I wanted to interview Dick and Angel, stars of the hit Channel 4 reality show Escape to the Chateau, to find out how lockdown had been for them.
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The Botanical Suite is decorated with Angel’s range of homeware Having visited them two years previously for YOU magazine, I certainly found myself doing a fair bit of daydreaming about what their life was like while I was trapped in my terraced house with its dingy patio.īut maybe, just maybe, the Strawbridges went bonkers in all that isolation? Got sick of la vie en France? Perhaps, with their wedding business put on hold while the pandemic raged, the château – already a substantial money pit – had fallen into rack and ruin and they had had to cancel the TV series? Or had all that cleaning got to them? Did I mention they have 45 rooms?! Their idyllic 19th-century castle in France is the sort of place many of us were dreaming about when we were stuck in our semis – fantasising about floating around the 45 rooms, which include three kitchens and an art studio, or cooking gastronomic delights with produce plucked from one’s own walled garden, going for long, rambling walks in the private 12-acre estate or perhaps just boating around your own moat. I put this all to Angel when we meet, and she goes perfectly pink. She’s already a rosy-cheeked sort, but she’s blushing up a storm. And that’s when I realise – darn it – these irrepressible Strawbridges, with their massive lust for life, even loved lockdown. Yes!’ she exclaims, before drifting off into a further reverie about how ‘lovely it was doing all that deep cleaning’, as well as ‘having time to get into all the decluttering…’ ‘I didn’t want to say yes because I feel guilty. Of course, after five years living in an actual castle, the clutter has started to add up – Dick says proudly ‘we have filled the château’ – and when they say it’s their forever home, what I think they mean is that they won’t ever be able to leave. Dick says they sometimes jest about retiring to a bungalow, trying to fit in all their possessions ‘like a giant game of Tetris’.ĭick does concede that, ‘We did have an advantage at the scale of our isolation.
We were quite fortunate to have this space around us.’ I had a daughter down in Spain and she had a tiny terrace and that was it. How did home schooling go? Angel got two detentions on the first dayĭick is referring to his daughter Charlotte, 35, from his first marriage, to environmental activist Brigit Weiner – the pair wed in 1982 and divorced in 2010 after 28 years. They also have a son – James, 37 – a chef who has appeared on Escape to the Chateau. Dick, 62, a former lieutenant colonel and engineer, met second wife Angel, 43, in 2010 at a mutual friend’s 40th birthday party. They had two children – Arthur (eight) and Dorothy (seven) – before marrying in 2015.
Almost immediately the pair decided to uproot their young family for a new adventure in Northwest France – spending £280,000 on the dilapidated Château de la Motte Husson – and bringing it painstakingly back to life. We are loving and open but there is a line… and if you cross it, end of The resulting documentary – Escape to the Chateau, which first aired in 2016 – enraptured the nation, with viewers falling not only for the stunning transformation of the property (the château had neither electricity nor running water) but also the sweet, romantic relationship between the husband-and-wife team. Weren’t they worried – with the wedding business on hold and the château needing constant attention – that they wouldn’t have the money to pay the staff? ‘Our biggest revenue is the weddings without a shadow of a doubt,’ says Angel.
‘They supplement everything, including the TV work,’ agreesĭick.
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