On a quiet afternoon in southwest London, Martha Lady Sitwell, a star of the new Bravo series “Ladies of London: The New Reign,” sipped a Coke Zero and smoked a Marlboro at her home in Battersea. Her magpie, Hecate, perched on her shoulder and tried to hide a worm in her hair.
Hecate, whom Sitwell rescued as a hatchling and named for the Greek goddess of magic, seemed eager to exploit her owner’s easygoing nature, taking run of the house, pecking at a sandwich on the table and swooping low overhead. (All visitors are offered goggles in case Hecate spots their pupils moving and decides to stick her beak in their eye.)
Sitwell, 46, dressed in a gray turtleneck and light jeans, her lips and nails both painted red, reflected on when she learned she had been cast in the series, which follows the lives of affluent Americans living in London and royal-adjacent Brits.
“I thought, well, who’s the most successful?” she said. “So, I watched two episodes of the ‘Kardashians,’ and I thought, You’re really going to struggle to emulate them. And then I figured, Well, they cast you, so they want you.”
The series is a reboot of a Bravo series that ran for three seasons, from 2014 to 2017. It borrows many of the same themes of the original — primarily, the awkward and dramatic moments that arise when American and British cultures clash. The show also features a few of Sitwell’s real-life friends and society acquaintances, like the British socialite and former “Made in Chelsea” star Mark-Francis Vandelli, and Emma Thynn, the Marchioness of Bath. The finale episode airs Thursday.
Sitwell’s role on the show is part glamorous good time girl and part wounded empath. Her ’30s-style pin-curl bob and affection for vintage silhouettes evokes a bygone era of aristocratic elegance, recalling characters in the literature of Evelyn Waugh. She is frequently scolded by her castmates for being too trusting, and, as a reality TV rookie, is willing to show a vulnerable side of herself that more seasoned reality stars often shy away from.
“Martha can only ever be authentically Martha,” wrote Kimi Murdoch, Sitwell’s castmate and close friend whom Bravo describes as a Haitian American shipping heiress, in an email interview. “She was absolutely born to be a star.”
Sitwell, born the second of three daughters into the well-connected de Blank family in Norfolk, attended boarding schools until her teen years, when undiagnosed A.D.H.D. and dyslexia — she calls herself “neurospicy” — led to troubles at home and in school. When her father, the restaurateur Justin Robert de Blank, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s and the family started facing financial troubles, Sitwell began acting out even more, and her mother kicked her out of the house.
“When you’re constantly the problem, you go: ‘Fine, I will be the problem,’” she said.
At 13, Sitwell began living on the street, where she said she was eventually scouted by the British fashion designer Vivienne Westwood, queen of modern day punk style, who asked her to come model for her.
“She saw me, and she was like, ‘Darling, you’re fabulous,’” Sitwell said. “And that started me back on the life I had known.”
After giving birth to her only child, a son, at 17, Sitwell continued modeling and worked odd jobs in P.R. and as a stylist and makeup artist before she met Sir George Reresby Sacheverell Sitwell, a baronet and film producer. When they married in 2007, she became Lady Sitwell and moved to the countryside.
After having spent more than a decade in London, Sitwell returned to her favorite childhood sport — horseback riding — and became a rider in sidesaddle, a form of equestrianism in which riders sit with their legs to one side of the horse.
Sitwell’s life in the countryside was idyllic and luxurious — with thousands of pounds to spend each month on whatever she pleased, mostly “clothes and champagne,” she said — but it was also lonely. She suffered two family tragedies within a few months: Her father died in December 2012 and her older sister Polly in July 2013.
“I left,” Sitwell said. “I ran away from home with seven dogs, two hound puppies and three horses, one of which was a foal. And I got to the end of the drive in the lorry with all of these animals, and I thought: Hmm, left or right?” The couple is now divorced. (Attempts to contact Sitwell went unanswered.)
