Two days after welcoming their son, Prince Harry and Duchess Meghan of Sussex appeared at Windsor Castle on Wednesday to introduce the newborn for the cameras. And a few hours later, Buckingham Palace announced the baby's name is Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor.
"It's magic. It's pretty amazing!" said Meghan, who wore a cream-colored sleeveless trench coat-style dress by Grace Wales Bonner and high heels for the baby reveal. "I have the two best guys in the world so I'm really happy."
On Wednesday afternoon, the couple shared a photo of little Archie meeting his paternal great-grandparents, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, and maternal grandmother Doria Ragland on their official Instagram account, @SussexRoyal.
Ragland, whom many royal fans saw for the first time during Harry and Meghan's May 2018 wedding, lives in Los Angeles but came over to the United Kingdom for the birth. She's been staying with her daughter and son-in-law at Frogmore Cottage, their new home on the Windsor Castle grounds.
When asked about meeting the queen, and her husband, Prince Philip, Meghan told reporters, “We just bumped into the Duke as we were walking by, which is so nice. It will be a nice moment to introduce the baby to more family and my mom’s with us as well.”
“Another great-grandchild,” Harry joked. The baby is the eighth great-grandchild for the queen, 93, and her 97-year-old husband, who is mostly retired from public life.
Meghan seemed to glow with happiness, mixed with fatigue. She couldn't say enough good things about the baby, snoozing in daddy's arms.
The baby has the "sweetest temperament," Meghan told the press. "He's calm, he's just been a dream."
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Proud new dad Harry, who put a new spin on royal baby debuts by being the one to hold the newborn during the photo opp in St. George's Hall, added, “Parenting is amazing. It’s only been – what, two-and-a-half days, three days – but we’re just so thrilled to have our own little bundle of joy. We have to spend some precious time with him as he slowly starts to grow up.”
According to a website that tracks Meghan's fashion choices, Archie was swaddled in a traditional merino wool ivory white leaves-and-flowers shawl from royal favorite, G.H. Hurt & Son.
Before departing from the grand hallway, Meghan conveyed her gratitude. "Thank you, everybody, for the well-wishes and the kindness. It just means so much.”
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Archie was born Monday at 5.26 a.m. local time Monday, weighing 7 lbs, 3 oz. It is not clear precisely how long labor lasted – Buckingham Palace said Meghan went into labor in the "early hours" of Monday and gave a post-birth update stating that mother and baby were both well.
Harry and Meghan had promised back in April that they would pose for photos within a few days of the baby's arrival, but first, they wanted "an opportunity to celebrate privately as a new family."
In the end, Harry didn't quite stick to the script. Overcome with joy, he appeared before media cameras at Windsor Castle Monday to announce the birth as horses looked on from the royal stables behind him.
Harry gushed that the birth experience was "amazing" and that he was "over the moon."
The couple did not have to travel far for the photo op. The palace said Monday after the birth that Harry, Meghan and Meghan's mother were all at home at Frogmore Cottage on the Windsor Castle estate immediately after the birth.
Harry and Meghan have not said precisely where the baby was born, at home or at a London hospital. The palace won't say either.
But their whereabouts so soon after the birth suggested the baby may have been born at Frogmore, the Sussex's newly renovated home about 25 miles west of London. Multiple pre-birth reports in the British media suggested Meghan, 37, wanted to give birth to her first baby at home for maximum privacy.
Although there are hospitals and birth centers within 20 miles of Windsor, none of the crowds of royal fans and or the media stakeout at the castle saw cars leaving or returning to the castle entrance during the relevant hours.
Frogmore Cottage, which isn't really a cottage in the usual sense of the term, is not to be confused with nearby Frogmore House, the former royal country retreat and burial ground on the Windsor estate where Harry and Meghan posed in November 2017 for one of their engagement portraits.
The photo op took place the day before Harry is scheduled to visit The Hague in the Netherlands on Thursday to launch the countdown to the 2020 Invictus Games in the Dutch city. He had been scheduled to visit Amsterdam on Wednesday but canceled last week as the wait for the birth looked likely to go into overtime.
Meanwhile, the baby's birth was celebrated Monday evening in London in lights: The London Eye was lit up in red, white and blue to mark the occasion, and a "It's a baby boy" banner illuminated the BT Tower, a communications tower in central London.
The baby's birth on May 6 means he will share close birthdays with two of his royal cousins: Princess Charlotte of Cambridge, Prince William and Duchess's Kate's daughter, who turned 4 on May 2, and Prince Louis, the youngest little Cambridge, who turned 1 on April 23.
Prince George of Cambridge turns 6 on July 22.
The baby is seventh in line to the throne, behind Harry at sixth. He is the eighth great-grandchild of the queen and Prince Philip, and the fourth grandchild of Prince Charles the Prince of Wales and his first wife, the late Princess Diana.
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The palace name announcement did not say specifically but it seems likely the baby will not receive a "royal highness" title or another courtesy title from the queen, who decides these matters based on personal preference of the parents and rules laid down in 1917 by her grandfather, King George V.
It is not clear yet the significance of the names Archie and Harrison (or "Harry's-son" to jokers on Twitter) to Harry and Meghan. But the last name they chose honors his grandfather, Prince Philip. Mountbatten-Windsor is the blended name created after Philip Mountbatten and Princess Elizabeth (Windsor) married in 1947. It is used mostly by descendants of the couple who are more distant in the line of succession; others use just Windsor, the official dynasty name.
And the highest ranking royals don't use last names at all, or use their father's title. William and Harry, for instance, the sons of the Prince of Wales, used the last name "Wales" in school and in the military.
The next big event in the little royal's life is likely to be his christening, which usually takes place two months after the birth and marks his official naming and his entry into the Church of England.
Prince George and Prince Louis were christened in the historic Chapel Royal at St. James's Palace in London, close to Buckingham Palace and to his grandfather Prince Charles's London base at Clarence House.
Princess Charlotte was christened in July 2015 at St. Mary Magdalene Church at Sandringham, the royal estate in Norfolk.
But given that the couple now live in Windsor and that Harry himself was christened Henry Charles Albert David in December 1984, at St. George's Chapel at Windsor (where he and Meghan married in May 2018), there's always the possibility that his son will be christened there, too.
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