Supermodel Kate Moss was among a host of celebrities who attended the funeral on Monday of Bob Geldof’s daughter Peaches, at an English village church filled with memories for the tragedy-hit family.
The 25-year-old television presenter’s body was carried into St Mary Magdalene and St Lawrence church in Davington in Kent, southern England, in a white coffin painted with a blue sky and clouds. The Rev Tracey Bateson, who led the service, told Kent Online: “I will be there for him as much as possible, just as I would with any other parishioners.” Peaches grew up in nearby Faversham.
The church, which is next to the Geldof family estate, was the venue for the funeral of Peaches’ mother Paula Yates, who died from an accidental heroin overdose in 2000, aged 41.
It was also where Yates married Bob Geldof, the lead singer of the Boomtown Rats and organiser of the Live Aid concert, and where Peaches herself married in 2012.
A picture of Peaches with her musician husband Tom Cohen and their two young sons, as well as her beloved pet dogs and cat, was painted on the back of the coffin.
Her ashes were reportedly planned to be scattered in the garden of the family estate.
Moss was among a star-studded crowd of mourners who attended the funeral in bright spring sunshine, including musician Bill Wyman, model Jo Wood, actress Trudie Styler and Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York. Actress Jaime Winston held a single red rose. Also in attendance were Alexa Chung, the model and television presenter, Johnny Borrell, the Razorlight frontman and singer Eliza Doolittle.
Geldof and his remaining daughters are thought to have entered the church by a private entrance, and the ceremony itself was private. Her father was expected to deliver the eulogy.
Peaches was found dead at her home in Kent on April 7, leaving her two children aged 23 months and 11 months.
Police have described her death as “non-suspicious” but “unexplained”. A post-mortem failed to establish a cause of death and toxicology tests are being carried out.
In a statement after her death, Bob Geldof said the family was “beyond pain”, saying: “She was the wildest, funniest, cleverest, wittiest and the most bonkers of all of us.”
Peaches was the second of three daughters for Geldof and Yates, who was married to Geldof from 1986 to 1996 but left him for Australian rock star Michael Hutchence, who committed suicide in 1997.
Making an early debut in the London glamour and society scene, Peaches wrote articles for British national newspapers from the age of 14 and was a regular on London’s party scene.
But after becoming a mother, she quit the city for country life. At the time of her death, she was a columnist for Mother & Baby magazine, writing that “being a mum is the best thing in my life” and she was “happier than ever”.
However she also wrote that motherhood had initially left her “friendless” and “alienated and abandoned”.
Peaches’ last Twitter post, the day before her death, was a photograph of herself and her mother.
