Now even Spain has beef with Meghan Markle as her new brand logo receives plagiarism claim from angry mayoress

We all know that Meghan Markle and her husband Prince Harry aren’t too popular. Be it with the royalists across the pond or their own neighbors in Montecito, the couple seems to have beef with a lot of people, but incredibly, Markle has found a way to anger even more people – in this case it’s the mayoress of a small town in Mallorca.

Markle recently revealed that she would be revamping her brand. In a video posted to Instagram she explained the new approach she’d be taking, complete with a name change, and new logo, (and hopefully some actual products to sell this time). As with anything Markle does, people were quick to criticize, it’s pretty much par for the course with Meghan and Harry. However, she likely wasn’t expecting to incur the wrath of a random Spanish Mayor by the name of Xisca Mora.

The As Ever logo is plagiarized

Mora has claimed that the new logo for Markle’s As Ever brand is an “exact copy” of her town’s historic coat of arms. It’s hard to deny her claims when you take a good look at both the logo and the coat of arms. Both feature a palm tree in the center with birds on either side. 

The town of Porreres in Mallorca has been represented the coat of arms since 1370 and it’s considered an important part of the heritage there. Mora has demanded that Markle remove the logo for her brand as it is disrespectful to her town. The mayor described the situation as “surreal” telling the Mail, ‘We are still a bit shocked, we thought it was fake news at first, we didn’t know what was happening.” She went on to say that the similarities are undeniable, ‘They are the same, except the birds are a little different and they used different colors, but they are nearly identical.’

Despite the apparent similarities, Mora and the town of Porreres are not in a position to take legal action against Markle, “To sue for plagiarism is complicated and costly, and a small town council like ours is not in a position to fight against the English crown.”

Has Meghan’s brand really plagiarized?

To be fair to Meghan and her brand, there’s only so much imagery in the world and when it comes to logos or coats of arms you tend to see the same visual motifs used time and time again, birds and trees are a common sight on tons of coats of arms. It’s not too difficult to imagine two designers coming up with the image of a palm tree with a bird on either side on two separate occasions over 700 years.

That’s not to say that the designer didn’t take inspiration from the coat of arms here. But if it went to court and I were Meghan’s lawyer, (a crazy thought I know), that would probably be how I’d defend against the plagiarism claims. The truth is, Meghan can, and probably will, just ignore Xisca Mora and the people of Porreres. They can’t do a lot to stop her from using the logo, even if it is plagiarized.