Prince Harry Discusses How Archie and Lili’s Sibling Dynamic Is Similar to Him and Prince William’s as Kids

For all Prince Harry’s memoir Spare and interviews have revealed about his dynamic with the royal family, the Duke of Sussex has actually spoken very little about his two children with Meghan Markle, Archie and Lilibet. But comments he made about his three-year-old son and one-year-old daughter’s dynamic during his ITV interview shed a little light on what their relationship with each other is like. Harry said their rapport reminds him of his and William’s when they were kids. Harry and William have a two-year age gap, just like Lili and Archie.

Harry started by speaking about his and William’s brotherly bond of “love but also separation. Which I think will really surprise people, the fact that we grew up—I mean our mother was dressing us in the same clothes to start with, William didn’t like that, I think I seem to remember I found it quite funny,” the younger prince said, via Hello!.

“But the older, younger sort of sibling rivalry as such, now is only really becoming real to me,” he continued. “For instance, I talk about the relationship between William and myself at Eton [the private high school they attended] and the fact that he didn’t really want to know me, and you know, as the younger brother that sucks.”

“It’s like, ‘Come on, you left me at Ludgrove [their middle school] and now I’m here at Eton—now we’re at the same school, let’s go.’ He didn’t want anything to do with me and that hurt at the time. But now, well the gap between me and William is very similar to Archie and Lili, and to see Lili obsessed with Archie and Archie like, ‘No, no, Lili, I need my space, I need my space,’ now I get it. I get how irritating the younger sibling can be to the older sibling. But in the moment, at the time, I didn’t really grasp that, I didn’t really realize it, but yes, I’ve always loved my brother.”

Harry shared a little more about Lili and Archie in his and Meghan’s Netflix documentary series, Harry & Meghan, including a lot of new photos.

“There was something that felt so complete once we had Lilibet,” Meghan said of welcoming their second child. “Everyone just really respected that we had been through so much. And that we, like any other parent, deserve to just welcome their child into the world peacefully and have that time as a family to nurture and cocoon. Which we did with the addition of our little toddler [Archie].”

Harry said that their daughter was starting to resemble his mother, Princess Diana. “I think at the moment I see a lot of my wife in Archie, and I see a lot of my mom in Lili,” he says. “She’s very Spencer-like. She’s got the same blue eyes.”

“Blue, blue, blue eyes,” Meghan added.

“Sort of like a golden reddish hair…” Harry continued. The couple opted not to release any new photos of their children in their holiday card this year, despite doing so in 2021. For the most part, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have managed to give Lili and Archie a private life in California.

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Senior News and Strategy Editor

Alyssa Bailey is the senior news and strategy editor at ELLE.com, where she oversees coverage of celebrities and royals (particularly Meghan Markle and Kate Middleton). She previously held positions at InStyle and Cosmopolitan. When she’s not working, she loves running around Central Park, making people take #ootd pics of her, and exploring New York City.

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