Say what you like about the Duchess of Sussex – and I try to – but she has a knack for coming up with the provocative. While the world is still reeling from the recent video of her twerking (and a thousand thinkpieces solemnly debating exactly whether she has a right to twerk or not), she has returned a few days later with news that is both entirely unexpected and grimly predictable. Meghan is considering parlaying her ‘As Ever’ lifestyle and homeware range into a series of restaurants and – be still my beating heart – hotels.
Although details of this potential hospitality empire are as yet sketchy, it has been reported that the brand has been trademarked with a view to providing ‘hospitality services’. This will reportedly include both places to stay and, chillingly, ‘the provision of food and drink’. Whether or not this will mean that guests will be treated to As Ever-branded honey and the already infamous strawberry jam at the breakfast table is as yet unclear, but it would not be remotely surprising to find, in a few months, that the first such enterprise is well on its way to opening.
A stay in an As Ever hotel would be an unforgettable one – for all the wrong reasons
After all, Meghan had already warned the world that such a thing was coming on her Netflix show, when she blithely stated that, ‘When I have someone stay, one of my favourite things to do is prep the guest room.’ It is tempting to imagine the Sussexes opening a small family-run bed-and-breakfast business in Montecito. Meghan would certainly excel at serving up the homespun dishes and treats that she demonstrated to an indifferent world in With Love, Meghan. Not only this, but you can imagine her attention to detail extending to placing passive-aggressive little notes on guests’ pillows with the turndown service: something along the lines, perhaps, of her brand statement that ‘As Ever is more than a brand – it’s a love language’.
And as for Harry, well, every independent hospitality business needs a former military man in charge of logistics, although this one will hardly shut up and get on with the job. Imagine the Major from Fawlty Towers, but with a propensity to drone on (and on) about the various legal cases that he has been involved in, how his father doesn’t understand him and how he hates his brother.
Such things would undoubtedly make a stay in an As Ever hotel an unforgettable one – for all the wrong reasons. However, I suspect that what is more likely is that the brand would instead turn into an overpriced, soulless mid-market group of identikit hotels and restaurants, no doubt with the omnipresent image of their founder and spiritual guru beneficently smiling down at their guests, like a more glamorous Big Brother. Undoubtedly, such venues would have curiosity value for a short period of time: I can almost hear the delighted shrieks of influencers and looky-loos in Montecito, positively orgasmic at the opportunity for more #content for their Instagram pages.
Yet those of us who can still restrain ourselves from excitement at the antics of La Markle will be looking at this latest development with a mixture of unease and dread. It is obvious that she now sees herself as an entrepreneur and lifestyle pioneer, and there is little limit to her ambitions: cruise ships, rocket ships; who knows what else is likely to follow if this does take off.
Perhaps it may have been kinder, on balance, to allow Meghan to retain her much-coveted HRH title. Had that happened, these perpetual exercises in self-gratification may have been less vital to her self-esteem. As it is, all we can do is to await, with suitable trepidation, the opening of the least welcoming hotel since The Shining’s The Overlook.
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