When we first met Fearne Cotton, she confessed the person she most wanted to
be was Radio 1 DJ and all-round rock goddess Jo Whiley. Fast-forward a few
years and her wish has been granted. Next week Fearne takes over Jo’s
legendary morning show and, at the age of 28, completes her rise to radio
royalty in record time. Is it any wonder we’ve crowned Ms Cotton the new
Queen of Cool?
It’s a role she slips into easily on our shoot. Pouting and strutting around
the studio, Her Royal Fearneness gives us attitude by the truckload, safe in
the knowledge she has the worlds of music and fashion at her feet. The only
thing she hasn’t sussed yet is boys. So what’s the problem?
“I’m always the one who gets dumped,” she says with disarming frankness.
Impossible to believe, but Fearne insists she’s serious.
“It’s been different every time,” she adds. “But I don’t like giving up on
things, so I’ve never dumped a boyfriend.”
I was doing Top of the Pops.. I had to do the show with a skirt and no knickers]]>
Her most recent serious relationship was with model and skateboarder Jesse
Jenkins, 23, whom she met in 2006.
“We broke up last year then tried to get back together over Christmas,” she
explains. “But all the problems were still there. I’m working a lot, he’s
working a lot. We tried. We tried very hard for six months. I’m 28 and you
get to the point where you start thinking this isn’t working out and I want
to have a family. You’ve got to quit while you’re ahead.”
Which begs the question: does the next boyfriend have to be the one she starts
a family with? “Not right now,” says Fearne emphatically. “But I’d like to
have a family by 35. I’ve got a lot of big changes going on. I’ve moved
house, I’ve got a new job. Change can be scary but it’s made me excited.”
To say things are hotting up for Fearne is a huge understatement. When she’s
not filming Guinness World Records Live, Celebrity Juice and iTunes Live,
hosting her radio shows, or designing a fashion range for Very, she’s
climbing mountains for Comic Relief. Hers is a life lived at 100mph.
“Perhaps I’m a workaholic,” she says. “I don’t know any different because I’ve
always worked this hard. If I had time off I would go out of my mind.
All of this didn’t help with Jesse I suppose, but I wasn’t about to make a
sacrifice.”
Fearne clearly puts her career before Cupid, which makes it easy to understand
how nonchalant she is when talk turns to the fling she embarked on with T4
hottie Steve Jones, 32, during the break in her relationship with Jesse.
“Steve dumped me,” she says.
“It wasn’t like we were in a relationship. We were just hanging out. I
wouldn’t say he was a bad boy, he just likes women and that’s as simple as
it is. We are two different people from two different planets and it wasn’t
serious.”
She is remarkably candid when it comes to talking about past loves. However,
Fearne is much more guarded when asked about the man rumoured to be
romancing her now.
On the morning of our interview, uber-cool pop star and Kanye West protégé Mr
Hudson (real name Ben Guntha), 28, is pictured leaving her south-west London
home. Busted!
“Oh God. Well, it’s difficult,” she stutters. “We’ve been hanging out together
with mates. We’ve been to some gigs and he’s really cool. That’s it really.”
So, fess up, do you fancy him? “We’re just mates, and we’re just hanging out.
I’m single, I’m going out a lot with lots of good people, and he makes me
feel very happy. He’s a lovely guy.”
It sounds like you really like him, we probe… “At the moment we’re just
friends, and that’s it.”
Her eyes suggest a different story. And we tell her it’s as if she’s covering
something up. She has the look of someone in a panic, trying to think fast.
“I have not got that look,” she laughs. “He’s a sweet guy. There is a
difficulty when pictures get printed. You might be just going for drinks,
having fun, and then there are pictures and people think something is
happening. But you haven’t even discussed it with that person and it’s
really awkward.”
So for prospective suitors, what is she looking for in a boyfriend? “Someone I
can have a laugh with, who can teach me something. Someone who has different
interests in their life. Someone who is going to be a really good mate as
well as hot.
