Martha Stewart Recreates Her 1995 “People” Cover on Her Gorgeous Farm and Talks Dating, ‘Street Cred’ and Never Slowing Down (Exclusive)

Ana CalderoneWed, August 5, 2026 at 12:00 PM UTC

0

Credit: Victoria Will

It’s Aug. 3, 1995—Martha Stewart’s birthday. Outside her $1.7 million shingled house on Lily Pond Lane in East Hampton, N.Y., the chatelaine is wiping away dirt on the side-door steps with a towel. An insomniac who rises long before dawn, Stewart has already walked her two dogs, exercised and baked a batch of blueberry muffins.

That’s how People’s 1995 cover story on Stewart began — and 31 years later almost to the day, not much has changed. It’s just gotten, well, better. On July 23, 2026, 10 days shy of her 85th birthday, Stewart pulls up to her People shoot in her Polaris Ranger utility vehicle to re-create thatcover for our first-ever Flashback issue.

Martha Stewart on the cover of People in 1995 & 2026

This time we’re at her 156-acre Bedford, N.Y., farm, which she bought in 2000 for $15.6 million. “Watch your feet!” she yells to the photo team in her way. No blueberry muffins were made (she now prefers a simple breakfast of green juice and cappuccino), but she did wake up at 3:00 a.m., like she does every morning, to do her daily puzzles before starting her day, which included an appearance on Today to promote her new home intelligence app Hint.

“I’m very particular still. I still am a perfectionist. I still like to do many things at the same time. I like to do all the same things I’ve pretty much always done,” she reflects. “I’d like to have a little bit more free time. I don’t have any free time at all—but I’m working on that.”

She’s going to have to try harder. Raised in Nutley, N.J., as the second-oldest of six children, Stewart has been working since high school, when she started modeling to make extra money for her family. The Barnard College graduate married young, welcomed her daughter Alexis (now 60) with her former husband Andy Stewart and bought a fixer-upper in Westport, Conn., where she kicked off her unparalleled career as a master of homemaking. She started a catering business and wrote her first cookbook, Entertaining, which spawned a show, magazines and eventually an “omnimedia” company that turned her into the first female self-made billionaire in the U.S. by 1999.

“It was a very fabulous time,” says Stewart.

Martha Stewart with one of her Friesian horses.Credit: Victoria Will

There have been lows, of course: Infidelity on both sides of her marriage; the loss of about half her net worth after she went to prison in 2004 for five months on charges related to the sale of a stock. But Stewart has been on a high ever since.

She has authored 102 cookbooks, opened restaurants in Las Vegas and Connecticut and, at age 81 in 2023, become the oldest Sports Illustrated Swimsuit cover star. “I worked out for three whole months,” she deadpans. Plus she has a new skincare line, Elm Biosciences, and partnerships with Kohler, Skechers and Miracle-Gro.

And yet despite her packed schedule, just the other day Stewart found time to regrout her marble kitchen floors. “Grouting is a serious business. I know all about it. It’s horrifying, but it’s true,” she says with a laugh. Maybe she’ll include a chapter on it in her autobiography, which is also in the works.

You might think Stewart has earned the right to slow down. “You have it all,” this reporter suggests. “No, I don’t. I didn’t have an app for my home, and so I’m making one,” she says. “My goal is to keep learning about everything.”

She’d also like a yacht, but more on that later.

In honor of our Flashback issue, tell us about when you were flying high in the ’90s.

It was a great time because my company was thriving. My magazine Martha Stewart Living was being read by millions of readers. We were on all the late-night shows. We were being fêted and fêting other people in New York City. The ’90s were a very, very good time.

How do you feel about the resurgence of ’90s trends?

I don’t think we need a resurgence of the ’90s. I mean, we had that. Now we have something else. Evolution is good.

What’s life like now on your farm?

This is the best place to live. You wake up with fresh air, you wake up with roosters crowing. You have vegetables from the garden to make your green juice from. You have eggs from the henhouse to scramble or boil for breakfast. It’s a pleasure to live like this.

Martha Stewart at home in Bedford, N.Y.Credit: Victoria Will

You divorced your husband in 1990. Five years later our cover story noted that you “envied friends who had a lovely married life.” Do you still feel that way?

Now it’s less important. The older you get, the less you really need a mate, I think. I wouldn’t want to be beleaguered with an older, ill person.

What about dating a younger guy?

