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Interview
Entrepreneur and style expert Trinny Woodall explains how overcoming her fears helped her to build a firmer foundation, and why good self-care is essential for us all
As the old saying goes, bravery isn’t an absence of fear, but the ability to keep going despite it. And fear is something that Trinny Woodall knows a lot about. So much, in fact, that the TV style guru and now make-up entrepreneur has entitled her new book Fearless.
‘There is no one route to having a life which takes away elements of fear,’ she says. ‘But there are lots of things we could be fearful about, so I listed all the things I’ve had fear around in my life, and the ways in which I dealt with it.’
The book weaves insights from her own sometimes rocky, often remarkable, and endlessly relatable path – spanning feeling like an insecure ‘outsider’ in her 20s, and finding purpose in her 30s, to IVF, loss, solo parenting and the newfound freedom of her 50s, alongside snippets of self-help guidance. Topics such as self-worth, confidence and intuition are mixed in with steps on finding your ideal colour palette and curating outfits. And, for Woodall, these are all part of the picture of living fearlessly.
As Woodall – who rose to fame alongside Susannah Constantine fronting the BBC’s seminal styling series, What Not To Wear, in the early-noughties – recalls: ‘I’ve had many life lessons over the years that forced me to look at myself differently.’
Born in London as the youngest of six siblings (three of whom were from her banker father’s first marriage), Woodall attended boarding school from the age of six, spending much of her childhood abroad as her parents travelled. She recounts in the book feeling like she ‘didn’t fit in’ after returning to London as a young adult – and how she ‘started taking drugs to overcome a lack of self-belief’.
‘When I realised I couldn’t use drugs and I had to stop, that was a tough life lesson. And I thought I could never stop – I was so scared I could never stop. But I did. And the strength it took to stop brought with it a whole load more fear,’ adds the 59-year-old, who had two stints in rehab in her early and mid-20s. ‘Because when you stop using a substance [and] end up in rehab, they sort of peel back your layers like an onion, and you’re left feeling that everything that’s been a sticking plaster that you put on that onion, has been removed. And you’re like, “But I have no support here”, and you feel very raw and wobbly.
‘But then you build it up with things that aren’t a sticking plaster anymore. You strip yourself back, so that what you build up again feels like it’s got concrete on the bottom, and you’re not running on quicksand, instead.’
Those concrete foundations have brought Woodall a
