Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale – according to her, theirs was a marriage that was, “extra hard.” They were from different countries, they were competitors in the same line of business, and they were both celebrities in their own right.
How Did Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale Meet?
According to Rossdale, he first saw Stefani while she was out for a Rollerblade-aided spin. “I don’ know what it was, something about her. She ruined my concentration.” She was in the rock band No Doubt while he was part of another one, Bush.
Though they performed on the same stage every night, the two had little interaction, even during their downtime. So Rossdale devised a plan. “I threw a party in New Orleans just as an excuse to hang out with her. We drank a bunch of hurricanes and went around the French Quarter. We had our first kiss that night.”
Their budding courtship inspired Stefani to pen the single Underneath It All. “I was in the park with Gavin, and I had been keeping a journal. And we were so in love, and I wrote that line, ‘You’re lovely underneath it all.’ You know, like, ‘After all the [expletive] we’ve been through, you’re a really good person. I really think I might like you.’”
So Nice, They Married Twice
On New Year’s Day, 2002, Rossdale proposed to Stefani. “She did tell me to say it again, but then she said yes.” The engagement ring was a thick black band with a row of diamonds running down its center.
The ceremony was scheduled for September 14, 2002, at Saint Paul’s Covent Garden in London. The bride arrived a full hour late, the groom’s Hungarian sheepdog sat by his side, and after the deeming, the 150 guests were shuttled to the reception on double-decker buses.
Two weeks later, a second wedding was held in Los Angeles for the family and friends unable to attend the overseas affair. Stefani wore the same hot pink dip-dyed gown during both services.
The Family Expands
On Friday, May 26, 2006, Stefani and Rossdale welcomed a son, Kingston James McGregor. The pregnancy had been announced the previous December by the expectant mother during the final leg of her U.S. tour.
The couple would subsequently welcome two more boys: Zuma Nesta Rock (August 21, 2008) and Apollo Bowie Flynn (March 1, 2014).
Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale Call It Quits
Fifteen months later, Stefani filed for divorce; the complaint alleged irreconcilable differences. Soon after, the couple issued a joint statement: “While the two of us have come to the mutual decision that we will no longer be partners in marriage, we remain partners in parenthood and are committed to jointly raising our three sons in a happy and healthy environment. To that end, we respectfully request privacy from the media during this time.”
Hot Tea
In keeping with the pair’s desire for privacy, the exact reasoning for the split was not made public – though Stefani did refer to February 9th, 2015 as, “the epicenter of the whole thing.”
Furthermore, she told Cosmopolitan magazine that the only people aware of the inciting incident are, “my parents, the people involved, and whoever they told.”
But rumors at the time were rampant that Rossdale had cheated with the nanny. The only other comment Stefani made was that “nobody would believe it if I could really say what happened. I went through months and months of torture,” and then she added that any curious persons should, “listen to every single song I’ve ever written, and it’s all there. It’s an ongoing theme that I’ve had for a long time.”
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