The Rise & Fall of Page 3 Girls: A Deep Dive
What happened to the girls of Page Three, and how did the multi-million dollar business go from #1 to defunct.
By Reichan Pendragon | Mar. 09, 2026; 5:20 p.m.
When you think about the reason Samantha Fox, Katie Price, Linda Lusardi, and Jodie Marsh became household names within the United Kingdom, you’ll realize that all roads point to Page 3. The British phenomenon that went from a multimillion-dollar business to the center of a scandal that found the name to be defunct by 2026. But let’s go back to the beginning. In 1969, The Sun editor Larry Lamb found himself in a predicament; he had to relaunch The Sun due to the amount of money the magazine was losing. In an attempt to compete with magazine rival The Mirror, on the anniversary of the magazine's relaunch, The Sun printed Stephanie Khan fully nude on the third page of the publication, shot by late photographer Beverley Goodway.
Lamb didn’t want the photographs to be considered sleazy pornography and sought to paint the glamour models as "good girls," he would ask The Sun’s female reporters to review the photos to make sure they weren’t regarded as "dirty." A year after the launch of Page Three, The Sun’s sales doubled to 2.5 million, becoming the best selling newspaper in the United Kingdom by 1978, forcing The Daily Mirror, The Sunday People, and The Daily Star to follow suit and start publishing nudity.
In the 1980s, The Sun’s Page Three was at an all time high. It had catapulted glamour models to the next level, while The Daily Mirror and The Sunday People discontinued publishing nude models as they found it demeaning to women. Producing the unknown faces of Debee Ashby, Donna Ewin, Samantha Fox, Kirsten Imrie, Kathy Lloyd, Gail McKenna, Suzanne Mizzi, and Maria Whittaker, making them celebrities (in their own right) overnight. By 1985, business for The Sun was booming more than ever, with an estimated 4.1 million copies selling per day, making it the most bought publication in the United Kingdom, outselling the Daily Mirror, Express, and the Daily Mail.
In 1986, glamour girl Samantha Fox (Who was named ‘Page 3 Girl of the year’ three times: 1984, ‘85, and ‘86) left her new found fame and sought a career in music. Breaking out of her Page Three image, she signed with Jive Records and released her Electro-dance-pop track, Touch Me (I Want Your Body), in March, which reached No. 1 in 17 countries, No. 4 in the United Kingdom, and No. 4 in America in the U.S. Billboard Hot 100. It was the first time a Page 3 Girl broke out of nude modeling to make a name for herself outside of Page 3.
After seeing the sales their publication was producing, thanks to the Page 3 Girls, The Sun wondered how much more sex appeal would attract their audience. In 1988, The Sun introduced the Page 7 Fella. The Page 7 Fella’s were male models who, similar to the women, posed for the seventh page of The Sun, topless, and of course instead of breasts, viewers just saw a shirtless somewhat attractive man. But "topless" modeling wasn’t what made the magazine boom, it was the girls. The desire to possess what a Page 3 Girl possessed. Page 7 was a bust and didn't increase sales so it fazed out by the early 90s.
The 1990s saw a rise in publications specifically for nude modeling, such as Loaded, FHM, and Maxim. Competition was high, and the girls were no longer yearning for a “girl next door’ image. They were polished and reached for perfection. Pay for the girls reached anywhere from £500 to £1,000. The world was formally introduced to the enigma that was Jordan, the beautiful unknown face that was really Katie Price, a 18 year old girl from Brighton, East Sussex, who left school at 16 to pursue her modeling career. To enhance her rates, she got her first breast augmentation at 19, going from a 32B to a busty 32FF, but she wasn’t the only one.
Many Page Three models openly admitted to getting surgery to enhance their assets; glamor girl Alicia Douvall (who according to her had a six month affair with Simon Cowell) went under her first breast augmentation at just 17, and has since (according to her) had over 350 procedures, including 18 breast augmentations, 11 rhinoplasties, liposuction, a chin implant, butt implants, facelifts, all equaling out to be over £1 million. In 1998 alone, 65,000 British women had cosmetic surgery, and that number would increase to 72,000 by 2000.
At the start of the 21st Century, Page Three wasn’t getting stale, but normalized. The Sun knew they had to do something to keep people interested. So in 2002, The Sun introduced the 'Page 3 Idol' initiative, in which models could submit their photos to be voted on by readers, with the winner receiving a cash prize and a Page 3 modeling contract. The first winner was Nicola Tappenden, who was credited as Nicola T. Page 3 Girls were now considered celebrities, now matter how many times they appeared in the publication, Nicola for example, went on to appear in Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo, WAGS Boutique, Celebrity Big Brother, and also tried her hand at music, having two singles, one of which featured Coolio.
This would become the new normal. Any girl who posed for Page 3 was essentially promised a successful career in entertainment. It was around this era, the publication began receiving criticism through things like the Sexual Offences Act 2003, which raised the age requirement for topless modelling from 16 to 18 and went into effect in May of 2004. However, The Sun continued their journey, and crowned Keeley Hazell with a one-year exclusive glamour modelling contract, along with £10,000 worth of clothing and a one-year membership to the Rex cinema and bar. She would go on to appear in Nuts, Zoo Weekly, Loaded, and the cover of The Sun’s Page 3 calendar between 2006 and 2007, with her own calendar selling 30,000 copies in 2007. It was also in 2003 that longtime photographer Beverley Goodway retired after 30 years with Page 3.
