The U.S. Is Home Now, Says Prince Harry

(Image credit: Getty Images)

published 23 April 2022

Speaking at the Invictus Games this week—held in The Hague, Netherlands—Prince Harry was only about six hours away from where he was born and raised in London. But, to the Harry of today, home isn’t there anymore—it’s in Montecito, California, an ocean away from Europe and where he’s built a life over the past two years with wife Meghan and their kids, Archie, nearly three, and Lili, 10 months.

“Home for me now is, for the time being, is in the States,” he told Hoda Kotb of Today, joking he was “sure” his preference for his California lifestyle would “become a thing” across the pond, per Page Six—though, the outlet writes, he “couldn’t deny the impact of his life with his two kids, Archie and Lilibet.”

Despite global conflicts like the war in Ukraine, it’s in Montecito that Harry admits at times he feels “massively at peace, but with everything that’s going on in the world…”

Of California—which is where wife Meghan was born and raised—“we’ve been welcomed with open arms, and it’s got such a great community up in Santa Barbara.”

That said, the father of two admits, it’s not all perfect: “Working from home is not all that it’s cracked up to be,” he told Kotb. “Archie spends more time interrupting our Zoom calls than anybody else, but he also gets us off them as well, so that’s helpful.”

As for missing his family in the U.K.? It was a bit of an artful dodge from the Duke of Sussex, as he answered “especially over the last two years, for most people, have they not missed their family?...I mean, for me, in the moment, I’m here [at the Invictus Games] with these guys, [the veterans] and their families,” he said.

Though tensions might be running high with some members of his family, Harry simply adores his grandmother the Queen, who he and Meghan visited at Windsor Castle last week.

“We have a really special relationship,” he said of Her Majesty, saying he and Meghan joined her for tea and that it was nice to catch up with her. “We talk about things that she can’t talk about with anybody else.”

As for missing older brother Prince William—who was skiing out of the country during Harry’s visit—“it was purely coincidental,” a source told Us Weekly. “Harry is coming back to visit soon and hopes to see William in person. They are trying to figure things out…Harry and Meghan had a wonderful time seeing the Queen again. It was one of the biggest highlights of their year so far.”

And, as special as Her Majesty and other members of the royal family are to Harry, his focus now is in California and his own family he is raising there.

“My sort of mantra now every day is I’m trying to make the world a better place for my kids,” he shared, per Page Six.

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Rachel Burchfield is a writer, editor, and podcaster whose primary interests are fashion and beauty, society and culture, and, most especially, the British Royal Family and other royal families around the world. She serves as Marie Claire’s Senior Celebrity and Royals Editor and has also contributed to publications like Allure, Cosmopolitan, Elle, Glamour, Harper’s Bazaar, InStyle, People, Vanity Fair, Vogue, and W, among others. Before taking on her current role with Marie Claire, Rachel served as its Weekend Editor and later Royals Editor. She is the cohost of Podcast Royal, a show that was named a top five royal podcast by The New York Times. A voracious reader and lover of books, Rachel also hosts I’d Rather Be Reading, which spotlights the best current nonfiction books hitting the market and interviews the authors of them. Rachel frequently appears as a media commentator, and she or her work has appeared on outlets like NBC’s Today Show, ABC’s Good Morning America, CNN, and more.

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