Meghan Markle’s anniversary candle: who wouldn’t want to pay $64 to celebrate someone else’s marriage?

Name: Anniversary candle. Appearance: A “modern and elegant” candle, “housed in a beautiful ceramic vessel”. Age: Brand new. Price: Yours for just $64, which is roughly £48. Sorry, that is objectively too much for a candle. Oh come on, it’s for an anniversary. What better way to mark a special occasion than with a beautiful scented candle? I suppose when you put it like that. What’s the big occasion? The eighth wedding anniversary of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. That’s it? Come on, where’s your sense of romance? Isn’t there a tiny part of you that wants to drop half the cost of a weekly shop on a candle that says “I recognise that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have now been married for eight years”? I don’t understand what’s going on. Look, it’s easy. Yesterday, the Instagram account of Markle’s As Ever lifestyle brand featured a post that read: “The feeling of warm sunshine and blue skies, surrounded by love and laughter. Celebrating 8 years of our founder @meghan and Prince Harry’s love story.” View image in fullscreen Prince Harry and Meghan Markle on their wedding day in 2018. Photograph: Damir Šagolj/Reuters What do blue skies feel like? Can you even feel a colour? The important thing is that the post also linked to a product called Signature Candle No 519. The website states that the candle is “bright and refreshing, with quietly grounding notes of Moroccan mint, white tea leaves, and a back note of woodsy cardamom”. Supposedly, it “evokes the freshness of a day in the English countryside”. Good that she remembers, since she hasn’t actually set foot in England since September 2022 (if you don’t count stopovers at Heathrow). You’re missing the point here. The point is that an eighth wedding anniversary is a very special thing. The bronze anniversary, isn’t it? Actually, no, I think you’ll find it’s the premium-mint-and-cardamom-scented-candle anniversary. Did you just make that up? Yes, of course I did! Listen, you try to justify something as bizarre as this. Nobody cares about their eighth anniversary! Why not just wait until your 10th? Honestly, it’s maddening. Glad we’re agreed. I mean, who is this for? Markle’s jams I understand, because everyone likes jams. I can even understand her other candles, because who doesn’t like a candle? Sure. But a candle you have made on the assumption that people will want to celebrate an arbitrary wedding anniversary? Come on, Markle, you’re not exactly making it easy to root for you. Do say: “Darling, let’s commemorate our anniversary traditionally this year.” Don’t say: “By monetising our relationship with merch for the rich and gullible.”