Prince Harry and Meghan Markle fans are celebrating baby Archie‘s birthday having raised over £40,000 for a fundraiser to mark the big day.
Supporters of Meghan, 38, and Prince Harry, 35, are marking the celebration today with the hashtag #ArchieDay on social media.
After officially launching the campaign earlier this month, they urged others to share donations with charities to help vulnerable children impacted by coronavirus in countries which the Duke and Duchess of Sussex hold dear to their hearts, including Canada America, South Africa and the UK.
The initiative, which has now raised over £40,000 for the four charities, posting on their official Instagram today, writing: ‘It’s here, it’s here! Happy Archie Day and happy birthday, Archie! You have the rest of today to celebrate Archie!’
Prince Harry, 35, and Meghan Markle, 38, fans are celebrating today after raising £40,000 to mark baby Archie’s first birthday
Followers of the Sussexes have been hosting a fundraiser for the past month in honour of the little royal’s birthday
Launching the campaign officially earlier this month, fan account @Archie_day urged others to help ‘celebrate Archie’s birthday with a global party’, before listing a series of charities selected for the ‘desire to help children.’
Among the charities chosen was British organisation WellChild, which is a patronage of Prince Harry’s, with donations quickly wracking up to over £8,000 in a matter of weeks.
Another of the three charities chosen by the group was the Nourish Eco Village in South Africa, where Prince Harry and Meghan performed their final royal tour in November.
Fans of the couple have now raised over £14,000 for the charity, which provides food to children from impoverished families in rural communities that rely on schools to get a meal daily.
Followers of Prince Harry and Meghan have raised thousands of pounds for different charities across the world in order to help vulnerable children impacted by coronavirus
Canadian charity Boys and Girls Clubs of Canada, which was chosen because ‘Canada has always been central to The Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s love story and relationship’, have been donated £6,919 as part of the campaign.
Fans were also directed to the organisation Children’s Aid, which helps children living in poverty in America to honour the Duchess’ home country, with over £12,100 donated to their cause.
Launching the campaign earlier last month, fan account @Archie_Day shared an image which read: ‘Motivated by the pure joy of Archie’s arrival and the very serious circumstances of our time, we introduce a campaign to honour his first birthday and to promote the principles we hold dear. Community, kindness and compassion.’
The image, which was shared by multiple fan accounts on social media as they launched the coordinated campaign read: ‘Before COVID-19 became an ominous presence in our lives, a group of us got together ot organise a fundraising campaign to honour the principles emphasized by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex in their humanitarian efforts: community, kindness, and compassion for vulnerable people and ecologies.’
The campaign was launched earlier this month to mark Archie’s first birthday today, with fans encouraged to donate to a series of charities to celebrate the day
It went on to explain that the group hoped to build on the success of previous fundraising efforts, including last year’s #GlobalSussexBabyShower, which was launched by a Meghan fan account, called for users to celebrate Mother’s Day by donating to some of the Duchess’ favourite charities and patronages.
The message went on: ‘It is in that spirit, we kick off the #ArchieDay fundraiser in benefit of vulnerable children affected by the coronavirus epidemic.
‘We are all in this together. We will get through this together. We would love your support.’
Prince Harry and Meghan shared a short video clip of the birthday boy today to mark the big day.
It comes as the Duke and Duchess released a video clip to Save the Children as Meghan read the birthday boy a story
With his cheeky smile and head of strawberry blonde hair, birthday boy Archie is the spitting image of his father Prince Harry in the family video shared on social media today.
Archie, who turns one today, showed off his first teeth as he smiled at his father behind the camera while mother Meghan read him children’s book Duck! Rabbit!.
The sweet video, filmed at their Los Angeles home, was met with great excitement from royal fans, who noted how much Archie looked like Harry at the same age.
The video was shared on the Save the Children Instagram account this morning and is part of a fundraising campaign that sees celebrities reading storybooks.