Trinny Woodall talks mile-high mischief, looking for love & the emotional rift that almost ended her bond with Susannah
AS a beauty mogul with a £200million business to run, Trinny Woodall spends plenty of time on jets.
But one thing the former co-host of makeover show What Not To Wear insists she would never do is get frisky at 30,000ft.
Sign up for the newsletter
Thank you!
Trinny Woodall hasn’t dated since her decade-long relationship with Charles Saatchi ended in 2023, but says she’d now be open to itCredit: Ian Harrison / Women’s Health UK
Trinny speaking exclusively to Fabulous’ No Parental Guidance podcast with Hannah East and Louise Boyce
Trinny, who owns £200 million beauty empire Trinny London, also opens up about the secret heartache that almost tore her and best pal Susannah Constantine apartCredit: Alamy
Trinny, 61, who has been single since 2023, says she can’t think of anything worse than getting it on with a bloke mid-flight.
“The Mile High Club? It would be really uncomfortable,” she tells Fabulous’s No Parental Guidance podcast — where she also opens up about the secret heartache that almost tore her and her best pal, former What Not To Wear co-host Susannah Constantine, apart.
“The aircraft toilets are always so small and dirty. And you just think, ‘No’.
Even so, it seems most of us aren’t as shy as Trinny, with 78 per cent confessing we would enjoy a little airborne mischief.
READ MORE SUN CLUB STORIES
streets apart
Truth behind Tina O’Brien’s split from Adam Fadle and brutal swipe revealed
hidden life
The dark truth behind the the disappearance of Hollywood icon Jim Carrey
As for Trinny’s current single status, that isn’t exactly surprising, as the star barely has time to brush her hair, let alone swipe right.
The businesswoman, whose brand Trinny London is one of Britain’s fastest-growing make-up companies, has not dated since her decade-long relationship with advertising tycoon Charles Saatchi ended two years ago.
Despite her hectic schedule, Trinny confirms she wants to meet someone.
Though she would rather it happen organically than through online dating.
She says: “Totally. Like, whether it’s on an aeroplane . . . I just try and fly.
“I’d shout from the rooftops if I had a relationship.
“I’m open to it, but I’m not on the apps.”
Trinny has a 22-year-old daughter, Lyla, with her ex-husband, rock drummer Johnny Elichaoff, who took his own life in 2014.
They had divorced in 2009, after ten years married.
With Lyla now in her second year at university in Madrid, Trinny has been enjoying a new-found freedom as an empty nester.
She says: “I’m feeling life is full. I’m now saying yes to things because, before, there was Lyla and work and not room for much else.
“Now I’m really re-engaging with friendships. I’m doing a lot more, and travelling.”
It’s understandable that Trinny has thrown herself into motherhood after her difficult journey to having Lyla.
Though she had once thought she didn’t want children, it was her best friend Susannah who helped her discover her maternal instincts.
The pair became besties, and household names, on What Not To Wear — grabbing women’s boobs and telling them how to dress to flatter their shape.
The BBC show was nominated for two Baftas and at its height drew more than 7million viewers.
But Trinny admits there was a time before her and Susannah’s TV fame when the pair were not quite on the same page, and she confesses that she couldn’t understand her friend’s decision to start a family.
The mile high club? I always feel it’d be really uncomfortable
Trinny Woodall
She says: “Susannah had Joe, her oldest when we had started a business together.
“I’d call her up saying ‘Where are you?’ And she’d go, ‘I’m breastfeeding’ and I’d go, ‘well, when will you be in?’
“I had no regard at all for the concept of motherhood for her.
“I pretended she wasn’t pregnant or she didn’t have a child because I couldn’t deal with it.
“And then Esme came along who was baby number two for Susannah, I noticed this evolution in her and she helped me appreciate how much I wanted to be a mum.”
Seeing Susannah juggle babies and business forced Trinny to confront her own maternal cravings.
Trinny admits there was a time when she and Susannah weren’t quite on the same page, saying she couldn’t understand her friend’s decision to start a familyCredit: Alamy
Trinny has a 22-year-old daughter, Lyla, with her ex-husband Johnny Elichaoff, who tragically died by suicideCredit: Getty
Trinny and Johnny divorced in 2009 after ten years of marriageCredit: Getty – Contributor
She says: “I did have 16 rounds of IVF — expensive.
“I didn’t have those yearnings to be a mum until my fifties. Maybe that was because my relationship with my mum was quite distant.
“I didn’t have that, ‘God, I can’t wait to be a mum’ feeling. I did start doing IVF because we had never used the Pill and so we weren’t getting pregnant.
“It worked the second time, but I had miscarriages.”
With such a stigma around miscarriage, Trinny would keep filming What Not To Wear and not tell anyone that she had lost a baby.
She recalls: “I was working, and then there were situations where I miscarried when we were filming.
Heart just sinks
“The first time, you feel that trickle and go to the bathroom and you think, ‘OK’ — and your heart just sinks
“I don’t remember if I did tell anyone. I was quite private, always separating work and what was going on.
