Meghan Markle has her religious education to thank for her unique skill. At the Los Angeles Immaculate Heart High School, she had a handwriting class that set the foundation for her calligraphy career. “What it evolved into was my pseudo-waitressing job when I was auditioning. I didn’t wait tables. I did calligraphy for the invitations for, like, Robin Thicke and Paula Patton’s wedding,” she told Esquire in 2018.
Patton couldn’t have been happier with what she got. “I just thought Meghan did a beautiful job,” Patton, who divorced Thicke in 2015, told Town & Country in 2018. “It really is a lost art, and it was so nice to create something without a device that doesn’t use a battery or need to be plugged in.” Markle was also in charge of Dolce & Gabbana’s holiday correspondence, showing calligraphy was more than a casual job. “I would sit there with a little white tube sock on my hand so no hand oils got on the card, trying to pay my bills while auditioning,” she said.
Though Markle is now married to Prince Harry and a member of the British royal family, she reportedly continues to use her calligraphy skills. According to People, she was the one who designed the intricate logo for American Riviera Orchard, the lifestyle brand she launched in March 2024. “I think handwritten notes are a lost art form,” she once wrote in her former blog The Tig.
