helena frith powell

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Category: Journalism

Me and my Santé magazine column

21st March 2016

It must  be more than 10 years ago that I received a call from an editor at the French magazine Santé. I was on a train at the time, heading from our home in the south of France to London, and I remember the line being rather bad. The editor asked me i …

The French role model (again)

5th February 2013

Just after Christmas we went to a party at the home of a French family we are quite friendly with. Like us, they have three children aged between nine and 13. Unlike us, these children look and behave like they have leapt straight from the pages of a ‘ …

Unacustomed as I am to public speaking…

27th November 2012

Tomorrow I have a terrifying task to perform. At 2pm I am to stand up in front of the WHOLE of Leo’s year at school and give a speech about what it’s like being a journalist. Nothing, not even my first appearance on Richard & Judy, or walking up th …

The future of journalism?

27th March 2011

I think I might be in the wrong business. Last week I was approached by a charming young lady from the Guardian, asking me to write an article about the Languedoc (the region where our house is in the south of France). “We can’t pay you,” she explained …

The December Issue

17th November 2010

Last night we all watched the documentary film The September Issue which is about American Vogue and its legendary editor Anna Wintour. The film centers on the biggest issue of the year, the September issue, and follows the fashion shoots, Anna’s meeti …

How a very small minority lives

2nd March 2010

Picture the scene: I am doing yoga looking out over a 90 degree view of Jumeirah Beach in Dubai from the comfort of the 34th floor. Someone is pressing the dress I am going to wear this evening to dinner with my husband in a private dining room. Two cl …

Baby Beauty…..

28th October 2008

My step-daughter Julia was here last week for half term. She is fourteen and I thought that she was old enough to come along with me for a manicure and a pedicure. We eased into our comfy chairs feeling jolly pleased with ourselves. Then I spotted her. …

What not to wear…..

16th July 2008

I am on a train speeding through the Swedish countryside en route to yet another tough assignment. I am going to write an article about Scandinavia’s first nudist B&B for The Times (www.hyltebergagard.se). I have covered (being the operative word) some …

Another tough assignment….

21st May 2008

I would like to give you all an insight into my hard working life. Rupert and I are in St Tropez at the chicest hotel in town, Byblos, which has been the best address in St Tropez since 1967 when Mick Jagger married Bianca on a terrace here. Guests inc …

How to start a career in journalism….

18th April 2008

In order to break into journalism in England I was forced to become a financial journalist on leaving university. This was not, as you can imagine, my natural environment. I worked for the gripping title ‘Trade Finance Magazine’ which shortly after I j …

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Helena Frith Powell was born in Sweden to a Swedish mother and Italian father, but grew up mainly in England. She is the author of eleven books, translated into several languages including Chinese and Russian. She wrote the French Mistress column The Sunday Times about life in France for several years. She is a regular contributor to the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, The Times, Daily Telegraph, Tatler Magazine and Harper’s Bazaar.

Helena has been the editor of four magazines, including M Magazine, a supplement for the Abu Dhabi-based National Newspaper and FIVE, a high-end fashion glossy, also published in Abu Dhabi. Helena was also editor-in-chief of 360 Life, a quarterly glossy magazine published with the Sports 360 Newspaper in Dubai, part of the Chalhoub Group.

Helena contributes regularly to UK-based newspapers and magazines and holds a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Cambridge. She is working on a thriller set in Sweden as well as a novel about the relationship between Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield called Sense of an Echo.

In 2022 her short story The Japanese Gardener came second in the Fish Publishing Short Story Prize. One of her stories was also shortlisted for the Bridport Short Story Prize. When she’s not writing, she works as a headhunter for the media and entertainment industry for the Sucherman Group. 

Helena, who was educated at Durham University, lives in the Languedoc region of France with her husband Rupert and their three children.

© 2023 Helena Frith Powell
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