Sienna Miller recalls the ‘completely traumatic’ experience of being packed off to pricey boarding school at the age of eight following her parents’ divorce

Sienna Miller recalls the “traumatic” experience of being sent to boarding school after her parents’ divorce.

The actress, 42, was just eight when her American art dealer father Edwin and former model mother Josephine split and she was sent to the £42,489-a-year girls’ Heathfield in Ascot.

The chic school features a swimming pool and extensive grounds with fellow famous alumni including model Amber Le Bon, socialite Daphne Guinness and TV star Susanna Constantine.

Speaking Ruthie’s table 4 podcast, Sienna said: ‘I was small and it was too young. It was, on paper, a very idyllic looking place. It was a country house and there were only 52 girls.

‘But that first night you sit in a room with ten girls you’ve never met, in metal beds with tweed blankets over them, and at seven o’clock it’s lights out. It’s traumatic, it’s completely traumatic.”

The mother-of-two also said it was far from a gilded life when it came to school meals: ‘They used to give us spam on Tuesdays and you had to finish your plate, you had to eat everything.

‘I remember putting it in my pockets and finding dried bits of Spam in my pocket – which was lovely.’

Edwin and Jo are also parents to Savannah, 45, while he is dad to sons Stephen and Charles as well as daughter Natasha from previous relationships.

In 2023, fashion designer Savannah revealed that her beloved father was battling Alzheimer’s disease.

Taking to Instagram alongside a photo of former art dealer Edwin, she shared a heartfelt Instagram post stating that she “missed him beyond words.”

She wrote: ‘Here he is…my daddy, the man with the deepest heart, the wisest words and the most incredible hug giver who ever lived. I miss him indescribably.

“As his Alzheimer’s progresses and he slowly withdraws from the world, my heart aches for this man. His hugs are still as deep, thank God, but the life and the spark that pervaded everything has gone out.’

She concluded, “It’s so brutal and complicated to navigate. Sending love to everyone who is having a hard time today. #fathersday #alzheimers.’

The Miller children rally around their father in his battle against dementia.

Earlier that year, Sienna joined her sister and bridal wear designer Savannah, 44, in New York, where they sat with their brothers around their father.

“For the first time in six years we are all together with our dad,” Savannah wrote. ‘A lot has changed in that time, with his declining health, but at the same time nothing at all.

‘Love feels the same, as deep and true as it ever has. We may be oceans apart, but our love for each other and our daddy transcends everything.

‘In these very real moments I am elegantly reminded of what it is all about. Love and human connection is all we ever really have and I am deeply grateful for the love and connection I have with these four remarkable people, my family.

After his divorce, Edwin married British interior designer Kelly Hoppen, who said she will also see Sienna as her stepdaughter despite no longer being married to her father.

The couple split in 2003 and the 64-year-old said she hates being called Sienna and Savannah’s former stepmother.

Earlier this year, Kelly explained, “I’ve never understood when people say Sienna’s ex-stepmother, because when you love a child and you’re there for most of their childhood, you don’t just turn that off.

‘Ed and I parted on good terms and Savannah calls me Mama K and Sienna calls me Celtic Wizard – we have nicknames for each other.’

Discussing how attitudes towards ‘blended families’ were different in the 1990s, Kelly added: ‘You have to remember that I’m 64 and being a stepmother wasn’t normal for them then – these kinds of extended families.

‘When I stood at the school gate, I was frowned upon as if I was the other woman, and that was hard for me.’

Kelly, who has one biological daughter, food writer Natasha Corrett says: ‘If I hadn’t had Sienna or Savannah, I would have felt cheated that I didn’t have another child.’

Speaking about her relationship with Savannah and Sienna in Mail on Sunday’s YOU magazine in 2020, Kelly said: ‘She [Savannah] and her (actress) sister Sienna are and remain two of the dearest people in my life – even though I have been separated from their father Edwin for 17 years.

‘She calls me Mama K and I call her Sasa. She and Sienna always send me cards and flowers on Mother’s Day, which really touches me.’