When airline pilot Rachel Maxwell is not soaring through the sky, then by land she pursues a side hustle clipping the wings of Meghan Markle.
The 36-year-old aviator is also a lifestyle brand satirist with a website ‘Montecito Minimalist’ – offering cosy-seeming products such as £23 candles, £10 mugs, £20 sweaters and £16 bags, reminiscent of the Duchess of Sussex‘s As Ever range.
Yet the slogans on Rachel’s products are a little more pointed – bearing phrases such as ‘No Titles, Just Taste’, ‘Burnt Bridges and Backpedaling’, ‘Privacy and Paparazzi’, ‘Let Them Eat Flower Sprinkles’, ‘Keep Calm And Mind The Spare’ and ‘As If’.
Among her best sellers bear the words ‘Recollections May Vary’ – the phrase used by the late Queen Elizabeth II taken as a rejection of Harry and Meghan’s claims alleging royal family racism during their 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey.
Rachel described her website to the Daily Mail as ‘a cheeky, satirical brand based off of a certain someone who lives in Montecito’ – and the top of the page declares: ‘These products are real but the intent is purely satirical and not affiliated with any individuals, institutions, or royally dramatic memoirs.’
Harry and Meghan moved to their Montecito mansion in California in 2020 after announcing their ‘Megxit’ from frontline royal duties – and the Duke has gone on to heavily criticise his estranged family, including in his 2023 memoir Spare.
As well as touting products which she supplies as order-to-print options, produced only when bought – Rachel’s website also offers a series of spoof blog posts by an unnamed socialite under the heading ‘Notes From The Manor’.
The product descriptions also poke fun, with the ‘Recollections May Vary’ candle described as being ‘for those moments when the lighting is soft, the camera is rolling, and the truth is… flexible’.
Airline pilot Rachel Maxwell has a sideline selling lifestyle products with satirical slogans
Her website shows evident signs of being influenced by – or else, that is, satirising – Meghan Markle’s As Ever lifestyle brand promotions. She is seen here in her series With Love, Meghan
The ‘Burnt Bridges and Backpedaling’ equivalent comes with this blurb: ‘A rich blend of contradictions, rebranding, and strategic victimhood – because why stick to one narrative when you can have them all?
‘This candle captures the essence of Montecito melodrama: a warm, flickering reminder that privacy is best enjoyed with a multi-million-dollar media deal.’
And a T-shirt branded, ‘As If, why even bother’, is said to be ‘your official response to performative soft launches, jam jars with agendas, and whatever that was’.
The entry adds: ‘Draped in elegant script and paired with a deadpan whisper of why even bother, this tee doesn’t shout – it sighs. And somehow, that’s worse.
‘Crafted for the quietly judgmental and the aesthetically superior, this shirt is what you wear when someone asks your thoughts on “the new lifestyle brand” and you’d rather not say it out loud (but still want the room to know exactly how you feel).’
Yet Rachel insists that the venture is more about having fun rather than any personal animus – and has described her fascination with the royal family since visiting Britain with her mother in the 1990s.
She was also intrigued by the rise of lifestyle and wellbeing brands taking off online in recent years and wondered whether she might be able to make a little extra money doing similar – albeit with tongue planted firmly in cheek too.
Rachel, who grew up in southern California not far from Montecito and now lives in Hawaii, told the Daily Mail: ‘I’m actually an airline pilot but in my downtime I like to work on my company where I have gained a bit of a following.
Rachel, while American, is fond of the UK – posing here by Buckingham Palace with her mother
Items including tote bags bear the late Queen Elizabeth II’s renowned quote, ‘Recollections May Vary’, following Harry and Meghan’s claims of royal family racism
She has a range of candles carrying different messages, seeming influenced by not only the Duchess of Sussex’s lifestyle brand but also the Hollywood actress Gwyneth Paltrow’s
The ‘Montecito Minimalist’ site also appears to nod to Meghan’s enthusiasm for floral sprinkles
This is among the products advertised as part of Meghan’s own As Ever range
‘I’d seen these lifestyle sites and wondered whether I could do that in a fun kind of way. I’m not a millionaire, I’m not married to anyone famous, and thought I’d just see how hard it might be.
‘I bought a domain for $11 and a shop trial, a month for a buck. I thought I’d see if it would work and found people in different countries did understand the joke, so I thought I might have something there.
‘It started off as a creative outlet, but when I began selling to customers in Singapore and Dubai I realised the collective eyeroll wasn’t just by Americans and Brits – it was global.
‘My site is all based on satire – all the slogans are based on everything that’s been published, that’s in the public domain. I never make assumptions.
‘It doesn’t come from a place of cruelty – instead meant to be fun, light-hearted, letting people be in on the joke. It’s a bit of catharsis.’
Yet she does admit feeling some scorn for celebrities and influencers bemoaning their lot while cashing in on such business ventures themselves.
Rachel said: ‘These people have enormous power and influence and access to PR people – and we’re meant to sympathise with them? There’s a disconnect. I think that’s why “Montecito Minimalist” holds the mirror up.
