Natasha Kaplinsky SPLITS from husband of 20 years as friends tell RICHARD EDEN ex-BBC star is 'devastated'

She was the first newsreader to be paid a reputed £1million a year and won the debut series of Strictly Come Dancing, but Natasha Kaplinsky has been unlucky in love.

The Daily Mail can disclose that the television star has separated from her husband, the investment banker Justin Bower.

The couple, both 54, have been married for more than 20 years and have two teenage children. They are now in the process of divorcing.

‘Natasha is devastated,’ a friend told the Mail. ‘It’s very sad. They are doing their best to concentrate on their children.’

Three years ago, Kaplinsky told the Mail’s Eden Confidential social diary that she and Bower were considering renewing their wedding vows.

‘I’d love to,’ she said. ‘We did go to our local church on our tenth wedding anniversary with renewal in mind, but our children were screeching, so we’ve put it off for a bit.’

Kaplinsky married Bower in 2005 after a whirlwind romance while she was a BBC One Breakfast presenter. They had been going out together for less than three months.

The couple exchanged vows at St Margaret’s Chapel, in the grounds of hotel and private members’ club Babington House, near Frome, in Somerset, in front of 100 friends and family.

The bride had said she would be happy to be married in jeans but wore a white satin gown by Kruszynska Couture.

‘Both Natasha and Justin said it was the most incredible day of their lives,’ a spokesman said at the time. ‘They are overjoyed to be married.’

In May, Eden Confidential disclosed that the couple had put their ski chalet in the French Alps on the market for £2.7million. It has five bedrooms, a sauna, a massage room and a wine cellar, and is just a three-minute walk from the ski lifts.

They had owned the property for more than a decade. In 2018, they had it extensively renovated over nine months, instructing alpine interior design firm Shep and Kyles to make the property ‘ski lodge meets snow queen chic with a little bit of Strictly Come Dancing glitter’.

Today, the couple told the Daily Mail: ‘We can confirm that we have made the joint decision to end our marriage and our focus now is on our children.’

The couple live in Sussex on a farm which includes two pygmy goats, three sheep, nine alpacas and a cow called Mabel.

In 2018, Wealden Council rejected Kaplinsky’s application to convert a barn into a house for a farm manager, who would have overseen a herd of 100 dairy cows.

Kaplinsky joined the BBC from Sky News in 2002 and became the regular presenter of BBC One’s Six O’Clock News.

Two years later, she was the first to lift the glitterball trophy on Strictly Come Dancing with professional partner Brendan Cole. She was so popular that she agreed to co-present the first half of the second series with the late Sir Bruce Forsyth, when regular presenter Tess Daly went on maternity leave.

Kaplinsky was poached by Channel Five News in 2007 on a reported salary of £1million per year, a record for a newsreader.

Jay Hunt, Five’s director of programmes, said at the time: ‘Natasha is one of the most talented broadcasters on British television. From the Six O’Clock News to Children in Need she has demonstrated her popularity with viewers. I am thrilled she has decided to join Five and become one of the key faces of the channel.’

She is now president of the British Board of Film Classification, as well as an ambassador for Save the Children. On her social media accounts, she describes herself as a ‘happy farmer’.

‘Bridezilla’ Gizzi’s £4,000 hi-tech facial

 While some brides go on diets before their weddings, Gizzi Erskine is taking more drastic measures. 

The aristocratic TV cook, 47, is due to exchange vows with punk rock singer Matt Turner, 40, of the band Luxury Apartments, in December. 

And she’s spending £4,000 to try and achieve a sculpted jawline. She shared this snap of her undergoing XERF, a ‘non-invasive radiofrequency treatment designed to stimulate collagen production, tighten and firm the skin’. 

Gizzi adds: ‘I’ll keep you updated on my progress as Bridezilla comes to the surface.’

Nigella Lawson sought the advice of her predecessor on how to handle fellow judge Paul Hollywood on The Great British Bake Off. 

‘Paul is wonderful, and I love him dearly, but he is a very strong character,’ Dame Prue Leith tells me at the Women of the Year awards. 

‘Nigella asked me how you do this job, and I said to her, “You just must push your way in, because Paul is incredibly competent and he could run the whole thing by himself. So, you must get in there.” And she does.

Shepherd's pie and fizz for Archer's send-off

Jeffrey Archer’s funeral will have a familiar feel for some of the mourners. 

For I hear that his widow, Dame Mary, is to recreate the atmosphere of their celebrated parties at their penthouse flat overlooking the Thames in London. 

She’s to serve shepherd’s pie and champagne at the wake next week at their home in Grantchester, Cambridgeshire. 

Lord Archer, who sold more than 300 million books, died last Monday aged 86.

Charlotte closes ‘healing retreat’

Charlotte Church, who called Ed Sheeran a greedy capitalist last month, has had to put her own business into ‘hibernation’. 

The Voice of an Angel star, 40, opened a ‘healing retreat’ in her native Wales in 2023. 

Called The Dreaming, it was based at Rhydoldog House, once the home of fashion designer Laura Ashley, which she bought for around £1.5million two years earlier.

Now, however, a spokesman says it will close in December because it is ‘a different world today than the one we started off in’ and it needs to ‘reassess what it is we should be offering’. 

The spokesman adds: ‘We must dream. And to do so we must hibernate. We cannot say when exactly we will be returning from the dream realm, but return we shall.’

While fellow former Neighbours stars Margot Robbie, Chris Hemsworth and Guy Pearce have gone on to enjoy flourishing Hollywood careers, Jason Donovan remains haunted by his failure to follow suit. 

Donovan, 58, now glumly reflects: ‘I’d love to have done a great film. Unfortunately, I made some pretty s*** choices early on.'

Kemi’s pop at Paloma’s parenting

Pop singer Paloma Faith said last month that she tells her children, ‘Free Palestine!’ each night before she puts them to bed. 

Kemi Badenoch is not impressed. ‘There’s no ideological training in our household,’ the Conservative Party leader says at Cliveden Literary Festival in Berkshire. 

‘We should just leave children alone. I don’t want my children being political.’ 

Kemi, who like Paloma has three children, adds: ‘The Paloma Faith example is very bizarre.

‘There’s something that’s gone wrong there when you want to put a “Free Palestine” slogan and all of the connotations into a child’s head without letting them read the history, understand the context. That’s very dangerous.'

Over to you, Paloma!