I was an original Gogglebox star, now I’ve quit fame for a very different career in Wales
FOR five years he was part of the Gogglebox furniture – but Chris Ashby-Steed is now desperately trying to move on from his telly past.
The hairdresser, 45, who appeared on the Channel 4 reality show with ex-boyfriend Stephen Webb, has now left Brighton behind for a new life in Wales with husband Tony Ashby-Steed, 52.
The couple have bought a stunning family home in the town of Newcastle Emlyn and have grand plans of renting four guest bedrooms on AirBnB.
Their income will be bolstered by Chris’s hairdressing and furniture restoration side hustle as well as Tony’s day job at Legal and General.
Speaking of his desire to put distance between himself and Brighton, Chris told WalesOnline: “I had the memories of Gogglebox there too and I wanted to eliminate those.”
His time on the programme left him struggling with impostor syndrome and affected his mental health.
“I felt like I was pretending and it was just this real angst,” he explained. “I got this real anxiety about different places because it’d be like people would stare at me and be like, ‘Oh my God, they’re staring at me, what are they going to say?”
Tragedy also influenced the couple to try something new and live life to the full.
Tony’s beloved mum died in 2021, two years after being diagnosed with a double bleed on the brain. In her final months she was admitted to hospital with a chest infection and went on to contract covid before receiving palliative care.
The couple chanced upon their new location, which they liken to the best of Devon and Cornwall, when looking for somewhere rural to put down roots.
Tony said: “We didn’t know any areas and we had an idea that we might discover an area that we like through looking at houses, or we might find a house that we completely fall in love with and then we need to check out the area that is it.”
Meanwhile, Chris’s ex Stephen and his husband Daniel Lustig, who ultimately replaced Chris on the show, recently announced they were quitting the show to pursue new opportunities.
It very much is an end of an era in more ways than one.