Penny Lancaster refuses to fit into a single box. To some viewers she is the warm, straight-talking panellist on ITV’s Loose Women. To others she is the former lingerie model who became the face of a major brand in the early 2000s. To Londoners in the Square Mile, she is something else entirely: a serving special constable with the City of London Police, volunteering on patrol in uniform.
She is also, of course, Lady Stewart — married since 2007 to rock legend Sir Rod Stewart. Yet to reduce her to her marriage would miss most of her story. Over three decades she has worked as a model, retrained as a professional photographer, competed on Strictly Come Dancing, spoken openly about dyslexia, IVF and the menopause, campaigned for better treatment for women, and, in her fifties, started a demanding new role in policing. In September 2025 she told her story in full in her memoir, Someone Like Me.
Penny Lancaster at a Glance
- Full name: Penelope Claire Lancaster, Lady Stewart
- Born: 15 March 1971, in Essex, England
- Age: 55 (as of October 2026)
- Height: 6ft 1in (1.85m), widely reported in her modelling profiles
- Occupations: Model, photographer, television personality, author and special constable
- Known for: Loose Women (ITV), modelling for Ultimo, Strictly Come Dancing (2007), Celebrity MasterChef (2021)
- Husband: Sir Rod Stewart (married 2007)
- Children: Two sons, Alastair and Aiden
- Police role: Volunteer special constable, City of London Police, since 2021
Who Is Penny Lancaster?
Penny Lancaster is an English model and television personality who first became widely known in the early 2000s. Her public life did not fade when the modelling work slowed down. Instead, she built a second career behind the camera as a photographer, then a third in daytime television, and then a fourth — the most unexpected of all — in uniform.
That willingness to reinvent herself runs through her life. She has talked about being underestimated at school because of undiagnosed dyslexia, and about finding, in her late forties and early fifties, two causes that now define much of her public work: menopause awareness and women’s safety.
Early Life in Essex
Penelope Claire Lancaster was born on 15 March 1971 to parents Graham and Sally. She grew up in Essex, in the Ilford area, and the family later moved to Chigwell. She has a younger brother, Oliver.
Both of her parents were regular gym-goers, and at six she began dance lessons — tap, ballet and modern — continuing for a decade. At 16 she gave dance up: at 6ft 1in, she felt her height made it an awkward fit, and switched to aerobics. A few years later she qualified as a certified fitness trainer.
It was while working in fitness that she was spotted by a model scout, who suggested she try modelling.
Modelling Career and the Ultimo Years
Lancaster modelled successfully for more than 15 years, according to the City of London Corporation, and studied at the London College of Fashion. Her breakthrough came in 2002, when she became the face of designer lingerie brand Ultimo.
She fronted the brand for around two years and became a regular presence in newspapers and magazines. Although the Ultimo contract ended in 2004, the visibility it gave her helped launch the broadcasting career that followed. She never treated modelling as the whole plan, though — even then, she was curious about the other side of the lens.
Retraining as a Photographer
In the late 1990s, Lancaster began taking photography classes to understand her industry from the photographer’s point of view. She gained a BTEC National Diploma in Photography and Design and turned professional in 2000.
Photography was not a celebrity side project. It became real work — and it changed her personal life too, because it was through photography that she first crossed paths with Rod Stewart in 1999, while he was on tour and she was still a photography student. She has since been associated with charitable photography projects, including charity calendar work.
For another famous face who has campaigned openly on women’s health, read our profile of Davina McCall.
Television Career: Strictly, Loose Women and More
Strictly Come Dancing
In 2007 Lancaster joined series five of the BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing. Partnered with Ian Waite, she produced some memorable performances — her Foxtrot was a high point with the judges — before being eliminated in week six. For someone who had given up dance at 16 because of her height, returning to it live on Saturday-night television was no small thing.
Loose Women
Her defining TV role arrived in 2014, when she joined ITV’s Loose Women as a panellist. She was a regular from 2014 to 2019, returned in 2021, and has been a familiar presence on the panel again from 2024 onwards.
