The song ‘Diamonds Are Forever’ plays as Trinny Woodall pouts at the camera in a pair of sparkling silver wedges.
Just as I’m about to introduce myself, she throws off her sequined blazer and stands topless in the middle of the studio.
There’s not a hint of embarrassment; she has a six-pack and a tan, and she doesn’t need a bra – a fact she shared freely with viewers of her noughties television show What Not to Wear.
In it she charged around shops with her friend and fellow Sloane Susannah Constantine, accosting women and handing out tough love, instructing them bluntly how to dress better.
‘I loved this photo shoot,’ says Woodall after it’s finished. ‘The clothes were sexy.’
Trinny Woodall, 59, says her style has progressed from girly to sophisticated as she’s got older, with clothes becoming tools of empowerment
She’s now wearing her own black-and-white polka-dot halterneck dress from Me+Em (still with no bra) and asking if we can ‘sit soft’ on the sofa.
‘I never used to dress sexy, I used to have lots of frilly dresses but I don’t feel good in them any more.
‘We can reach a stage where the way we dress doesn’t fit where we are at; now I want to be sophisticated as opposed to girly.
‘If you push yourself and change your look it can bring out a side you didn’t know you had, empower you.’
Woodall will turn 60 in February and feels she has reached a new, emancipated stage of her life.
In spring she broke up with her partner of ten years, the advertising mogul Charles Saatchi, 80; her daughter Lyla, 19, is about to head to university in Spain; and she has hit her stride in her second career, as CEO of her expanding make-up and skincare business, Trinny London (valued at about £180 million).
Friends of a similar age are ‘thinking they can take it easy, but that is the last thought in my head,’ she says.
‘I still feel like a 30-year-old rushing around because there is so much to do. I don’t feel like I would ever not work. Ever. Until I die.’
Trinny wears a sheer, beaded cape from Jenny Packham with earrings by Graham Cruz and shoes by Cult Gaia
She is sharing her blueprint for life in a book, Fearless, which she describes as a ‘manual’ she wishes she’d had.
It spans everything from money (Woodall grew up rich until her father’s business took a downturn and she had to get a Saturday job at a deli in West London) to addiction (she went to rehab in her 20s and has been sober for 33 years) and IVF (of which she had several rounds), to whether anyone can wear pink and how to get glowing skin at any age.
The book evolved from her Instagram account, where she shares honest videos about her exercise and beauty regimes and hands out advice to her 1.2 million followers, known as the Trinny Tribe.
‘I’d never do a proper autobiography because I don’t have a brilliant memory,’ she says.
‘But I do remember certain things. My 20s I f***ing hated, my 30s were when my career took off and I began to get my confidence, but by the end of that decade I was nearly a workaholic.
‘My 40s were learning to be a mum and have a career – I couldn’t afford to take maternity leave so I took Lyla to America to make a TV show a few weeks after she was born.’
Woodall had a nanny for Lyla on the trip, which turned out to be a longer-term arrangement: ‘She [the nanny] was meant to come for a few months and she’s still with us.’
To Woodall’s relief, her nephew has asked to move in when Lyla leaves for university, ‘so I won’t be coming home to an empty house’.
Trinny’s top and cuffs are by Graham Cruz. Her sparkling trousers are by Carolina Herrera, from the Outnet
It wouldn’t be like Woodall to make a fuss, though. A message of resilience and moving forward is woven through the book.
After she broke up with Saatchi, who at one point she called her ‘best friend’, she posted videos on Instagram of her getting on with her life, moving out of his house, where they had lived together for their ten-year relationship, and going skiing in France.
‘At the end of a relationship,’ she says, ‘you think forensically – what worked, what didn’t, what am I looking for?’
She is not seeking another relationship so won’t be drawn on what she would like to be different, bristling when I ask.
Yet sex matters; while she doesn’t want to embarrass Lyla, she says, ‘As women, if we have not had sex for a while, what does that do?
‘You have nuns who have a happy life and you can have self-fulfilment, it needn’t be that someone else has to fulfil you, but there’s something about the release that completes you as a woman, from my experience.
‘I’ve had times in my life where for a few years I have not had any sex and it took the oxygen out of me and made me less complete.
‘It’s easy to think it’s fine because you have other things in your life but at some stage it is important to question yourself.’
Abs fab: Woodall reveals her trim tum during a home yoga session with trainer (and former YOU staff member) Victoria Woodhall
So is she planning to date? ‘Right now I just do not have the time. At all. I don’t feel lonely in any way.
‘When you meet somebody there will always be some compromise, especially the older you get.
‘At the moment I’m very happy to go to bed when I want to, watch telly when I want to, live to totally my schedule.’
Work is what gives her satisfaction, but she has wrangled with the implications of that.
‘When you are building a business you make compromises. I have missed half my friends’ important birthdays.’
Just recently she went to New York for the funeral of her oldest male friend, the hairdresser John Barrett, and the airline changed her flight, meaning she would have to cut short her trip if she wanted to make a recording of the podcast of The Diary of a CEO the next day.
‘I was in the car with Lyla outside the funeral home and I didn’t know whether to cancel the podcast to stay and meet John’s friends,’ she says, still looking agonised.
‘I do have this obligation to my work more than personal spiritual fulfilment.’ Lyla gave her advice: ‘Don’t get stressed, just make a decision.’
Trinny looks sophisticated in a suit by Nadine Merabi. The cuffs are by Graham Cruz and the shoes are from Sophia Webster
As she’d had dinner with some of Barrett’s friends the night before, she decided the podcast was more important.
‘People say when you die nobody will think “I didn’t work hard enough”, they will say “I didn’t see my friends enough”, but my work is not just work,’ Woodall says.
