A house ‘fit for royalty’ is more than real estate jargon when it comes to Frogmore Cottage.
The former home of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle is a beautiful property by most people’s standards.
The Grade II-listed cottage boasts five bedrooms, four bathrooms and a nursery. Under the couple’s tasteful eye, it underwent an extensive renovation that saw additions like a modern beige aesthetic, underfloor heating, a copper bathtub and even the installation of a barbecue.
If put on the market today, it would conservatively net about £5million.
The Sussexes’ former home was recently back in the spotlight after there was speculation it would be the likely next base for disgraced Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor – formerly Prince Andrew – who had been living at the much grander 30-room, 98-acre Royal Lodge, located on the grounds of Windsor Great Park.
Then Thursday’s bombshell dropped: the man once known as the Duke of York had been officially stripped of his titles and evicted from the Royal Lodge.
But before that announcement, there were whispers that Andrew would instead be quietly shifted to Frogmore, with reports suggesting he was only willing to accept the downgraded lodgings in the event that certain demands were met – namely, that he was provided with both Frogmore Cottage and neighbouring property Adelaide Cottage for himself and ex-wife Sarah Ferguson.
His reasoning? Frogmore Cottage alone was far too small for the co-dependent divorced couple to live together, given that it’s nowhere near the palatial scale they were accustomed to at Royal Lodge.
Frogmore Cottage, once home to The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, was reportedly offered to Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor as alternative accommodation to get him out of the Royal Lodge
Andrew and ex-wife Sarah Ferguson (above in September) have been living separate lives under one roof at the Royal Lodge since 2008. They have now been evicted and Andrew’s royal titles stripped. He will move to a private home in Norfolk; she ‘will make her own arrangements’
But following this week’s decision by King Charles, an agreement has been struck for Andrew to move onto another property – privately funded by the King – on Sandringham Estate in Norfolk.
No accommodation will be provided for his ex, who ‘will make her own arrangements’ when it comes to her future, according to a royal source. It is understood that Fergie intends to, finally, live separately from Andrew, almost 30 years after they divorced.
While Andrew may not have a say in his lodgings anymore, it was quite telling that he was reportedly so resistant to moving into Frogmore Cottage, and was only prepared to do so on the proviso he got Adelaide Cottage too. It really highlighted the man’s arrogance, right until the bitter end.
It also got me thinking that Frogmore Cottage does seem to be almost cursed at this point. It’s the charming little home where no royal seemingly wants to live.
For Andrew, his refusal to downsize is understandable. When his mother, the late Queen Elizabeth II, was alive, she arranged for her ne’er-do-well son to sign a cushy 75-year lease for the Royal Lodge, requiring an upfront payment of £1million and an additional £7.5million for repairs and refurbishment.
He has reportedly been living there mostly rent-free ever since.
Meanwhile, Fergie – who moved in around 2008 after a small fire at her former residence Dolphin House in Englefield Green – previously described their shared life at Royal Lodge as proof they’re ‘the happiest divorced couple’.
Sounds delightful. But after Andrew’s ties to convicted paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein were exposed, it was clear they were on borrowed time at the Lodge.
Frogmore Cottage underwent £2.4million in renovations in 2019, paid through the Sovereign Grant. This amount was later repaid by the Sussexes after their move to California
Frogmore Cottage became home to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle in 2019 after the late Queen Elizabeth II gifted it to them. Glimpses of the home were seen in a Netflix documentary
Before his titles were stripped and he was sent to live in Norfolk, reports indicated that Andrew would only agree to vacate the Royal Lodge and into the much smaller Frogmore Cottage if his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson was also able to relocate to nearby Adelaide Cottage (pictured)
Pictured: Andrew, his accuser Virginia Giuffre and sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell in a photo reportedly taken in 2001, when Giuffre was 17 years old
Frogmore Cottage was reportedly floated as a less-extravagant alternative for a man who’d brought disgrace on the Royal Family. But Andrew stubbornly turned it down, insisting his lease on Royal Lodge was ‘cast iron’ and he would not budge.
But damning new allegations and leaked emails laying bare the depth of his friendship with Epstein – combined with the release of a posthumous memoir by Andrew’s accuser Virginia Giuffre – forced King Charles’ hand.
Andrew was relinquished of his princely title, dukedom and other royal accolades.
He was evicted from the Royal Lodge, and Frogmore Cottage – accommodation he always thought was beneath him anyway – was taken off the table.
