Idris Elba wears many hats. The 47-year-old Brit is an award-winning actor, a producer, a DJ, a musician, Royal pal, an athlete and most proudly, a dad-of-two.
He’s also quite the lothario, with a long list of past loves who all claim an intensely romantic history with ‘Sexiest Man Alive’ title holder.
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Idris Elba with fiancé, Sabrina Dhowre and kids, Winston and Isan. Image: Instagram/IdrisElba
Born Idrissa Akuna Elba in September, 1972, The Luther star has risen to success as one of Hollywood’s most popular heavyweights. A far cry from his humble beginnings in poverty in East London’s Canning Town.
His successes are many, with awards rolling in and in 2016, Elba was even named in the Time 100 list of the ‘Most Influential People in the World’. However despite his accomplishments, its his love-life that attracts the most interest. Put quite simply, he’s a love ’em and leave ’em type of guy.
With two ex-wives, two baby-mammas, a string of exes, dalliances with models and celebs and one current fiancé, Elba is a man who loves to love.
Those unions have given Elba his two children who he adores. 17-year-old daughter, Isan Elba and son, four-year-old Winston Elba.
Idris Elba has been married twice; first to Isan’s mother Hanne “Kim” Nørgaard from 1999 until 2003. A ten-year affair with pole dancer Desiree Newberry followed, it was a break in this affair where he met second wife Sonya Nicole Hamlin to whom he was married briefly in 2006.
Winston’s mother is Elba’s British ex-girlfriend Naiyana Garth who he met in 2013, the pair splitting when Winston was nearly two in 2016 after a host of infidelities on Elba’s part.
Elba has since became engaged to fiancé, Sabrina Dhowre who he met in 2017.
Keeping up? Let’s look at those romances a little deeper.
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Idris Elba’s first wife, wife Hanne “Kim” Nørgaard with their daughter, Isan. Image: Instagram/IsanElba
Elba tied the knot with Danish make-up artist, Hanne “Kim” Nørgaard in 1999. His ex remains famously tight-lipped about their time together. What is known is that Elba left Nørgaard while she was pregnant with their daughter, Isan in 2002. The pair divorced in 2003.
While no longer together, the pair remain on good terms, co-parenting Isan, with both appearing side-by-side at her 16th birthday.
Elba has a particularly close bond with daughter, Isan. During an appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon he said: “She loves me but she tells me to calm down a little bit.
“She thinks I’m trying to be cool all of the time and I’m like, I am cool. She’s always trying to quiz me about rappers and I don’t know who’s who anymore.”
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Idris Elba is super-close with daughter, Isan Image: Instagram/IdrisElba
After leaving Nørgaard, Elba began a torrid affair with pole dancer Desiree Newberry. She gave birth to a son, who Elba believed was his, but after suspecting that may not be the truth, a paternity test proved otherwise, and the actor was left devastated.
It was during a break in this relationship that Elba met property lawyer, Sonya Hamlin after being introduced by a mutual friend in 2006.
The pair wed not too long afterwards in Vegas, however the union was short lived.
Speaking about her time with Idris, Hamlin says it was pressure from others that saw that end of their relationship.
Idris Elba and second wife, Sonya Hamlin. Image: Sonya Hamlin
“People were telling him he was going to ruin his career,’ she says in an interview with the The Sun.
“He was being told it was an important part of his image to be a single sex symbol in Hollywood and being married would damage that.
“It was very sad. Idris and I were madly in love, but he was getting a lot of flak for being married. Everyone was like, ‘Dude, you’re the hottest sex symbol!'”
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Eldra’s next significant relationship was with make-up artist, Naiyana Garth. The pair met in 2013 and fell deep and hard for one another. Their son, Winston – named after Elba’s father, was born in 2014, however by early 2016 Elba was once again, walking out of the door.
The news of their split came a matter of days after he was seen leaving a nightclub in New York with model Naomi Campbell, a long-time friend and admirer of Elba’s.
Idris Elba with ex-partner, Naiyana Garth who is mother of his four-year-old son, Wisnton Image: Getty Images
It wasn’t the first time their was rumoured infidelity in the relationship between Elba and Garth. Runours abounded in America that Elba had been seeing rapper, K Michelle while they were still together.
Speaking on television, the rapper confessed that their romance took place while Winston was a newborn, adding: “When I met him I did find out he had a woman. But I did not know they still had that situation. So I kind of looked up and saw that I was the side chick.”
Isan Elba is Idris Elba’s eldest child. Image: Instagram/IdrisElba
It was 2017 when famous flirt, Elba met American model Sabrina Dhowre. The model, who was crowned Miss Vancouver in 2014, began dating Elba in secret but by February 2018 wedding bells were beginning to tinkle, and Elba proposed.
In Elba’s Sexiest Man Alive interview with People, he said proposing to Dhowre “was the most nerve-wracking thing” he’s ever done in his life.
“In terms of wanting to make someone feel super special and feel my love,” he said, “that was pretty romantic for me.”
Idris Elba and fiancé, Sabrina Dhowre. Image: Instagram/IdrisElba
As far as work goes, 2019 is shaping up to be a busy year for Idris Elba. Sources say that Elba is Warner Bros. choice to replace Will Smith as Deadshot in the Suicide Squad sequel.
Elba is also starring in the upcoming Netflix series Turn Up Charlie which bows this spring. Ahead of Suicide Squad 2 he will appear on the big screen for The Fast and the Furious spinoff Hobbs and Shaw alongside Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham, as well as Universal and Tom Hooper’s Cats adaptation with Taylor Swift, James Corden, and Jennifer Hudson.