“I’m not a lovey-dovey girl, although it’s obviously nice to be on the
receiving end of it now and again.
“I’ve never gone into any relationship and thought: ‘this is The One’. And
seeing my best mate Holly Willoughby and husband Dan with their baby has
made me realise what hard work successful family life is, and I’m not
capable of it yet. Holly is literally superwoman.”
So hanging around Holly, 28, and her five-month-old son Harry hasn’t made her
broody for babies? “Not now – it’s put me off! It’s made me appreciate the
severity of it. Holly is a natural mum. It’s beautiful to see someone you
love change and be an incredible person that you didn’t expect.”
Fearne’s girlfriends are very important to her. Together they love to cosmic
order – make predictions that they believe will come true if they wish for
them.
“At my house I have a blackboard and my friends and I write silly
predictions,” she explains. “It might be ‘Fearne looks hot today’, or ‘India
gets a promotion’, or ‘Lolly will meet a nice guy’. Weirdly, some stuff
comes true. I do believe if you visualise something you attract it. I love
the fun of cosmic ordering, but it’s just a game. If I were doing a cosmic
order now it would be to meet the right guy at the right time. That could be
in two years, three years, who knows.”
Fearne is a hippy at heart. She has her tarot cards read frequently and is
always looking for mystic signs. She even underwent something called a
‘rebirth’ after she broke up with Fame Academy’s bad boy Peter Brame, 30, in
2004.
“I loved it. It’s a breathing exercise, a bit like hypnosis.
It puts you into a weird state. I just cried a lot really – got loads of stuff
out. I felt a lot better afterwards. I’d love to do it again.”
One imagines that Fearne gets badly affected by break-ups, especially as she’s
always the one getting dumped. But she’s ever the optimist.
“I think that all this is fate – one day I’ll meet the right guy and then be
so glad the others dumped me. I’m just going to go with what feels right. No
rules. I’m not saying I should be with someone in this industry or not,
successful or not.
It depends on the individual. You can meet people who are extremely successful
and amazingly insecure,” she says.
Fearne, on the other hand, is super-successful, and quite secure in herself –
a strong woman and role model for today’s generation. No surprise then that
she was Radio 1’s first choice when Jo Whiley asked to move to the weekend
schedule so she could spend more time with her four children.
“It’s a dream come true,” says Fearne.
“I love to talk about music, so this prestigious slot is a massive honour.
I’ve got huge shoes to fill, but I’m going to give it a good bash.”
Fearne is set to meet Jo to “grill her” about the show and, despite the
rumour-mongering, she laughs at the suggestion there is any rivalry between
them. Still, the fact she is replacing 44-year-old Jo has only added to the
BBC ageism row fuelled by newsreader Moira Stewart, 60, and Strictly’s
Arlene Phillips, 66, and Karen Hardy, 39, losing their jobs.
“It does make people angry. I read all the articles, but it’s good to see
every side of the spectrum,” she says. And Fearne is more than aware that
not even her job is safe in the fickle world of fame. “I know there’s always
going to be fresh people coming up. That’s good because it keeps you on your
toes. I put in 110 per cent because so many people want my job and you can’t
be complacent. As soon as you start doing that you slip into diva territory.
But my mum would shoot me in the head if I ever tried to pull anything
diva-ish.”
Being mired in the age debate is not the first time Fearne has had to deal
with criticism, even from her listeners. “There are people who really hate
you. They will write all sorts of horrible things. They text the radio
station. But I always try to see the good in people. I have kids on MySpace
emailing
me nasty messages. I email them back and say: ‘I’m sorry I upset you, I didn’t
mean to.’ And they will often reply and say: ‘I was having a bad day, I
didn’t mean it,’ as soon as they see you’re a human being.”
Wait a minute, you actually reply to people you don’t know who contact you on
MySpace? “Absolutely. Not all of them, but if one is particularly mean, I’ll
think: ‘I’m not having that.’”