The saga underlines how Frogmore Cottage continues to be the outcast of royal residences – the property seemingly no one wants, that is rarely anything other than a temporary grace-and-favour home, and one that is only accepted at the behest of a more senior royal family member.
Cast your mind back to the heady and happy royal family days of 2018.
Following the excitement of Harry and Meghan’s wedding, the late Queen gifted the newlyweds use of Frogmore Cottage.
The house has a storied royal history, having been built in 1801 as a retreat for Queen Charlotte, the wife of King George III. It was also, at one time, a place of sanctuary for Grand Duchess Xenia, the sister of Tsar Nicholas II.
It was originally named Double Garden Cottage, but the moniker changed to Frogmore after Queen Victoria noted an ‘immense number of little frogs’ while eating breakfast there.
Once the Duke and Duchess of Sussex became the official permanent residents of Frogmore Cottage, they decided to undertake renovations so that it better reflected their style, taste and needs.
It was at this point that the Sussexes – who were widely popular among Britons at the time – arguably made their first misstep in the public’s eyes.
The couple carried out a £2.4million refurbishment, funded by UK taxpayers. It was paid through the Sovereign Grant, which meant the money spent later became public knowledge.
The no-expense spared renovation offered a clue that perhaps Meghan and Harry weren’t wholeheartedly enchanted by the property they’d been given.
Harry and Meghan took this photo in 2020 inside the renovated Frogmore Cottage kitchen
A still from the Netflix documentary Harry & Meghan shows Prince Harry running around the garden of Frogmore Cottage chasing after the couple’s dogs
Princess Eugenie briefly lived at Frogmore Cottage after Harry and Meghan moved out. She shared this snap taken inside the home, revealing a comfy couch in front of a blue bookcase
Royal expert Charlotte Griffiths previously reported that the Duchess of Sussex was particularly unimpressed with her lodgings, saying that given their popularity at that time, the Suits star had presumed they would be allocated a grander homestead.
Griffiths wrote: ‘And there were a few reports at the time that Meghan actually thought she was moving into Frogmore House, which is a much grander property.’
The royal reporter added the Hollywood actress reportedly felt ‘a bit sort of tricked or confused and hadn’t quite realised it was actually a cottage’.
Meghan and Harry never publicly criticised Frogmore Cottage, so we’re relying solely on Griffiths’ account. Yet tellingly, her reporting mirrors grievances the Sussexes later aired about their time at another assigned royal residence: Nottingham Cottage.
In their 2022 Netflix documentary series Harry & Meghan, the pair admitted that they were not living in the palatial digs people may have imagined.
‘As far as people were concerned, we were living in a palace,’ Harry said of their time at Nottingham Cottage. ‘[But] we were living in a cottage on palace grounds.’
Meghan added: ‘Kensington Palace sounds very regal – of course it does, it says palace in the name. But Nottingham Cottage was so small.’
‘The whole thing was really small on a slight lean with low ceilings,’ Harry added.
But back to the Frogmore Cottage renovation: when Harry and Meghan stepped down as senior royals in 2020, the issue of taxpayers’ money spent on the renovation became a flashpoint.
Royalists could stomach public funds being used to bankroll the reno when the couple were in public service. But once they’d backed out, there were demands that they should repay the funds spent on what was now, in effect, a private home.
The public pressure was so immense that eventually it was agreed that the Sussexes would repay the costs as part of the terms of their departure from The Firm.
After relocating to California, the Sussexes initially retained the keys to Frogmore Cottage. When Harry returned to the UK for visits, he reportedly stayed at their former Windsor home.
The cottage was also occupied at times by other royals – most notably Princess Eugenie and her husband Jack Brooksbank, who sublet the property in 2022.
But the release of Harry’s controversial memoir Spare in January 2023 sealed the Sussex’s fate at Frogmore.
The day before the tell-all was released, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex were served with an eviction notice, according to Omid Scobie’s book Endgame.
‘As they were no longer working royals or based in Britain, they needed to give up the keys to their royal rental,’ reported Scobie, a confidante of the Sussexes.
Since then, Frogmore Cottage has mostly remained vacant.
And just when it seemed that the arrival of a new tenant was imminent, Charles has ensured that hasn’t happened, sending his brother instead to Norfolk.
So Frogmore Cottage remains empty – unwanted by the disgraced Andrew, possibly too modest for the glamorous Sussexes, and now sealed off by the King himself.