On the show she is known for speaking plainly about subjects daytime programmes once avoided — fertility treatment, family illness, the menopause, and later her police work. Several of her most widely reported statements, including her menopause story below, were first made in conversation with her fellow panellists.
Other television appearances
Her other screen credits include Famous and Fighting Crime (Channel 4, 2019) — the series that changed her life — Celebrity MasterChef (BBC One, 2021), And They’re Off! for Sport Relief, and guest appearances including Celebrity Catchphrase.
Her Celebrity MasterChef experience returned to the headlines in 2025, when she wrote in her memoir about finding former host Gregg Wallace’s behaviour difficult during filming in 2021, and contributed to the inquiry that followed. Wallace was dismissed after many historic complaints about his behaviour were upheld.
Penny Lancaster and Rod Stewart: Marriage and Family
Lancaster met Rod Stewart in 1999. He was coming out of his marriage to his second wife, model Rachel Hunter, and by Lancaster’s own account she was not looking for a relationship either, having just come out of a long-term one. A romance developed despite intense media attention.
They married on 16 June 2007 at La Cervara, a former monastery near Portofino in Italy — eight years after they first met. Together they have two sons:
- Alastair Wallace Stewart, born in November 2005, before the couple married
- Aiden Patrick Stewart, born in February 2011
Lancaster is also stepmother to Stewart’s children from earlier relationships, and has often spoken about the importance of the wider, blended family. The couple’s homes include Durrington House in Hertfordshire, where in recent interviews she has talked about the gardens, beehives and her growing interest in nature — even floating the idea of one day presenting a gardening programme.
The marriage is now Stewart’s longest, and the couple renewed their vows in 2017 — something Lancaster has said Stewart wanted to do much earlier, and which she made him wait for.
Motherhood and IVF: What She Has Said Herself
Lancaster has been open, on Loose Women and in her memoir, about her journey to motherhood involving IVF treatment. She has described falling pregnant on her third round of IVF, and shared the bittersweet memory of learning she was pregnant at almost the same moment her family received difficult news about her sister-in-law Louise’s breast cancer diagnosis.
Her willingness to discuss fertility treatment — something many couples go through quietly — on daytime television is one reason viewers connect with her.
Menopause Advocacy: Her Own Words and Campaigning
The health topic most closely associated with Penny Lancaster is the menopause — and everything in this section comes from what she has said publicly herself, on Loose Women, on BBC Breakfast, on Channel 5 News and in interviews around her memoir.
Symptoms she did not recognise at first
Lancaster has said her symptoms began during the first lockdown in 2020, when she was 49. The hot flushes were so pronounced that she initially thought she might have Covid, and she put her rising anxiety down to homeschooling and lockdown stress. On Loose Women she described anxiety going through the roof, losing her usual patience, disrupted sleep that left her unable to function in the day, and bursting into tears without understanding why.
Antidepressants before a menopause diagnosis
One point is central to her campaigning: when she first went to her GP, she was prescribed antidepressants. They helped a little, she has said, but did not address the underlying cause. It was her Loose Women colleagues who recognised what was happening. Recalling the conversation on Loose Women: The Podcast in 2025, she said Coleen Nolan was among those who listened to her symptoms and told her it sounded like the menopause — something she had resisted at first, feeling she was not old enough.
She later began hormone replacement therapy (HRT), which she has credited with giving her back her balance and the ability to take on new challenges.
Campaigning for free HRT and better GP training
In October 2021 she appeared on BBC Breakfast ahead of a march on Parliament Square in support of a bill that would have made HRT free in England, as it already was in Scotland and Wales. She described menopause symptoms in that interview as soul-destroying, and argued women were simply asking for their hormones back so they could feel normal.
She has also backed Loose Women‘s Menopause Manifesto, and consistently argued that GPs need better training to recognise menopause symptoms quickly rather than reaching first for antidepressants. Most strikingly, she has credited HRT directly with her policing career, saying she would not have had the foundation to train for that job without it.