At one point Fearne had a stalker – in July a 21-year-old man was arrested and
cautioned by police after she received threatening text messages while
presenting Radio 1’s Chart Show. Fearne, however, is unfazed by the drama.
“It really wasn’t that bad. BBC security thought it would be fitting for me
to get a police escort home. I thought that was very over the top. It was
just a kid who didn’t understand the severity of what he was doing.”
Close up, Fearne is stunning and doesn’t look her age – last week she was even
asked for ID in a supermarket. And just like her career, she works hard on
her body, too.
“I go to the gym a lot – four times a week for an hour and a half,” she says.
“I like running, swimming and high-octane, sweaty, punchy things. It’s a
great stress release. I used to do Bikram Yoga [yoga at high temperature]
but I found it very boring.
“I don’t diet but I definitely eat healthily. I don’t eat meat. I love sushi,
vegetables and stir-fries.”
But that’s not to say Fearne is a girl without any vices. Quite the opposite.
“Cake and chocolate are my weaknesses, but I don’t deny myself and I also
like a drink. Since I’ve been single I’ve been really hitting the gin – not
the gym, the gin – it’s my favourite drink ever.”
SO FEARNE, HAVE YOU EVER…
Pretended to be someone else? When I was 18 I went to Paris with my
friend Hayley and we pretended we were fashion designers. These French guys
were buying us champagne and we wanted to sound a bit more fabulous so we
said we ran a fashion shop called Karma. I was called Portia and she was
Camilla. This went on for two days. The language barrier definitely helped
with the lies!
Gone commando? My mum gave me this hideous thong with diamonds up the
back. I was doing Top Of The Pops and when I put my microphone on I bent
over and the diamonds went ping ping ping. So I had to do the show with a
skirt and no knickers.
Been mistaken for another celebrity? I get called Fern Britton a lot.
Looked up your exes on Facebook? Absolutely. I’ve stalked ex-boyfriends
on Facebook. I have a sneaky look and see their hangouts, girls in photos.
We all do it – come on!
Googled yourself? Yes. I find it quite interesting to see what the
perception of me is.
PHOTOGRAPHY: XPOSURE, PA, EXPRESS
SYNDICATION, REX. STYLING: ANGIE SMITH (ANGIESMITH.CO.UK) HAIR: JAMES
MCMAHON AT NAKED ARTISTS USING L’ORÉAL TECNI.ART MAKE-UP: JUSTINE JENKINS
USING MAC.FEARNE WEARS (TOP): CORSET, AGENT PROVOCATEUR; BODY, JASPER
CONRAN; CROWN, ANGELS; GLOVES, ATSUKO KUDO; BRACELET AND MULTI-CHAIN
NECKLACE, FREEDOM AT TOPSHOP; SMALL SKULL PENDANT, FEARNE’S OWN, (SECOND):
JACKET, AIMEE MCWILLIAMS; BRA TOP, KATY RODRIGUEZ; HOT PANTS, TOPSHOP;
CROWN, ERICKSON BEAMON; SCEPTRE, ANGELS; NECKLACE AND BLACK CUFF, FREEDOM AT
TOPSHOP; RING, ERICKSON BEAMON; BANGLES, KABIRI; SILVER CUFF, FENWICK;
STOCKINGS, AGENT PROVOCATEUR; HEELS, KURT GEIGER, (BOTTOM): FEARNE WEARS:
CLOAK, ANGELS; BRA TOP, KATY RODRIGUEZ; KNICKERS, JASPER CONRAN; EARRINGS,
FENWICK; LONG SKULL PENDANT AND RING, DISAYA; SMALL SKULL PENDANT, FEARNE’S
OWN; CHAIN SCARF, FREEDOM AT TOPSHOP; BANGLES, FENWICK; GLOVES, RIVER
ISLAND; BOOTS, BERNARD CHANDRAN
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