Newly single after more than a decade, Sitwell moved back to London and began trying to put her life back together.
“I was just sort of trundling along in my little career when I went and threw it all away again for another wealthy man,” Sitwell said of her next relationship. Now, “I’ve decided not to do that anymore,” she added.
After her mother died in 2021, Sitwell moved to the Kensington neighborhood of London, before several terrifying encounters with a stalker forced her to relocate to her current home, which she calls “the grottage” — a combination of “grotty” and “cottage.” Having always loved writing, she began churning out personal essays for The Times of London — about her mother’s death and her experience with homelessness.
“It occurred to me that I should probably be on telly because I’m really not good at anything else, other than just being me,” Sitwell said.
A friend introduced her to Elaine Foran, the former publisher of Elle U.K. who ran her own talent agency, and helped Sitwell get cast on “Ladies of London.”
Her self-deprecation and haplessness — Sitwell frequently describes herself as “wandering in circles, talking nonsense, pushing doors clearly marked pull” — are part of the charm.
In addition to her penchant for animals, Sitwell is fond of the unexplained, the supernatural and the woo woo. She shows a video on her phone of a psychic she hired several years ago predicting her appearance on TV. She was into tarot for a while but got freaked out when she kept pulling the Tower, a card symbolizing chaos and destruction.
A pet psychic whom she hired to communicate with Hecate, her magpie, on one episode of “Ladies of London” revealed that though Sitwell technically owns the bird, Hecate actually thinks she owns Sitwell. (Sitwell also said on the show that she believes the bird is her mother reincarnated because “they both love men and champagne.”)
When Hecate seemed full of worms and Sitwell had finished her Coke Zero, she disappeared into another room and returned wearing a black jumpsuit and ankle-length fur coat. She put on several layers of sparkly necklaces and a pair of diamond hoops, and finished the look with black heels and a Chanel flap bag.
(Her castmate Vandelli wrote in an email interview that he admired her commitment to “the art of personal style,” which veers 1940s vintage with pops of modern touches. “In an era of ubiquity, predictability and disposable trends, Martha’s aesthetic reads as defiance and discipline,” he wrote. “She dresses not to be seen, but to express.”)
It’s a Tuesday night, and we’re heading to 5 Hertford Street, the private members club in Mayfair known as one of London’s “most secretive.” Sitwell also held a “divorce party” at the club in 2017 that was so extravagant it was picked up by the tabloids. When asked who belonged to the club, Sitwell, a founding member, deadpanned: “the really rich.”
And though Sitwell may not currently count herself among that group, she is welcomed to 5 Hertford Street like royalty, embraced by the coat check girls and greeted by the servers, who guide her to a prime outdoor table beside a roaring fireplace. She sips on champagne while discussing politics — she has a bone to pick with the billionaires of the world — as well as what’s next for her.
She would like to adhere to the Bravo star playbook by starting her own business, perhaps a makeup brand or a line of dog coats. She wants to have enough money for more frequent visits to her horse, Daphne, who’s being cared for by a friend. She would also like to sign some brand deals and, of course, film a second season of “Ladies of London.” (The show hasn’t officially been picked up for a Season 2, though some critics have hailed it as “the best new Bravo show in years.”)
In Sitwell’s estimation, her life has been a series of “peaks and troughs,” and now she seems to be hitting another peak. Even the manager of 5 Hertford Street, who greets her like an old friend, is a fan of the show, and before she heads home for the evening, he offers his opinion on a recent episode. (In his assessment, Margo is starting a little too much drama.)
“Do you think they’d ever let me film here?” she asks him, gesturing to the gilded walls of 5 Hertford Street.
“Yes, definitely,” he says, before backpedaling. “Actually no, definitely not.”
But Sitwell isn’t deterred. After all, what’s one more trough? She gives one of her booming laughs and kisses him on both cheeks before disappearing into the night, her fur coat and the scent of cigarettes trailing behind her.
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