Lisa Butcher

Career

Butcher won British Elle's first ELLE's Angels modelling competition in 1987, judged by Marie Helvin, Laraine Ashton, and photographer Terry O'Neill. Her first job after she finished school was for Ralph Lauren in New York.

Royal photographer Norman Parkinson called Butcher the "Face of the '90s", and she graced the covers of Vogue, Elle, Marie Claire, Harpers and Queen and Tatler. She has also appeared in numerous commercials most notably for Max Factor, Olympus Cameras, Vision Express, Lancaster, Vidal Sassoon, Pirelli, Clarion mascara and Onebiol moisturiser.

Butcher appeared regularly at the prêt-à-porter shows in Paris, Milan and New York until she became a mother for the first time in 1995. As a mother of two, Butcher works exclusively from London. She has modelled for many brands, including Yves Saint Laurent, Ferritti Jeans and John Galliano. She has also been the face of Hardy Amies since 2003. She is currently the face for Long Tall Sally with her first collection coming out in the spring 2009.

Butcher has her own jewellery collection, the Eden Collection.

TV presenter

Butcher first appeared on TV with an appearance on The Big Breakfast alongside Chris Evans. Due to her demanding schedule, she shelved her TV career until she appeared, years later, as the host for Living TV's Britain's Next Top Model.

After it was announced that Trinny Woodall and Susannah Constantine would be defecting to ITV, Butcher and her friend singer Mica Paris were announced in April 2006 as the new presenters of BBC1s fashion show What Not to Wear.

TV production company

Butcher formed Libra Productions under the umbrella of Alchemy.

Personal life

Butcher has two daughters.

She has been married twice, most famously to chef Marco Pierre White when she was 21 – Albert Roux was best man, but the union lasted just 15 weeks. They met at Tramp, the Jermyn Street nightclub, and were married three weeks later at the Brompton Oratory in Knightsbridge. White says today that he was intoxicated by her looks. But it didn't help the marriage when, after being asked by a reporter what he thought of his bride’s £3,000 floor-length, backless white dress designed by Bruce Oldfield, White said she looked dressed to go down the catwalk rather than the aisle. Butcher says of their brief marriage: "We went to the Scilly Isles for our honeymoon. On the first day Marco turned to me and said, “I don’t love you.” We spent two miserable days when we didn’t speak and he went shark fishing. Then I left." In her one interview about the marriage, Butcher said about the honeymoon: "Something very bad did happen but I’m not going to say what it was. It really wasn’t a very pleasant experience for me and my family." White subsequently revealed a few weeks after they were married that he had been having an affair with Matilda Conjero, his maître d' at Canteen, and revealed in a newspaper that she was carrying her first baby. They subsequently had another child together.

Her partners after this have included actor Jeremy Northam, entrepreneur Damian Aspinall, Chilean polo player Gabriel Donoso (father of her two children, and second husband but widowed), Jonathan Rhys Meyers; and then 24-year-old Jacobi Anstruther-Gough-Calthorpe.