VIP’s September issue has finally hit shelves and we are so excited for you to take a look inside! We’ve got an issue filled with beauty and fashion content perfect for that transitional weather and back to school season. We also have some incredible interviews with some of your favourite Irish talent where we talk all things family, relationships, pain, courage and how we can make a difference in our environment.
This month’s cover star’s story is one filled with motherly love. Una Healy is a woman of many talents but being a mam to her two children Aoife Belle (11) and Tadhg (8) is her top priority, above all else. VIP got a chance to catch up with Una and her little family the beautiful 5-star Fairmont Carton House. It’s clear the three have a special bond which Una believes is down to the fact they’re that little bit older now. “They’ve got to that age now where they’re like my little friends. They’re really developing their own personalities and I love hanging out with them.”
It’s been a tough few months for Una, with a huge amount of her personal life playing out in the public eye. But, more than anything, it’s the public’s interest in her love life that she can’t quite wrap her head around. “I still find any little date I go on blows up into this spectacular news and I don’t understand it sometimes,” she says. As anyone would, she finds it difficult having her relationships put under a microscope but as she mentions in our interview it’s what comes with the territory: “Your private life gets exposed and it can be quite intrusive but you have to accept that’s how it is.”
Like any celebrity, trolls come with the territory when it comes to social media. Una just doesn’t engage. She knows many people react differently, some will expose trolls but she just blocks them. “I don’t like to feed them”. Music was a massive part of the stars teenage and young adult years. It was all about doing as much as she could to get her music out there whether it was performing in pubs or clubs, writing music or winning song contests. “All of those things helped build me up and prepare me for when I did get the audition for The Saturdays”.
You’ll be delighted to know that Una is still close with her ex bandmates – there’s even a group chat! “We have a WhatsApp group and were actually just chatting there about how it’s been 15 years since our first single, 16 years since we first met,” she revealed. But it’s not the end of the music days for Una as she is working away on her next single, which she says is almost ready to go.
We also got the chance to chat to adaptive adventurer and motivational speaker, Nikki Bradley. Nikki is possibly the country’s most adventurous crutch user a title which has been hard earned through pain and persistence, grit and graft. The accomplished climber was diagnosed with a rare bone cancer called Ewing’s sarcoma at the age of 16. She has endured a number of surgeries that nobody should have to go through as an adult let alone a teenager including a tumour removal, two hip replacements, a femur repair and an amputation.
The Donegal native is a woman filled with motivation, something she feels was necessary for her to keep moving forward. “The last year was probably when I’ve had to pull that trick out of my hat the most. Considering how many surgeries I have had. My last surgery was by far the hardest”. You could feel her pain as she described the excruciating pain she went through following her most recent surgery, “I just had to go lie in bed. It was physically and emotionally exhausting knowing that pain was coming each evening”.
Exercise has been a saving grace for Nikki, her accomplishments and drive keep her going even through her worst days. She has completed a number of firsts including being the first person to climb four Irish mountain peaks – on crutches – in 32 hours, the first woman to abseil off Fanad Head Lighthouse and the first female on crutches to trek the 24kms on the Brecon Beacons mountain range in Wales. She really doesn’t do things in halves!
So what’s next on the cards for Nikki? In October she will receive a new prosthetic so she’s a bit limited in what she can do at the minute but the plan once she’s recovered is to explore Wicklow.
Our Editor Bianca Luykx got the chance to catch up with biologist, environmentalist, author and President of the Tree Council of Ireland, Éanna Ní Lamhna.
A delightfully pragmatic person, Éanna had a lot top say about the state of our little nation but also about the environmental state of our world. Chatting to Bianca about our rather hectic summer weather and the records that have been made from wettest March to warmest June, Éanna gets a little teary eyed wondering what the world is going to be like for her grandkids and the people of the year 2080. “Unless we do something fairly smartly, and we’re still not doing it, it’s going to be bad. We need to reduce our standard of living just a little, and we’re still not willing to do it.”
So, what can you do to help combat the climate issues from getting any worse? Éanna says “Think to yourself, ‘What am I wasting?’ .There’s a lot of food waste, I don’t get why people buy stuff and not eat it, and why do they eat out all the time? I mean these are all luxuries.”
We also have a whole host of beauty, fashion and lifestyle content for you to enjoy including all the back to school beauty bits you need and all the newest fashion trends for this coming season We also got to speak to Irish reality TV icon Maura Higgins and actor Domhnall Gleeson who gave us an insight into their lives at the minute, so make sure to pick up your copy in-store now!
