With wildflower honey in her pantry, California warmth in her wardrobe and reconciliation perhaps in her heart, Meghan returns to England as a Queen Bee who has built a hive of her own
Wildflower honey in the pantry is deliciously perfect to contemplate, especially at this time of year. With her lifestyle brand, As Ever, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex has coolly brought California honey to the English countryside. And boy, is a little bit of honey exactly what everyone needs at a time like this.
Meghan’s not merely carrying it in her luggage, of course, but bringing with her everything it represents: sunshine captured in a jar, the scent of orange groves, wildflowers trembling in the warm California air, and the instinct to turn something simple into a beautiful ritual.
As Ever’s latest email arrived in my inbox this morning, introducing “two distinct expressions of California”: Wildflower Honey and Orange Blossom Honey, harvested in the state Meghan now calls home. It just sounded so hopeful when you consider the reception she and Harry have received from King Charles. If he wanted the Duke and Duchess to feel at home, he sure picked a strange way to show it. Which is why California will always be Meghan’s home state, even if she can build a beautiful life in the Cotswolds so long as she is there.
She is a queen bee, after all. We would expect nothing less.
The Honey Duo Gift Box is intended for “drizzling, stirring, savoring, and sharing”—four little words that describe not simply a product, but an entire way of living.
In my imagined rendition of Harry and Meghan’s year in England, I see those elegant jars unpacked in a Cotswolds kitchen, sitting on an old wooden table beneath a mullioned window. Outside, the English morning is pewter-grey. The grass is wet. Somewhere beyond the garden wall, a dog returns from its walk with muddy paws.
Inside, California is glowing amber in a jar.
England may provide the stone house, the autumn mist and the long wooden breakfast table. But Meghan brings the sunshine.
THE QUEEN BEE HAS ARRIVED
Meghan is the Queen Bee, and everyone knows it. This unfortunately can expose her to jealousies. But it is not her fault she is the queen. And no, she is not asking anyone to place another crown upon her head. She has already lived inside the royal hive and discovered precisely how sharp its sting can be. No, she is the Queen Bee because she understands the work of building a hive of her own.
Over the past several years, the Duchess has quietly gathered her family close, protected her children, defended her marriage and created a home thousands of miles from the institution that once sought to define her in the narrowest most diminishing way. She has planted roots in California and built As Ever from the ground up, around the things she appears to value: the garden, the pantry, the beautifully laid table and the pleasure of sharing something lovely with another person. All the while, her detractors have spent every working hour mocking her, ranting and raving at her, criticizing her and even hating on her. Through it all, she has remained dignified and focused.
My sense is that her dignity has surprised them. They expected her to show anger and desperation, but with each year, she has remained calm and composed, as if she is perfectly clear about what is important and what is not.
The Queen Bee does not spend all day answering every insect buzzing around her. She tends the hive. She protects its sweetness. And she keeps building.
Meghan seems to have resigned herself to the fact that there will, inevitably, be wagging tongues waiting to turn even a jar of honey sour. Some people possess the remarkable ability to find bitterness in almost anything Meghan does. A gift box becomes an act of provocation. A handwritten note becomes strategy. A pot of jam apparently threatens the constitutional order.
But the timing of this honey feels almost playfully symbolic. As Harry and Meghan begin another chapter in England with Archie and Lili beside them, Meghan is not returning as the uncertain young woman who once entered palace life. She arrives with a marriage that endured, two beautiful children, an established California home and a business that carries her particular language of hospitality.
She is not returning empty-handed. She is bringing the honey. The symbolism cannot be overstated.
CALIFORNIA MEETS THE COTSWOLDS
Naturally, our Queen Bee must be dressed for the occasion.
I imagine Meghan walking across the damp grass in a buttery cream cashmere sweater by American designer Gabriela Hearst, paired with beautifully cut olive trousers from Burberry. On her feet, practical brown leather boots; over one arm, a woven basket holding a loaf of bread, late-season pears and two jars of As Ever honey.
America above the waist. Britain below it.
California warmth meeting English tailoring.
It would be more than an outfit. It would be a quiet declaration that Meghan no longer needs to choose between the different parts of herself. She can be American and a Duchess. Californian and connected to Britain. An entrepreneur and a woman who still understands the history carried by her husband and children.
Perhaps that is the mature lesson beneath this imagined homecoming. Reconciliation does not require a woman to erase herself before entering the room. It does not demand that she abandon the life she built in order to be welcomed back into the life she left.
Meghan can bring her own sweetness to the table. With a honeycomb built on connection.
