There are two ways to know if you are really compatible with your partner, they say – go on a long trip together, or renovate together. Sunrise presenter Edwina Bartholomew and her writer-farmer husband, Neil Varcoe, opted for the second route, undertaking a massive project to restore a historic hotel in the regional NSW town of Carcoar.
That’s no small project, and Bartholomew’s admission in early 2024 that she and Varcoe spent most of their year living separately stunned her fans, who wondered how such an arrangement could work.
Bartholomew’s Sunrise commitments keep her mostly in Sydney, while Varcoe lives in the Capertee Valley, three hours west of Sydney.
There, he works as the chief farming officer at Warramba, the 1890s farm the pair lovingly restored several years ago.
In between all of that, they are turning Carcoar’s The Victoria 1846 hotel into a new boutique establishment called Saltash Farm, due to open in 2025.
“My husband lives in the country with the dog and I live in the city with the kids,” Bartholomew told Stellar in April 2024 (the couple have two children, daughter Molly, four, and son Tom, two.)
“Each weekend, we traipse back and forth between the two or meet somewhere in the middle.”
And for her and Varcoe, who wed in April 2018, the arrangement works. Contrary to what you might expect, living separately helps to keep their relationship alive, rather than stifle it.
“It feels like a Love Actually airport reunion every time we come together with a slow-motion embrace and those newlywed feels,” Bartholomew joked, adding that the separation kept their “love alive”.
Earlier this year, Bartholomew’s lighthearted reference to their living arrangements as a “sleep divorce” prompted headlines suggesting the pair had separated – but nothing could be further from the truth!
“It was an amazing response,” she told Stellar, referring to the shocked public response after she announced that she and Varcoe mostly lived apart.
“It’s just something people don’t talk about (couples who live separately), but so many couples do.
“It absolutely went bananas, because I think it’s not the ‘done thing.’ When you talk about what you’re doing in your relationship that just works for you – and that’s it for us, for many reasons and on many levels – I think that resonated (with people).”
Bartholomew also revealed that she and Varcoe slept in separate bedrooms even when they were sharing a house – “for about 10 years, long before we were married and long before we had kids.”
But it wasn’t because Varcoe snored or Bartholomew was a doona hog – it was simply due to differing work schedules, with Bartholomew getting up before the crack of dawn for her work on Sunrise.
“It shocks people when they come to our house and see two rooms set up,” Bartholomew told The Daily Telegraph.
Here’s what else we know about Edwina Bartholomew and Neil Varcoe’s relationship.
How did Edwina Bartholomew meet her husband?
The pair first met when working together on Sydney radio station 2GB. They dated for six years before Varcoe popped the question.
What does Neil Varcoe do?
Describing himself as “an accidental farmer,” Varcoe was a journalist, writer and digital media executive for Twitter before turning his hand to farming – and hotel restoration!
Does Edwina Bartholomew have children?
Yes! Edwina Bartholomew and Neil Varcoe have two children, daughter Molly (four) and son Tom (two).
What has Edwina Bartholomew said about her husband?
Bartholomew opened up earlier in 2024 about her husband’s struggle with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome – part of the reason Varcoe moved away from the city and into the relative calm of rural living.
“I think he’s the best he’s been for a number of years, just by virtue of having that space to recover,” Bartholomew told News.com.au in March 2024.
“Eating healthily, exercising, having a really regimented routine. He’s actually really good, which is fantastic because for a while he definitely wasn’t and it was challenging for both of us. As a wife, it’s hard to see your husband go through that, and hard for him to miss out on things because he physically can’t be there.”
What has Neil Varcoe said about Edwina Bartholomew?
In 2023, Varcoe and Bartholomew opened up to Australian Women’s Weekly about his Chronic Fatigue Syndrome diagnosis.
“It’s hard on me, but it’s harder on the ones who love you,” Varcoe said.
“I’m lucky. I have a supportive wife and family and wonderful friends.”
Taking to LinkedIn to reflect on his move away from the city, Varcoe added that he was doing it for his wife and kids.
“At times, I’ve wanted to pack up and head home – get another job in media or tech and let the dream fade,” he admitted.
“Then I think about why I am doing it. It’s for them. It’s always been about them.
“We’re not just building a family business. We’re making a life for ourselves and our children. What more remarkable thing is there?”