‘I have been put on this planet to help people. I am not being boastful – people say that.’
She was touched that the Trinny Tribe sent messages of condolence about Barrett, with the advice ‘not to keep running like I usually do’.
She’s used to putting a brave face on things. ‘Especially at work – people need to see the CEO, not somebody with a personal problem.’
In the book, Woodall refers to Lyla’s father, Johnny Elichaoff, a businessman. He and Woodall divorced in 2009 after ten years of marriage and he died by suicide in November 2014, aged 55.
He used to tell her, ‘Ninety-nine per cent of everything you worry about never happens, Trinny… Then the one per cent did happen: he died and Lyla had to grow up without her dad.’
These days, Lyla looks after her. ‘When I’m caught up in a frenzy, she’ll ask why I’m getting so stressed.
Two’s company: Woodall and daughter Lyla, 19, at the V&A Summer Party in London in June
And she’s unbelievably polite – I can be quite tight with people but she will edit my texts, saying, “You haven’t done a kiss at the end or said, Hello darling.”
She does that lovely buffering. I don’t know where the f**k she gets it from, probably her nanny, who is also like a mother to me.’
Lockdown was tough for Lyla’s generation, Woodall says. ‘They have grown up in a different way – they are emotionally younger, they haven’t had as many experiences. Lyla had a bit of anxiety after her A-levels so she took a year off.’
Whenever Woodall has a professional achievement, she marks it by buying a Prada bag and putting a picture of Lyla in the luggage tag. She likes to buy things to mark significant moments.
Today she’s wearing silver Chanel sandals that she and Lyla bought at Heathrow on the way to Barrett’s funeral when they were ‘feeling really flat.
I had never bought anything from Chanel, that’s one step too far, but I saw these sandals and bought them for us to share so we can look at them and remember John.’
She readjusts herself on the sofa, checking, ‘Can you see up my fanny?’
My work is not just work. I’ve been put on this planet to help people. it isn’t boastful – people say that
I ask if our attitude to women and fashion has changed since What Not to Wear – look at any red carpet and women are still feeling the pressure to reveal perfect bodies and wear see-through dresses, despite talking about feminism.
‘What’s wrong with wearing that if they want to?’ asks Woodall, who is resolutely nonjudgmental. As for the rise of Botox, she says, ‘Do whatever you want.’
She’s had it since 35, along with filler under her eyes, ‘because I was doing telly and was embarrassed by the lines on my forehead, so it seemed like a great solution. But I wouldn’t have threads again.’
The health of your skin is what really matters, though, she believes.
‘It’s mind-boggling what you can do now compared to 40 years ago when my mother bought me Pond’s cream for everything. A spot? Pond’s cream.’
While she claims not to think much about turning 60, she does a lot to age-proof her mind and body.
‘My mother had Alzheimer’s and vascular dementia and when you have an inherited illness in your family you look at what you want to do about it.
‘A friend who has a biotech company says there is a 70 per cent reduction in the chance of developing it if you have many friends.
‘Isolation has an impact on your brain. I’ve noticed with my parents – my father didn’t have Alzheimer’s but I saw his world become small post-75.’
Top, Ad Hoc London. Diamond earrings and rings, Aariya. Trinny has hit her stride in her second career, as CEO of her expanding make-up and skincare business, Trinny London (valued at about £180 million)
Woodall wants to make her world big. ‘Tech is crucial – you can easily let your child teach you but I want to feel I can do it myself.
‘There’s a fixed mindset, where your opinion never varies, and a growth mindset, where you challenge your thoughts. I want to always feel there’s a growth mindset.’
Artificial intelligence doesn’t scare her – she’s deploying it to improve Trinny London’s make-up customisation services.
Her Instagram followers will be familiar with her daily routine. She does strength training and pilates and has practised yoga since 2020 (always before breakfast).
She hated games at school. ‘Lacrosse. Winter. Girls’ school. S**t. I’d fake a cough to get out of it. The only sport I’d do is ski.
‘Some days I think, “Oh f**k, I don’t want to”, but my mother had osteoporosis, so I want to support my bones.’
Breakfast is broccoli then an omelette and ‘black bread’, all designed to slow down the ageing effects of glycation (the body’s processing of sugars in fruits and carbohydrates).
She admits that, ‘Sometimes there’s a chocolate digestive moment when I’ve had a stressful day.’
Friends have taken Ozempic, which she can’t pronounce but is fine with, although she prefers to eat well.
Sometimes there’s a chocolate digestive moment when I’ve had a stressful day’
Susannah Constantine is still a friend – she has shown Woodall draft chapters of her novels. Would Woodall make another television show? ‘No. I run a business of 220 people.’
She does This Morning but is steely when I broach the subject of its former co-host Phillip Schofield, who resigned in May after admitting to an affair with a younger colleague. ‘They are a fabulous team and work f***ing hard. It is what it is.’
What does she make of the prime minister’s style, particularly his signature short trousers?
‘I wear a cropped trouser the whole time,’ Woodall says approvingly. ‘I’ve seen him in the flesh and never realised how short he was – probably because of how he dresses.
‘He’s wearing what he has in his wardrobe, not pretending to be some roll-your-sleeves-up politician.’
As for the royals, the Princess of Wales is ‘chic and appropriate. She’s found herself – and in the public eye.’
I mention the princess’s trip to a rave at Houghton Hall in Norfolk and Woodall turns scathing. ‘Would you call that a rave? I’m sorry.’
We’re interrupted by Lyla arriving for a lift home. Woodall concludes with her main thought on turning 60: ‘The one thing I think I should do is have a big party.’
Fearless: Style. Beauty. Life by Trinny Woodall will be published by HQ, HarperCollins on 14 September, £26*