JESS IRWIN

ON KEEPING HIS SPIRIT ALIVE FOR THEIR ADORED LITTLE BOYS

- BELINDA ROBEY

It’s happy chaos in the Irwin household as Rex, five, and three-year-old twins Rafa and Cormac dart in and out of the garden of the spacious family home on which their dad Jonnie worked so hard.

Bright and airy, with a comforting warmth that feels like a hug the moment you step over the threshold, the property was a labour of love for the presenter in the truest sense of the words.

Jonnie, who fronted Channel 4’s travel property programme A Place in the Sun and the BBC’s Escape to the Country, had already been diagnosed with terminal cancer when he and his wife Jess bought the house, in a leafy suburb of Newcastle, in December 2021.

Not knowing how much time he had left, he set about pouring his heart and soul into transforming it into the perfect home for his family before his death in February, at the age of 50.

“Some of the last things I said to Jonnie were about this house and how grateful I was for everything he did to make it more than I could ever have dreamt of, because I know how much he put into it,” says Jess, 40.

OPENING UP

Jess is speaking exclusively to Hello! in her first interview since losing the man for whom she fell head-overheels after they were set up on a date by mutual friends in summer 2015. They married the following year.

“He was continually trying to improve it for us. Right to the end, he was working for us; saying yes to things because he was thinking about me and the boys and our future.