In case you missed her first outing of the day, Meghan wore a Martin Grant sundress on Bondi Beach. I’m torn on what she wore for their afternoon school visit: Meghan switched into a sleeveless Roksanda dress (with her suede Stuart Weitzmans), and admittedly, at first I thought, “Huh, another solid blue thing?” I’m not sure if she’s actually worn a lot of these or if it just feels like it because she wore a light variation on the theme the precious day. The paler stripe at the bottom does at least differentiate it, and it’s a very nice dress; the color scheme evokes that of the uniforms of the students at Macarthur Girls’ School. If that was the thinking, I like it; quite the opposite of the Queen’s usual approach, Meghan blends with them well in the group photos, as if she is one of them. Which I think was the message — a sort of “We’re all in this together” kind of thing. She apparently commented on her shared experience at a girls’ school, and they’re the young royals trying to empower young people, so I think the dress must have been very well thought out from that perspective. Here’s a bit from her informal chat, by the by, courtesy of the DMIK:
[Meghan], who has been a long-term advocate for women’s rights, told students that their projects, including making boxes of supplies for women in need, made her proud.
‘You guys all remind me so much of myself when I was growing up,’ she told 14-year-old girls. ‘I went to an all girls school which was incredibly diverse as well.
‘I think being around such empowered young women, it becomes something that you all just grasp onto to understand your world. It’s made you confident, well-spoken. You have an intention set to really do something to change the world, and you have to keep it up.
‘It makes me so emotional. You’re doing really, really good work and I’m so happy that we’re here. We give you our full support.’
My one reservation: As noted, she just wore a sleeveless blue dress yesterday. Plus, the stripe isn’t visible in all photos, taking the uniqueness out of it altogether (a problem I’ve noted a couple other times, her wedding dress being one of them). With the uniform-matching in mind (assuming that’s true), I think I’d have held the Dion Lee from Wednesday/Thursday to wear later in the tour, so that this one didn’t feel quite like it was coming in the shadow of a sibling. And if it wasn’t an intentional match to the school unis, then why not take the budgetary freedom that probably comes with a specialty royal tour and vary it a tad more? Roksanda is not short on frocks, nor is Dion Lee.
[Also, just as an anecdotal note, this is also available in olive with a navy stripe; if not for the potential uniform-matching, that would’ve been a tough choice for her, as that’s also right in Meghan’s color wheelhouse.]
This visit was meant to be a surprise, apparently — they told the girls it was a government minister coming — but word leaked out anyway. Still, check out this reaction:
Safe to say that #harryandmeghan turning up at MacArthur Girls High school in west Sydney was quite a surprise to the students!! Listen to the screams! Meghan changed into the Roksanda ‘Athena’ dress (hope it brought her wisdom…) pic.twitter.com/4DrQ811cF2
— Emily Andrews (@byEmilyAndrews) October 19, 2018
And this is very funny, unintentionally (I assume):
Just noticed this slightly unfortunate juxtaposition.. #royalvisitAUS pic.twitter.com/JIy0PrQMQi
— Emily Nash (@emynash) October 19, 2018
Click on through for more pics, and some shots of Harry climbing the Sydney Harbor Bridge in his black shirt, coordinating with the Invictus flag. A video report is here:
Prince Harry and Prime Minister @ScottMorrisonMP have climbed the Sydney Harbour Bridge raising the flag for the 2018 @InvictusSydney. #RoyalVisitAustralia #7News pic.twitter.com/QgtKLlS5O5
— 7 News Sydney (@7NewsSydney) October 19, 2018
Y’all, I am READY for some sportsfaces.
