When she began modeling at the age of 18, SOPHIE DAHL’s voluptuous physique and alluring beauty threw her into the eye of a media storm. Now a bestselling author, she talks to JENNIFER DICKINSON about domestic bliss, nakedness and how her latest project was written in the stars.
Picture this: Sophie Dahl in bed, all 6ft 1in of her; impossibly long legs outstretched; disheveled blond hair falling in front of her face before she reaches up and scoops a handful behind one ear, revealing the planes of a face so striking it could hang in the Louvre. Cheeks like bulbs; a long but tiny-tipped nose; an open, heart-shaped face: a Picasso portrait come to succulent, peach-fleshed life. The very image of seduction, you might imagine. But not according to her husband. “I write at night,” Dahl explains, “and my husband is constantly walking in and saying that I hunch and make this horrific face. He even does an impression...”
I would wager that it takes more than hunching and frowning to make Dahl unappealing. Spend just 10 minutes in her company, and you will feel deprived of her smile each time it fades, like a sunset dropping behind sand dunes. That may sound overly fawning, but it really is spectacular, the way a grin explodes over her face, carving two dimples into her cheeks.
The impressionist husband, father of Dahl’s two daughters – Lyra, three next month, and almost-one Margot – is fellow Brit, singer Jamie Cullum. Dahl is off to see him perform in France at the weekend and says she is planning to keep the blow-dried hair and a few false lashes from tomorrow’s photoshoot in his honor. She mentions him often; in that shorthand way that interlocked couples do, which makes it clear that theirs is a happy partnership.
Despite the fact that cover shoots are cloaked in secrecy and only a select few are aware that I am interviewing Dahl in our local coffee shop (it emerges that we live in neighboring villages, 30 minutes from London, and have a mutual appreciation for the juices at The Grocer in local town Amersham), no less than three people tell me that the model-turned-writer is the nicest person I could hope to meet – a very impressive ratio. ‘Nice’ may not be the most inspiring adjective, but it clearly does inspire loyalty. And, when she walks into the café in flared jeans, an animal-print coat and fawn sweater, a Loquet London locket around her neck, blond hair windswept and blue-green eyes bright in an unmade-up face, Dahl manages to blend in despite her outlandish looks. She is, after all, just another mother taking respite from the demands of adorable small children and the far less adorable sodden British weather in a cup of coffee.
Marriage, kids, a country house: Dahl says that her new “boring” life is “a really different time” from the heady modeling days of her twenties. Famously discovered at 18 by the late, great stylist Isabella Blow, a combination of other-worldly beauty, exotic parentage (she is the daughter of actor Julian Holloway and writer Tessa Dahl; her maternal grandparents were British author Roald Dahl and American actress Patricia Neal; her paternal grandparents the actor Stanley Holloway and dancer Violet Lane) and a fantastically voluptuous body, the like of which was, and still is, rarely seen on runways, propelled her to global awareness. Championed by the likes of photographer Steven Meisel, she moved from London to New York, collecting high-fashion campaigns and magazine covers the way other 20 year olds amass bar receipts. “The time I spent in New York was my university – it wasn’t wild, I was quite together,” Dahl says. “I was going to these amazing places... I was very, very lucky.” Does it seem unreal now? “Not unreal, but it does feel like another lifetime. And I’m glad it’s gone; I couldn’t sustain that. I have some great stories, but I am very happy with my domesticity.” It suits her, this existence away from the frenetic force of fashion. After years of writing pieces for magazines between runways and photoshoots, in 2003 she released her first book, The Man with the Dancing Eyes. “I am proudest of [my books], I think,” Dahl responds when asked about her greatest achievement. “It’s something you can’t take away. The beauty of a book is that it is a tangible thing.”
It is obvious that Dahl was meant to write – her sentences are structured as though part of a carefully woven story. “I grew up around storytellers,” she explains. “Each member of my family is very good at telling a story. The language of our family was telling a tale.” Family, domesticity, fashion, beauty – all of these themes co-exist within Dahl’s
latest project, At The Kitchen Table, a curated website of her own interests, and those of her friends and family. “I had all these bits of writing floating around my house and nothing was in one place,” she says. “And because I am quite organized, I wanted to have it all in a neat place...” So, essentially, it is an online filing system? “Basically, yes! Then I thought, why should it be all me, why not have other great and interesting people [writing]? And that was how it happened – out of Virgo control-freakery.”
Indeed, astrology sits alongside essays on subjects as diverse as the beauty of an old-school typewriter, a Pilates awakening and recipes for soufflés and baked eggs. Contributors so far include makeup artist Lisa Eldridge, Kids Company charity founder Camila Batmanghelidjh and one Jamie Cullum, who, it turns out, is pretty darn good with words. “I know, so annoying,” says Dahl, laughing. “I didn’t even have to edit his piece.”
It is the website that has her hunched over at night. Days are spent with her two girls, and Dahl says it is “impossible” to fit in any writing – there is no staff of nannies in their house. Another book (to accompany 2007’s Playing with the Grown-ups, and three cookbooks, Miss Dahl’s Voluptuous Delights (2009), From Season To Season (2011), and 2012’s Very Fond of Food) is waiting to be written, but meanwhile the site allows her to find a place for her thoughts and the opportunity to collaborate. Her wish list of contributors includes Beyoncé, whom she would like to “write some thing polemic about womanhood”. She also describes Rihanna as “a total babe”. What about the almost default nakedness of today’s stars? “I don’t believe that is new, I think what is new is the reach it has. Kate Moss was naked. I was naked! [But] as a parent, I do understand now. If you are walking your kids to school and there’s a picture of a model on her back in the nude…” she says, referring to her infamous YSL Opium advert in 2000. “Not that I would call for it to be banned, but I think it needs some explaining.”
The 36-year-old Dahl is a quietly assured character. Though admittedly critical of herself, she is more fearless these days: “I’d much rather be this age than 22; I’m much happier. I spent my twenties worrying about how I was perceived. Now the thing I worry about is just balancing everything – I spend a lot of time figuring out my time.” Conversation turns to heroines – Dahl herself was the inspiration for Sophie, the little girl in her grandfather’s novel The BFG – and she cites fictional characters Pippi Longstocking and Anne of Green Gables as the women she hopes her girls grow up to admire. Personally, I think they could do a lot worse than their own mother.
, it's always nice to see her on the runway
. We really don't see this beauty enough
