Prince Harry and Meghan Markle Reclaim Royal Identity With New Website: It ‘Suits Their Purpose’
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle quietly unveiled a new website, reclaiming their royal identity almost four years after leaving their official duties for the crown. The couple’s new online home is their fourth website in five years.
With Sussex.com, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle reclaim their royal identity
Late in the evening of Feb. 12, 2024, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle unveiled a new website titled Sussex.com. It is their latest attempt at royal rebranding since leaving their royal roles in March 2020.
This new website replaces their Archewell site with Sussex.com and “The Office of Prince Harry & Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.” The new website allows Harry and Meghan to promote events and activities along with the work of their not-for-profit, Archewell Foundation, and Archewell Productions.
Royal commentator Daniela Elser of News.com.au writes, “Harry and Meghan had every right to walk away from royal life, but again, we see them prove they are more than happy to claim membership of this problematic institution when it suits their purpose.”
Elser believes the couple realized what they have done thus far “has not exactly worked.” She writes, “This new site seems designed to reposition the Sussexes as much more serious and accomplished figures, people who truly matter and occupy a meaningful role in public life.” She said they have again embraced their royal titles with “straight-faced gusto.”
However, this rebrand may piggyback on Meghan’s comments at Variety’s Power of Women Event in November 2023. She teased the couple’s new projects, saying, “I can’t wait until we can announce them, but I’m just really proud of what we’re creating. My husband is loving it, too. It’s really fun.”
Why would Prince Harry and Meghan Markle initiate a royal rebrand?
Royal commentator Daniela Elser questioned the couple’s motives for initiating what appears to be a royal rebrand. This comes four years after stepping back from their official duties for the crown.
“Post-Megxit, the duo went out into the world. They built their identity and careers on speaking truth to the crusty powers-that-be inside Buckingham Palace,” she wrote.
“And yet now we have the same two people going to serious lengths to reassert their membership of said same institution. That was, by the Sussexes’ own accounts, cruel, biased, and basically willing to eat their own in order to survive.”
Elser claims the couple is “hoping we might all suddenly develop a swift and incurable case of collective amnesia about what has come before and suddenly take them at their website’s face value.” However, she finds one element of their new website suspiciously familiar: a coat of arms that does not belong to Prince Harry.
Meghan’s royal coat of arms is prominently featured on the couple’s new home page
Strangely, the new website features only Meghan Markle’s coat of arms. Meghan was given that regal pattern to symbolize her membership in the royal family on her wedding day.
Daniela Elser writes, “But let’s begin with the most obvious. The duke and duchess dug deep in the boxes in their Montecito attic to dig out a dusty coat of arms to slap all over this site.”
She continued, “It’s a move with all the subtlety and nuance of a partridge spork to the eyeball. A transparent attempt to remind the world and Hollywood they are the only people within Range Rover distance of Nobu with titles.”
Meghan’s coat of arms was unveiled in a 2018 royal family post on X. The coat of arms is typically given to the father of the bride rather than the bride herself.
Meghan’s coat of arms includes a blue background and shield, representing the Pacific Ocean off the California coast. Two golden rays across the shield symbolize the sunshine of Meghan’s hometown of Los Angeles.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have not discussed why they initiated what appears to be a royal rebrand. The couple will visit Vancouver, Canada, to launch the One Year to Go Event for the 2025 Invictus Games.
