The reimagining of Eugenie – a new princess power player in the making?

Last week, Princess Eugenie kicked off the second series of herFloodlights podcast about modern slavery with an interview with Theresa May. During the podcast, run by Eugenie’s Anti-Slavery Collective, the former prime minister talked about her work to pass the Modern Slavery Act in 2015, with Eugenie making her admiration for the achievement abundantly clear.

Hailing May as “incredible and cool” and a “massive inspiration”, Eugenie said of her prioritisation of the issue: “That is so cool that you were prime minister and that was your biggest thing. I just wanted to say that. That is awesome that you were championing this as prime minister.”

The 33-year-old’s delivery may have been gushing, but those who know her say her dedication to the cause is deadly serious. She and business consultant Julia de Boinville co-founded the Anti-Slavery Collective in 2017 following a 2012 trip to Kolkata, India, in which they were “shocked to discover the extent to which slavery still exists”, with almost 50 million people enslaved worldwide. The charity’s aim? To raise awareness and funds to help eradicate the problem altogether.

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Eugenie, on maternity leave from her day job as director at London’s Hauser & Wirth art gallery following the birth of her second child, Ernest, in May, is currently immersed in preparations for the charity’s first gala on 29 November. It promises to be a lavish event at the Battersea Arts Centre, with Eugenie’s celebrity friends including James Blunt attending, along with her mother and sister.

“Eugenie is an absolute force,” says one of her circle. “This isn’t something she’s just lending her name to – she’s built the charity from the ground up and it’s her biggest passion.”

Of course, she’s not the first royal to use the medium of podcasting to draw attention to a cause close to her heart – comparisons with her cousin Harry and his wife Meghan are inevitable. Eugenie remains extremely close to the couple, despite their very public rift with the rest of the royals; the two families spent time together in Portugal following the Invictus Games in September. It’s impossible not to wonder whether, as she takes an increasingly public role, Eugenie might be taking inspiration from the pair – and from Meghan, in particular.

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Until now, it’s fair to say the youngest daughter of Sarah Ferguson and Prince Andrew – currently 10th in line to the throne – has managed to avoid the level of scrutiny to which other royals have been subjected.

Since she was born in 1990, her immediate family has been mired in one scandal after another, from Fergie’s toe-sucking exploits with businessman John Bryan to the more recent furore that surrounded the Duke of York’s association with paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, which saw him ousted from frontline royal duties. Her mother’s diagnosis of breast cancer, for which she had surgery in June, has no doubt added to her and her sister’s worries.

As the Queen’s granddaughters, and nieces to the King, Eugenie and her sister Beatrice are in the no man’s land position of having HRH titles but not being working royals, funded by the crown. Charles’s desire for a streamlined monarchy with just a few key members, along with his decision to leave his disgraced brother firmly out in the cold, could easily have sent Eugenie down a well-trodden path: the pampered life of a society belle, flitting between her home in Frogmore Cottage, where she’s lived since it was vacated by Harry and Meghan, and Portugal’s Atlantic coast, where her husband Jack Brooksbank works in a marketing role at the luxury CostaTerra Golf and Ocean Club.

Instead, she’s stepping into the spotlight in an unexpected way. For the first time, her views on a range of weighty subjects are being made known. Earlier this year, Eugenie surprised commentators by turning up at the World Economic Forum in Davos and giving an interview about the climate crisis, in which she said her elder son August “is going to be an activist from two years old” and that “at home, we try as much as possible to have no plastic”.

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Her words echoed the public views of her cousin Harry, with whom she’s always had an exceptionally close bond. Growing up, they were the naughtier younger siblings of the more serious William and Beatrice, giggling together as they hid from the paparazzi on skiing holidays in Klosters.

According to the Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand book Finding Freedom: “Like Harry, Eugenie is loyal, honest and great fun. The two had many nights out together in London, sneaking into back entrances of clubs, such as Mahiki, where Jack was once manager, or Tonteria where in one of the VIP cave areas they downed shots from Mexican skull-shaped glasses.”

As adults, the pair share a natural ability to develop a rapport with those they meet. “Eugenie is very down to earth and well-liked,” says the member of her circle. “When she meets people, she’ll really listen to them and be interested and willing to learn.”

Eugenie was friends with Meghan prior to the first meeting between Meghan and Harry – the two women meeting through their mutual friend, fashion designer Misha Nonoo – and was among the first to know about their burgeoning relationship, partying in Toronto with the couple before their relationship went public. She has remained steadfast in her support of the pair since they quit royal life and moved to California, visiting them there several times and even appearing in the background of their Netflix documentary. It’s often speculated that if anyone can bring them back into the fold, it’s her.

Crucially, Harry and Eugenie have also bonded over the difficulty they both faced in carving a role as “them” in the royal family’s very clear “us and them” divide. Both grew up listening to their adored and greatly respected grandmother, the Queen, emphasising the duty that goes with a royal title, and Eugenie is known to admire the humanitarian work Meghan and Harry have continued despite no longer being working royals. Their riposte of “Service is universal” when they were stripped of their titles may have been viewed by many as disrespectful, but for Eugenie, it appears to resonate.

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The modern, less formal approach Meghan takes to highlighting the causes she cares about seems to be one she’s keen to emulate. When the princess donned an apron during a visit in September to the Bramber Bakehouse in East Sussex, which supports female survivors of human trafficking and modern slavery, the images were more than a little reminiscent of Meghan’s work with the Hubb Community Kitchen to benefit survivors of the Grenfell Tower fire.

And using a podcast to spread the message about her charity work is straight out of the Markle playbook. While she’s highly unlikely to sign up for a $20m Spotify deal like the Sussexes, her Floodlight podcast, which features a series of high-profile guests including Dame Emma Thompson, is a canny way to raise awareness of her work without facing a barrage of difficult questions about her father – a predicament Meghan could certainly sympathise with following the “Markle debacle” with her own father, Thomas.

Ironically, Eugenie’s hard work to carve her own niche may be paying off in a way she didn’t expect: speculation is mounting that, with the number of working royals dwindling and plenty of engagements still to be done, she and Beatrice may be now be called upon to step up. How she will navigate the next chapter – combining being a “spare” and getting on with her own life and passion projects, with a more official royal role – will be interesting to watch. It is a fine balance neither Harry nor Meghan managed to achieve, but Eugenie could yet emerge as a significant power princess for the House of Windsor.