince William and Kate Middleton are to marry on April 29 at Westminster Abbey, the historic London church where the funeral of his mother Diana was held in 1997, royal officials said yesterday.

Downing Street announced that there would be a special public holiday on the day, perhaps the biggest royal event in Britain since the ill-fated union of Prince William’s parents Prince Charles and Diana nearly three decades ago.

“The venue has long associations with the royal family – it is in many ways the royal family’s church – and of course with Prince William personally,” said Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton, private secretary to the prince. The imposing gothic abbey has been the British monarchy’s coronation church for centuries. Queen Elizabeth II also married Prince Philip at the abbey in 1947.

The date and venue were revealed just under a week after the second-in-line to the throne officially revealed his engagement, capping a romance that began at St Andrews University in Scotland nearly eight years earlier.

In what the prince said was a way of giving a posthumous role to his mother who died in a car crash in Paris 13 years ago, he also revealed that he had given Kate his mother’s diamond and sapphire engagement ring.

The wedding has given Britain a boost as it battens down the economic hatches ahead of harsh budget cuts aimed at cutting the country’s huge deficit, and with its armed forces mired in a tenth year of war in Afghanistan.

Mindful of the economic circumstances, Lowther-Pinkerton said the costs of the wedding would be paid for by the royal family and Middleton’s parents. “All parties involved in the wedding, not least Prince William and Miss Middleton, want to ensure that a balance is struck between an enjoyable day and the current economic situation,” he said. “To that end the royal family and the Middleton family will pay for the wedding.”