On Saturday, the Duchess of Sussex stepped out in Paris. She attended the Balenciaga show, and then changed into a sexy black dress for a post-runway party or dinner. She looked amazing. She glowed. She looked rich! Obviously, the usual suspects are upset about all of it. The immediate reaction from the British media was “how can Meghan visit France but not England?” Because King Charles has made it perfectly clear that the Sussex family should be put in mortal danger without security if they ever step foot on British soil? Because Meghan’s private security was most likely supplemented by official French police protection? Because the British papers to this day scream about how everyone on Abandonment Issues Isle hates Meghan and they never want her to come back? After the initial shock wore off, British royalists are trying a new tack: pretending that Meghan’s relative proximity to the UK means she secretly wants to come back to them! Bizarrely, they’re also acting as if France is part of the United Kingdom (it is not). From The Royalists’s fevered commentary:
Meghan Markle’s return to the European stage at Paris Fashion Week on Saturday night was nothing less than a statement of intent. This was her first time in Europe since she attended the Düsseldorf Invictus Games in 2023. Her team insisted that she was there simply to support Balenciaga’s new creative director, Pierpaolo Piccioli, but the symbolism was impossible to miss.
In the mirrored hall of Balenciaga, Meghan was once again among the European elite. Her solo trip may well have been planned to support a friend, but it also marked something larger, a controlled return to the continent she once seemed ready to abandon. After years of distance from the old world, she appears to be easing herself back into its orbit. It would be naive not to link her reappearance in Paris with her husband Prince Harry’s visit to London in September, when he met his father King Charles III for tea and cake amid talk of reconciliation. Harry said he wanted to spend more time in Britain. The couple’s much-publicised security concerns seem to have faded. Both now appear willing to cross the Atlantic quietly, without the drama that once surrounded their every move.
Palace officials, though, are uneasy. “If they really plan to spend more time here,” one former courtier told me after seeing the Paris pictures, “it changes everything. It puts them back in the frame, and that’s not what anyone expected.”
Her Paris appearance, unveiled to millions through Instagram reels, carried all the signatures of the Sussex operation: celebrity and glamour softened by a narrative of friendship and creativity. Every image—the tailored white suit, the chauffeured car, the candlelit after-party, and the black evening dress—was part of the same message: that she is relevant again on a continent where her in-laws still dominate the stage.
This return to Europe is undoubtedly more than a fashion moment. It feels like a recalibration, a quiet repositioning after years of distance. Meghan has no desire to return to royal life, but she knows that influence depends on proximity to power. Supporting Balenciaga allowed her to maintain independence while coolly reminding everyone of her connections.
Inside the Palace, this will be read as something much bigger than a night out in Paris. Harry’s September trip to London already signalled a wish to reconnect. With the King’s health an open question, Meghan’s sudden appearance on European soil only deepens the sense that the couple are re-establishing a presence they once swore off. For courtiers trying to keep the monarchy’s focus elsewhere, that prospect is unnerving.
Whether Europe truly welcomes her back is another question. The British press happily plastered her image everywhere on Sunday, showing that this time Meghan has successfully shaped the story on her own terms. By choosing Paris, she staked out a neutral ground. This was continental Europe, not Britain—glamorous, yet disentangled from royal politics. For one evening, she was not the runaway duchess, but the returning one; poised, confident, and no longer afraid of the stage she once fled. Will we see more of the Sussexes in Europe as the royal family prepares for a post-Charles world? Watch this space.
“She is relevant again on a continent where her in-laws still dominate the stage” – lmao. Camilla is in the wind, and even when she’s out and about, she doesn’t “dominate” jacksh-t. King Charles gets attention in Europe because everyone thinks he’s going to be gone in the next year. The only thing Kate dominates is buttons and hairpieces, although I would argue that those wiglets are the ones dominating poor Katie Keen. And Work-shy Willy? LMAO. This is all they have though – they’re so mad that Meghan is free, rich and glamorous, they’re trying their best to impose themselves on her and ride her glamorous cape-tails. “Meghan visited Paris, how can we make this all about the WINDSORS, this must mean that Meghan wants to come back to the UK!” These desperate hags.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid.