“I definitely would have told Susannah, but I don’t know if I would have told the production crew. I just carried on because otherwise what else do you do?
“Also, when you do IVF, it could be that you’ve put two eggs in and one egg is coming out.
“You don’t know [if one has survived]. So there’s that sort of sense that maybe . . . that tiny bit of hope.
“And then I did a few more rounds of IVF and that didn’t work.
“Then I got pregnant, and it happened again but at 16 weeks, and so then I had to go and give birth.
I didn’t have those yearnings to be a mum until my 30s. Maybe that was because my relationship with my mum was quite distant
Trinny Woodall
“It’s very difficult. We’d done these full rounds of IVF which was full on. Then Johnny went away.
“He was my husband at the time and he had problems with pain meds and he was in rehab.
“And my lady at the clinic called me up and said, ‘You’ve got some embryos. Do you want us to just put them in and not do the whole IVF process?’
“So I said, ‘Why not?’ I’d sort of let it go. It was a few years later.
“When it was the first time, I’d call on day 12 and say, ‘Can I come in now for a blood test?’ because I just had that feeling.
“Anyone who has gone through IVF will know. But then this time she called me and said, ‘You haven’t called me’.
“It was day 15 but I had thought, ‘It’s not going to happen’. And I was pregnant.
“I have a spiritual belief — not a godly belief, but I do believe in a higher power.
Things happen for a reason
“I believe in that concept that this is the path I’m on and things happen for a reason.”
Trinny was overjoyed finally to be expecting her long-awaited baby, and even more so to be pregnant at the same time as Susannah.
But then heartbreak threatened to strike again.
She recalls: “We went to do the Oscars in LA with [American TV presenter] Diane Sawyer, and we were on the red carpet, and it was a really big deal for us to do it.
“We were doing it for Good Morning America and we were working quite a lot in America then.
“Susannah was also pregnant with CeCe but we got back and we both had blood on our pants. And so I just thought, ‘That’s it, I’ve lost it again’.
“And I remember calling up my doctor in London in the middle of the night and saying, ‘I think I’ve lost the baby again’.
“So I arrived at the airport and I went straight to see him. He had this little portable machine, and he put it on my tummy and I could hear her heartbeat.
“I didn’t expect to hear a heartbeat. I couldn’t believe it.
“I think I’d lost an egg because they put a few back in. So then I had a scan every few weeks.
The star also reveals on the podcast that she can’t think of anything worse than getting frisky while at 30,000 feetCredit: Camera Press
Trinny stuns on the cover of Women’s HealthCredit: Ian Harrison / Women’s Health UK
“She did not move once and I didn’t feel her so I didn’t know if she was alive.
“She was upside down and back to front and quite little.
“Then I had a check-up and I had to have her the next day as I had lost fluid. She was born six weeks early.”
After all Trinny had gone through to conceive, she hoped the birth would bring relief, but a new worry emerged — her daughter was born with a condition affecting her legs.
Trinny says: “It was a mix because I had to have a Caesarean because she couldn’t come out. And so there was a fear all the way through that process.
“And then she came out and Johnny was holding her, and I said, ‘Is she OK?’
“And he went, ‘She’s great. Just a little thing around her legs’.
“And I remember pulling back the blanket and her legs were back to front.
“She had very bad talipes [clubfoot] because she’d been back to front and upside down.
“So her feet were like club feet and back to front.”
Talipes is an uncommon condition that causes a baby to be born with one or both feet curved into an unusual position. It affects around one in 1,000 babies.
I wanted to have another child and I did another five rounds of IVF, but I didn’t get pregnant
Trinny Woodall
Trinny says: “I remember looking at her and thinking, ‘She’ll never walk’.
“And then we found this guy who was the best person and they said they were going to operate on her and break all her bones.
“They took her off the next day. She came back from hospital with these casts on her little baby legs, which stayed on for about six weeks and had to be changed every two weeks.
“She had to have special shoes and then she had to learn to walk a little bit differently.
“By the time Lyla was two, she was absolutely fine. But you don’t have the expectation of everything being perfect because of experiencing IVF.”
Trinny had been keen to have a second child but wasn’t lucky enough to conceive again — something which her daughter jokes she is grateful for.
Trinny says: “I wanted to have another child and I did another five rounds of IVF, but I didn’t get pregnant.
“By this stage I’m 40 and I had no hormones. When Lyla was seven or eight, and if I had a bloated tummy, she would say, ‘That better not be a baby because it’s only me’.
“We joke about it now. She says, ‘God, if you had had another child, I wouldn’t have let it exist. So you know I’m OK’.”
Trinny, who went through 16 rounds of IVF and suffered miscarriages, also says she was overjoyed to finally be expecting Lyla, who was born six weeks early
I wanted to have another child and I did another five rounds of IVF, but I didn’t get pregnant, she reveals
- No Parental Guidance is a weekly vodcast where every week, hosts and comedy powerhouses Louise Boyce and Hannah East are joined by a celebrity guest to discuss the ever evolving world of parenting, bringing fresh and varied opinions from all angles.