The British public saw the transformation go from model to glamour girl, which would equate to Page 3 Girl, which would translate to socialite/media personality. Former stripper Jodie Marsh was scouted after her appearance on Essex Wives in 2002, and after only appearing on Page 3 six times in total, she was asked to appear on the fourth series of Celebrity Big Brother, where she was relentlessly bullied and demeaned by George Galloway, Michael Barrymore, and Pete Burns for her career choices, before becoming the first evictee with 42% of the public vote to evict her. She later became one of the most recognizable television personalities in the UK, appearing on The Weakest Link, The All Star Talent Show, and later her own reality show on MTV entitled Totally Jodie Marsh: Who'll Take Her Up the Aisle? Katie Price also received massive media attention, having multiple documentaries and television shows including, Katie & Peter: Unleashed (2004–09), Katie (2009–2020), Katie & Alex (2010), Signed by Katie Price (2011), Katie Price's Pony Club (2016), Katie Price: Harvey and Me (2021), and Katie Price: Making Babies (2025). I say all of this to show the ups and downs in the life of a Page 3 Girl. Jodie was seemingly adored and drooled over by men who saw her in their newspaper, but after seeing that Page Three girls have a personality, she was publicly shamed and a target of bullying, which was supported by the watchers of Celebrity Big Brother, while Katie Price was criticized for her looks but was simultaneously praised for being 'real' and 'raw', later winning Big Brother.
In August 2012, Lucy-Anne Holmes launched the online campaign 'No More Page Three', after expressing her beliefs that the spread is demeaning to women. Holmes wasn’t the first woman with this opinion, however. Women's disavowal of the publication dates back to the beginning of its creation in the 70s. In 1986, Labour MP Clare Short attempted to introduce legislation that would ban all nude images from news publications; however, she was discredited and demeaned specifically by The Sun, which launched their "Stop Crazy Clare" campaign. But Short didn’t stop there, and neither did The Sun. As she continued to publicly criticize the newspaper and the contents on its third page, she was met with insults on her appearance, with the magazine labeling her as "fat and jealous." So what had changed? Lucy-Anne Holmes shared her anecdote regarding Page Three at 11 years old, recalling her brother talking to his friends about "the tits on Page Three." “I just assumed, from that age, that my breasts were there to look at, and that they fell short,” said Holmes, while Clare Short recalled receiving letters from female rape victims who claimed Page Three was mentioned while they were being raped.
The Sun initially dismissed the campaign's claims of misogyny, with editor Dominic Mohan describing Page Three as an "innocuous British institution", and its models as "good role models," saying, “Some of the allegations I've heard about The Sun being sexist and not tackling women's issues is a false one,” said Mohan. According to a YouGov poll, 61% of The Sun’s readers wanted Page 3 to remain, with the lackluster 24% of readers believing it should be abandoned altogether. The following year in 2013, the 'No More Page 3' campaign received over 200,000 signatures and gained the support of Unison (the largest trade union in the United Kingdom), Girl Guides, celebrities such as Jennifer Saunders, Rebecca Front, Frances Barber, Eliza Doolittle, Alastair Campbell, Caitlin Moran and Lauren Laverne and 124 members of British Parliament, including Caroline Lucas who wore a 'No More Page 3' T-shirt in the House of Commons. In June, new editor for The Sun, David Dinsmore, insisted Page Three and its contents would remain the same. Outraged by The Sun’s refusal to take any action, 22 universities throughout the U.K. such as Cambridge, Durham and UCL withdrew the tabloid from their campus stores.
In the midst of the debate, former Page Three girls weighed in; Jodie Marsh disavowed the campaign in a January 2015 Tweet, writing ‘So called "feminists" really annoy me. Telling girls they shouldn't do page 3 is NOT being a feminist; women should do WHATEVER they want!!’ She continued, ‘The real oppression to women is in places where women aren't allowed to drive and are made to (or brainwashed into wanting to) wear a burka,’ Katie Price (Jordan) described Page Three as 'an institution, light-hearted and cheeky', and compared it to topless catwalk modeling, Nicola McClean claimed: “Everybody still wants Page 3, apart from the feminists who are fighting an argument I just don't agree with,” while Chloe Goodman found the campaign hypocritical saying, “Why should feminist women then tell other women how to live their lives?”
The 16 January 2015 paper of The Sun did not include a nude model in its third page, as it did the day prior (Lissy Cunningham). Seven days later, on 22 January, The Sun would produce their final publication including a topless Page 3 Girl. The final Page 3 Girl was Kiersten Imrie. When you think all would be right in the world, 'No More Page 3' founder Lucy-Anne Holmes says, “I can’t stand here and say it's an amazing day for women and female representation in the media when, essentially, all The Sun have done is they've stopped showing nipples.” After three years in the making, Holmes got exactly what she wanted, but it just wasn’t enough for her.
But where are all the Page 3 Girls now? Lucy Pinder, Rhian Sugden, Nicola T, Lacey Banghard, Chloe Ayling, Alicia Douvall, Katie Price, Jodie Marsh, Melinda Messenger, Nicola McLean, Kelly Brook, and Samantha Fox all went on to appear on reality television series such as Celebrity Big Brother, or I’m a Celeb Get Me Out of Here!