‘The global economy is not in a great position – I ask, why is someone trying to get us to feel sorry for them in a mansion? That’s hard for us to reason.
Rachel Maxwell has been flying professionally since 2019, having first been a flight attendant
She initially felt cautious about this mash-up of World War Two rallying cry ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ and a reference to Prince Harry’s 2023 memoir named Spare
‘It’s celebrity culture in general – fame doesn’t give you authority or make you authentic.
‘I want to be anti-pretension in an ironic way – a fun experiment, meant to be cheeky and playful.
‘The “Recollections May Vary” product line, that’s the big seller – because of what it doesn’t say. It was such a powerful statement by the Queen.’
But she does feel cautious at times when creating her new designs, recalling: ‘”Keep Calm And Mind The Spare” – that’s two Britishisms put together. I didn’t want people to think I was making fun of the war, where “Keep Calm And Carry On” came from.
‘If I got any negative feedback, I’d remove it from the website. I checked with some British friends and people said they wear the shirts on the Tube and get nodded at – that was really touching, in a way. They got it.
‘I love the UK. I’ve always been an aviation enthusiast, since I was a child. Before I was an airline pilot, I was a flight attendant. I wanted to see if that would scratch the itch.
‘My first international trip was to London, in the 1990s, with my mom. I fell in love with it – it was as magical as I hoped it would be.’
And she has a blend of feelings herself towards the royal family, saying: ‘The passing of Diana was a really big moment in cultural history.
Rachel first visited Britain in the 1990s – she and her mother are seen here beside the Thames, with London’s Tower Bridge in the background
Rachel described this product on her Montecito Minimalist website as ‘a satirical self help workbook/journal – all about “feeling” like a founder’
‘As if, why even bother?’ is the slogan on this T-shirt – Meghan’s lifestyle brand is As Ever
‘I remember seeing Harry walking behind his mother’s coffin. I looked at my mum and thought, what if I had to do that?
‘Whether you’re a monarchist or not, the royals are a part of everyone’s life in Britain. I imagine it would probably hurt anyone who grew up in the UK and grew up with the royal family – and Harry and Meghan have now become cultural lightning rods.’
Meghan is not the only famous figure with a lifestyle brand who gets a nod on the Montecito Minimalist site, with an evident allusion to Gwyneth Paltrow’s scented candle called This Smells Like My Vagina.
Rachel said: ‘The candles on my site – the ones saying “Smells Like: Todger and Night Cream” seem to have taken off most by far.
‘There’s another lifestyle brand that released candles which smell like a certain part of the female anatomy – I thought, wouldn’t it be funny if I could do something like that? And the candle really took off.’
She combines her Montecito Minimalist design and sales sideline with the day job of flying regularly throughout each week as a professional – having started as a flight attendant 10 years ago and flying professionally since 2019.
Rachel said: ‘I fell in love with aviation as a child but when I looked into becoming a pilot, the entry jobs were getting paid $8 an hour. I was getting paid more working in Starbucks. My parents were telling me to go to college and get a degree.
‘I became a normal flight attendant and the world opened up to me.
She spent recent months preparing special festive versions of her Montecito Minimalist items
Rachel says: ‘I’d seen these lifestyle sites and wondered whether I could do that in a fun kind of way. I’m not a millionaire, I’m not married to anyone famous’
‘I saved up all my money for a couple of years to finally train to be a pilot and get my certificate.
‘I’d seen a lot of guys flying planes and thought, if they can do it, why can’t I?’
She had grown up in the southern Californian town of Arcadia, about a one-hour road trip from Montecito.
She added: ‘My dad used to like driving us over there – we were always going, coming back with big bags of oranges.
‘But I’ve been in Hawaii since 2023. It’s always sunny and warm and the people are lovely. The beaches are great. It’s a little slice of Paradise.’
The launch of the Duchess of Sussex’s As Ever product range last March coincided with the first series of her Netflix show Love, Meghan, in which she offers hosting tips while she cooks with celebrity friends.
The brand sells products including raspberry jam and flower sprinkles, which she repeatedly promotes throughout the show.
There was also a recent, critically-panned festive edition – called With Love, Meghan: Holiday Celebration.
Rachel produced a twist on the ‘Recollections May Vary’ range as a Christmas decoration
As well as bags, T-shirts, sweaters, mugs and fridge magnets, there is also a padel set
Prince Harry has made occasional appearances in his wife’s Netflix series With Love, Meghan
That came as new seasonal items were added to the asever.com website, such as a 43g spiced cider mulling spice kit priced at $16 and a three-pack of spreads in a gift box for $42.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex secured a lucrative contract with Netflix, thought to be worth more than $100million in 2020, after quitting as senior working royals.
Harry and Meghan announced they had signed a new ‘multi-year, first-look deal for film and television projects’ with the streaming platform in August.
Yet media analysts suggested the new deal was a ‘downgrade’, amid suggestions Netflix was ‘pivoting away’ from the Duke and the Duchess for future projects.
