By Daily Mail (U.S.) | Created at 2026-08-07 17:40:55 | Updated at 2026-08-07 19:35:36
3 hours ago
To mark her milestone 45th birthday, few could be surprised that the Duchess of Sussex, who we still can't stop calling Meghan Markle, turned to Instagram to make sure we all got to see a few glimpses of her impeccably perfect day.
A birthday dance in T-shirt and lounge pants and a cuddle with the dogs who joined in the celebrations with their paper party hats were the foreground to an impossible to miss post that captured the Duchess jumping feet first into an outdoor pool – while clutching an enormous array of balloons.
The mid-leap moment, her way of saying thanks 'for the birthday love,' went immediately viral – not just because it added another turn to the continuing kaleidoscope of 'Brand Sussex' but for the possible inspiration it took from another, altogether more iconic shot.
The picture was of her late mother-in-law, Diana, Princess of Wales and the image, taken almost twenty-nine years ago to the day, was shot from the long lens of a paparazzi camera on July 19, 1997.
On vacation with William and Harry in Saint-Tropez as guests of Harrods boss Mohammed Al-Fayed, Diana was caught leaping into the ocean – arms up in the air, one leg bent forward and the other outstretched behind her – enjoying to the full her final day of sun.
The visual similarities are so strikingly obvious, the pose, the water, the sense of abandonment – that it feels improbable that Meghan, a woman who has nailed the art of aesthetics, would not have been aware she was channeling a higher princess power.
Forging a connection between these two unconventional entries into the British Royal Family has, after all, for Harry become something of a trademark.
In their 2022 Netflix documentary, with archival footage of his mother playing, the Duke voices his belief that, 'So much of what Meghan is, and how she is, is so similar to my mum.
Clutching an enormous array of balloons, Meghan Markle jumped in a pool to mark her milestone 45th birthday
The picture took possible inspiration from her late mother-in-law, Diana, Princess of Wales in an image taken almost twenty-nine years ago to the day
Meghan celebrated her birthday with a dance in T-shirt and lounge pants
'She has the same compassion, the same empathy, she has the same confidence, she has this warmth about her.'
Believing his wife was subject to the same cruel scrutiny, both from the press and the Royal Family, their exit to a Montecito mansion was the failsafe not available to his mother.
To speak out to Oprah Winfrey in 2021, Meghan echoed the black and white color palette Diana had donned for her Panorama expose – one which like her daughter-in-law's called out an uncaring Royal Family that ignored mental trauma in favor of unbending institutional traditions.
It seems natural then, that as Meghan (not her husband) builds their commercial future almost exclusively around the lifestyle glimpses she offers us via Instagram, which she hopes will translate into sales of jam, the specter of Diana would remain omnipresent.
Throwing out a montage of holiday snaps, the ones that triggered the obvious comments were those taken at Althorp, the place that Diana from the age of 13 called home and where in its grounds she is buried.
The sentimentalists interpreted this homage as heart-wrenching. The more cynical saw the way in which a still beloved icon was being repurposed for brand building.
It is impossible to really know the truth about Harry's claims for comparisons between his wife and mother. We know neither woman really – that remains the remit of their family and close friends.
But there is, I think, a striking commonality, one which both unites but ultimately divides them as both public figures and standard bearers for a modern royal woman.
Each has demonstrated an acumen for crafting their image that is unrivalled within the wider Windsor network. Nothing, at least when it comes to their public presentation, ever happens by chance.
For Diana, we most frequently saw this with her clothes. From her 'black sheep sweater' – a sign of her escalating isolation from both Charles and the monarchy – to her iconic 'Revenge Dress,' the thigh high black cocktail number worn on June 29, 1994, the night her husband admitted his adultery.
To speak out to Oprah Winfrey in 2021, Meghan echoed the black and white color palette Diana had donned for her Panorama expose
In 1995, Diana called out an uncaring Royal Family that ignored mental trauma in favor of unbending institutional traditions
Diana and her dress blew Charles and his shocking admission straight off the front pages.
But other, more emotional, moments were just as carefully crafted.
Days after the publication of Diana: Her True Story and the volcano-like explosion caused by revelations of the princess's eating disorders, self-harm and depression, Diana let slip a few tears as she was praised for her compassion at Ashworth Hospital in Liverpool.
The raw emotion was unprecedented and was just one amongst many instances of Diana's ability to articulate a humanity that chimed with the universal human experience.
Meghan seems just as adept at crafting a moment through both dress and expression. Her chirpy birthday dance in the kitchen of her Montecito mansion was, we are asked to believe, a glimpse into the family's behind-the-public-persona existence.
Like Diana, she aims to give us authenticity, setting the scene with seeming perfection that compels us to both look and listen with as much intensity as we did that of her iconic mother-in-law. Yet there the resemblance ends.
Meghan, unlike Diana, cannot seem to find the sympathy with the public she is determined to target. She may have snared our voyeuristic obsession with her impeccable fashion sense and interiors which seem straight out of Architectural Digest, but she has yet to convince us these glimpses are any less artificial than her now defunct Netflix cooking show in which she played happy homes in a down the road rented kitchen.
Celebrating her birthday by a solitary leap into a private pool clutching a balloon bouquet feels, despite its obvious photographic appeal, like yet another instance of a Meghan manifested entirely for visual consumption and gives us no real insight into the person behind the portrayal.
Meghan seems just as adept at crafting a moment through both dress and expression as she did here taking inspiration from Diana's outfit more than two decades earlier at the Tongogara Refugee Camp in Zimbabwe in 1993
Both Meghan and Diana have demonstrated an acumen for crafting their image. Diana wore her iconic 'Revenge Dress' on the night her husband admitted his adultery
The exact opposite was true of Diana. Jumping into the Mediterranean on what was to be her final holiday with her two boys, the now divorced Diana projected a sense of fun and freedom.
Determined to derail headlines from focusing on the 50th birthday being given for Camilla Parker Bowles at Highgrove, her formal marital home, Diana had let rip for the cameras her bathing suit body, brandishing a newfound independence that seemed as authentically lived as the unhappiness of her preceding years.
Her gamble worked, and coverage remained firmly on the princess and not a woman who she still considered a rival.
Whether Meghan knows the wider story behind this moment of time in Diana's life is unclear. But she would, I firmly believe, do well to dig a bit more deeply when she next channels the late princess – because it was the authenticity, not the image, that, whether in success or failure, Diana always managed to convey that guaranteed her a place in the nation's heart and history.
