Every couple is used to telling the story of how they met.
Sometimes it’s ridiculously romantic (“we were seated next to each other on a plane and just never stopped talking”), sometimes it’s slightly problematic (“I… I was actually seeing someone else at the time”), and sometimes it’s a straight-up lie (“we met on Tinder through mutual friends”).
It’s one of the first things we want to know when we meet a couple – for a few reasons. We want to be assured it’s possible to find love in a #hopelessplace, we want to believe in love at first sight, and we also want to hear about how an unassuming series of events can ultimately lead to a happy relationship.
So to satisfy our curiosity, here are the stories of how some of our favourite Aussie celebrity couples met.
Hamish and Zoë Foster Blake
The couple first met in 2004, when Zoë was 23 and Hamish was 21. They were both at an event for a “horrible men’s deodorant launch thing.”
In an interview with Fairfax Media’s Good Weekend, author and cosmetics entrepreneur Zoë Foster Blake said she initially felt no physical attraction towards Hamish, who was a comedian at the time and would go on to become one of the country’s most successful radio hosts. (“No offence, honey” she said to him after.)
However, they established a strong friendship for years while they both dated other people, during which they wrote a dating book together – Textbook Romance, published in 2009.
“I had never met anyone like her – confident, hilarious, obviously beautiful and very full of fun and life. I’ve come to know it as the Zoë magic,” Blake told the magazine.
When they were both single in 2010, their relationship began to change.
“We had a few conversations and it slowly unravelled,” Foster Blake said.
They were married in December 2012 and had their son Sonny in May two years later.
On the moment she realised she wanted Blake to be more than a friend, Foster Blake told Show and Tell, “It was quite a startling moment because he’d always just been firmly a friend, even brother like, to the point that when people were like ‘I think you and Hamish would be good together’ I’d be like [vomit sound].”
“You know, we’d both had partners, and I’d been single for a year, out of a relationship for a few months, and it was quite organic I think.”
In July this year, the couple welcomed their daughter Rudy, growing their family from three to four.
Jesinta and Buddy Franklin
Model Jesinta Campbell and AFL player Lance ‘Buddy’ Franklin were reportedly introduced at the Grand Prix in March 2013. But when Buddy asked Jesinta out, she rejected him because she was hesitant about dating a footballer.
Speaking at the Swans Ladies Lunch at the International Convention Centre Sydney in July, Franklin said, “When he first messaged me, I ignored it for quite some time. But he’s Mr Persistent”.
“It was actually my mum who encouraged me to meet with him! I was (in Melbourne) for an event and he was calling me and she asked who it was.
“I said, ‘This pesky footballer. I don’t want to see him, I don’t want to date him. I don’t want to be one of those girls who dates a footballer!’
“Because I’d built up a stereotype in my head about (what) a girl who dated a footballer was.”
Her mother, however, challenged her attitude.
“She said, ‘Imagine if someone said that about you? I don’t want to see her because she’s a dumb model! Just go and meet him.’ So I met up with him for a green tea and the rest is history.”
The couple married in November 2016 in the Blue Mountains.
Rebecca and Chris Judd
Model and television presenter Rebecca Judd met her AFL player partner Chris when she was 19.
Speaking to Show and Tell, the now 34-year-old said she was at a pub in Perth when she met Chris. She had been living and working in Hong Kong, and was spending a night out with a friend during a visit home.
“I was back for a few weeks. I met out with one of my girlfriends. And she had been kissing one of Chris’ friends. Chris was with him that day,” she said.
Rebecca Judd talks all about the final hours of pregnancy, on our pregnancy podcast Hello Bump. Post continues after audio.
“I met Chris and that was it. It was kind of instant. I don’t know if it was for him but it was for me.”
At the time, Judd didn’t know the man she met was an up and coming AFL star, but it wasn’t long before she moved back to Australia to study and to be with Chris.
They were married in 2010, and now have four children, twins Tom and Darcy, four-year-old Billie and seven-year-old Oscar.
Andy Lee and Rebecca Harding
In 2015, 33-year-old Andy Lee was sitting in a Melbourne café when he met 23-year-old university student and model Rebecca Harding.
She was the waitress, and earlier this year on 60 Minutes, Lee commented that she wasn’t a particularly good one.
“I’d just witnessed two customers complaining about her,” Andy told the show.
“I spent too much time talking to customers!” Rebecca laughed. “… I just didn’t know what [they] wanted for breakfast.”
When Andy first asked her out, Rebecca was hesitant.
“He hadn’t had a girlfriend in a while,” she told 60 Minutes. “He was Cleo Bachelor of the year, I thought he was a bit of a sleaze bag maybe?”
“He’s a bit sweeter than I was actually picturing… He’s a very sweet, kind, generous person,” she said.
Interestingly, Andy decided to give Rebecca his email, rather than his phone number – something she admitted later that she hated.
Last year, the couple had a six-month break before getting back together.