Meghan Markle’s recent move on social media was described as “pure narcissistic rubbish” by a royal commentator who criticised her brand’s birthday tribute. The Duchess of Sussex stayed silent on Monday, August 4, her 44th birthday, but her lifestyle brand, As Ever, posted a gushing tribute to “the woman behind it all.”
As Ever uploaded a new black-and-white image of the Duchess wearing a dark dress and a light fedora, writing in the caption: “Celebrating the woman behind it all. She pours her heart, vision, and magic touch into every detail, and today, we raise a glass to her! Happy birthday to our founder @meghan.”
The post was praised by some of Meghan’s fans, but was largely criticised by others.
One of those slamming the Duchess was Lee Cohen, a US-based columnist as well as a royal and foreign policy commentator, who regularly comments on the Sussex couple.
Mr Cohen questioned whether As Ever’s post was uploaded by the Duchess’s team or herself and told the Express: “With Markle’s historically strange relationship with the truth, absolutely nothing from her or her ‘team’ (how many are actually still there and haven’t jumped ship?) carries a shred of credibility or authenticity.”
He added: “Her ‘As Ever ‘Instagram post, fawning over the ‘woman behind it all’ for her 44th birthday, is pure narcissistic rubbish— painfully contrived, and with her reputation, suspect to be self-penned.
“Only a handful of supporters tossed her birthday scraps, proof her reputation’s as unsalvageable as her Netflix flop.”
Mr Cohen’s Netflix comments refer to the latest Netflix rankings, which showed the Duchess’s series, With Love, Meghan, taking a nose dive to the 383rd spot with a total of 5.3million views since its release in March.
The royal commentator went on to say: “Privacy? Laughable—she’s shoving staged photos, jewellery gleaming, down our throats. Using her business page to wish herself a happy birthday—guess no one else would.”
On Tuesday night, Meghan made a belated birthday post on her Instagram, saying that she was “blowing out the candles on a beautiful 24 hours”.
She also thanked her husband, friends and family for “making it so special”.
Meghan said in her post: “Blowing out the candles on a beautiful 24 hours, and thanking my husband, friends and family for making it so special. To those of you I don’t know, but who send love every day – thank you so much. Please know I feel it and appreciate it. And just to get a little foodie on you… this dinner last night at @funke_la with the culinary mastery of @evanfunke and his team is in the top five meals of my life. Extraordinary. Thank you for a standout dining experience.”
The Duchess shared a new picture of herself blowing two candles on top of a stunning birthday cake featuring yellow flowers.