Well, I’ve done that. Been there, done that. I have lots of friends. I’m not a lonely person. I have a very, very full —oh, probably too full! — life. I go out on . . . I don’t know if you call them dates or not, but I go out.

What are you like at a party?

My friends call me LIFO: last in, first out. I don’t like cocktail parties terribly much. I don’t like standing around. If it’s a dinner, I like to get there when people are about to sit down. And then I like to leave shortly after dessert is served. But I have a good time while I’m there. I had dinner with Meghan Markle the other night. We were both guests at a dinner party in California. And she had just gotten back from the palace. I didn’t talk to her really more than to say a couple words, but I know she was talking about it.

What do you think about her stepping into your space with her own cooking show?

If you’re an actress, it’s hard to then transition to a princess and then from a princess into a homemaking guru on a television show. It doesn’t sort of follow. So go from there.

Advertisement

You opened up about your difficult divorce in your 2024 Netflix documentary Martha. Did you hear from Andy after it came out?

Only legally, to remind me of divorce settlement statements, which I had never read. I mean, who cared after two years of arguing about a settlement? I still haven’t read it. He’s a jerk.

Martha Stewart in her Polaris ranger.Credit: Victoria Will

What did you love about running a magazine?

It was the most exciting time to have a national magazine devoted to my favorite subject, which is living, and to everything to do with the home, inside and outside. I had the best staff of editors, art directors, photographers. We discovered so many photographers. I think we’ve tried to count and keep track of everyone who ever worked at Martha Stewart Living, and it’s over 4,000 people now. Many of them are so talented and so well-known in their own right now. We keep track.

You coined the catchphrase “it’s a good thing” to give your stamp of approval. Do you still say it?

Oh, of course I do. All the time. I’m not allowed to say it more than two or three times a day, though. I’ll be called on it.

Martha Stewart with her geese at her Bedford, N.Y. farm.Credit: Victoria Will

Do you still cook for yourself often?

All the time. I love going to the grocery store. You have to go to the grocery store to know what prices are, if you want to know what people can buy and the quality, is it any good? If I’m buying fish, I go to the fishmonger. One day I went to three stores to get the right lamb chops.

You don’t send people to do the shopping?

They bring home the wrong stuff. My driver goes and gets the milk, that’s all, because we use a tremendous amount of milk because we have a lot of cappuccino machines. We have a cappuccino machine in the stable. We have a cappuccino machine in the groundskeepers’ lunchroom. We have one in the greenhouse, and we have one in my house, and we have one in the studio. [Laughs]

You’ve come a long way. People say your time in prison gave you “street cred.” Can you appreciate that?

Of course it gave me street cred. I mean, you would never know what jail was like until you go to jail. It’s a horrible place. It’s not a restorative process.

Perhaps it brought you to your pal Snoop Dogg.

No, I don’t think Snoop likes me because I have street cred. I invited Snoop to be on my show [in 2008] because he was a rapper, and I was attracted to rappers. I like rap music. I especially like Eminem, and I could never get Eminem to come on any show. He would not accept any invitation. I still haven’t met him.

How are you feeling about turning 85?

I don’t think about age. Eighty-five is just a number; that’s all I consider it. I don’t want to have a party. It’s not a big deal.

What are you doing to stay looking so good?

I have good genes. My mom looked great at 95. We eat well. We don’t drink very much. We don’t smoke. We eat healthy food. We exercise daily. I horseback-ride.

Do you do any cosmetic procedures?

I go to Dr. Dan Belkin in New York City. He is a very superb dermatologist. And I use a little bit of fillers. I go maybe once every four months for touch-ups. I have not had any plastic surgery at all. I don’t think I need it. I do facial exercises and have the best facials from Mario Badescu and Georgia Louise. Peptides are very good. I take a few peptides. So that’s what I do. I’m more a maintenance kind of person. I’m not getting boobs done and hips and butts and stuff like that.

Martha Stewart’s 2026 People cover

You seem to never stop. What is on your list of goals?

I am doing stuff that I probably didn’t think I would do. I’m learning all about AI and agentics.

What’s the best part about fame and all you’ve built?

I couldn’t care less about being rich and famous. All I want to be is comfortable, have beautiful gardens, have enough money to support my family and treat my friends well. [Pauses] I would like a yacht — a big yacht. I don’t have that yet.

For more on Martha Stewart and the Flashback Issue, pick up this week’s issue of PEOPLE, available everywhere Friday.

on People

Original Article on Source

Source: “AOL Entertainment”