Dyslexia: Diagnosed at 46
Lancaster has said she always suspected she had a learning difficulty but kept it private, and was only formally diagnosed with dyslexia at 46. Reading aloud was, she told The Guardian, once her greatest fear. She has described the panic of being asked to read a pledge at a charity event, and how Stewart encouraged her through it until the fear lifted. At school, one teacher told her father there was little point trying with her — a remark her family ignored while arranging extra English lessons.
She now discusses what the condition taught her: that struggling with the written word pushed her to read rooms and people instead. She recorded her memoir’s audiobook at the RNIB’s Talking Books studios and supports charities for people who are blind or partially sighted, including the Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB).
From TV Experiment to Real Police Officer
Famous and Fighting Crime
In 2019 Lancaster took part in Channel 4’s Famous and Fighting Crime, in which celebrities worked alongside real emergency service teams. Working with police officers had a profound effect on her — instead of leaving the experience behind with the filming, she decided to apply for real.
Training and qualifying in 2021
Lancaster completed the selection process — exams, interviews and a fitness test — and around eight months of training. She took her oath and qualified as a special constable with the City of London Police in April 2021.
Special constables are volunteers, but they are not observers. They wear the same uniform, hold the same powers of arrest as regular officers, and commit to regular duties — in her case broadly one duty a week, often on foot patrol in the Square Mile, including night shifts.
On duty at national moments
- September 2022: on duty for the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II, an experience she described to the PA news agency as the biggest honour
- May 2023: on duty for the coronation of King Charles III, stationed on Whitehall, which she told ITV’s Good Morning Britain she was tremendously proud and honoured to be part of
She has also spoken about making arrests, and about how being a mother helps when dealing with teenagers and victims. Policing has a personal meaning for her too: in her memoir she discloses assaults she experienced as a schoolgirl and as a young model, and connects her desire to make streets safer for women directly to those experiences.
Freedom of the City of London
That service has been formally recognised with the Freedom of the City of London, awarded for her work as a special constable and her support for charitable causes — including charities helping young people and people who are blind or partially sighted. At the Guildhall ceremony, attended by her husband, family and friends, she said she was humbled by the honour. Read the official announcement on the City of London Corporation news pages.
Someone Like Me: Her Memoir and What She Is Doing Now
On 25 September 2025 Lancaster published her memoir, Someone Like Me (Bloomsbury) — her first full account of her life, covering her Essex childhood and school bullying, undiagnosed dyslexia, modelling, meeting and marrying Stewart, IVF and motherhood, depression, the menopause, and joining the police. A Radio Times interview around the book explored how policing had strengthened her — read more in the Radio Times interview with Penny Lancaster.
Since publication she has recorded the audiobook herself at the RNIB Talking Books studios, continued her regular Loose Women appearances and her weekly special constable duties, and spoken about her love of gardening and nature in Hertfordshire. It is a striking picture for someone in her mid-fifties: author, broadcaster, photographer — and, most Thursday nights, a volunteer police officer on patrol in the City.
Frequently Asked Questions
How old is Penny Lancaster?
Penny Lancaster was born on 15 March 1971, which makes her 55 years old as of October 2026. She celebrated her 50th birthday in March 2021, the same spring she qualified as a special constable.
Who is Penny Lancaster married to?
She is married to singer Sir Rod Stewart. They met in 1999, married in Italy in June 2007, and have two sons together, Alastair (born 2005) and Aiden (born 2011). As Rod Stewart’s wife she is formally known as Lady Stewart.
What does Penny Lancaster do now?
She is a regular Loose Women panellist, a volunteer special constable with the City of London Police, and an author — her memoir Someone Like Me was published in September 2025.
Why did Penny Lancaster become a police officer?
After working alongside officers on Channel 4’s Famous and Fighting Crime in 2019, she applied to train for real. She qualified as a special constable in April 2021, has served on duty at Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral and King Charles III’s coronation, and says a key motivation is making the streets safer for women.
What has Penny Lancaster said about the menopause?
In her own public statements, Lancaster has said her menopause symptoms began during lockdown in 2020, that she was first prescribed antidepressants, and that her Loose Women colleagues helped her recognise it was the menopause. She began HRT, campaigned in 2021 for HRT to be free in England, and has called for better menopause training for GPs.
