The Noughties relationship is a funny beast. Half the population is bemoaning the death of the family unit, while the rest of us are doing far more interesting things behind closed doors. There’s Tilda Swinton and her husband, John Byrne, separated, but bringing up their children together in Scotland as part of an amicable agreement, and Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee moving back in together for the sake of their children. As Anderson said: “We’re great friends. We just live together. And we’re ex-husband and wife. It’s kinda silly. I don’t know where that’s gonna go.” Which sounds more fun than being Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells.

Still, it’s not often that exes remain friends, and even less often that they live together harmoniously once the marriage is over. Sometimes, however, events conspire to bring people back together. The author Simi Bedford, who also runs the lifestyle boutique Eni with her daughter, Morele, divorced her husband, the artist Martin Bedford, in 1985. He went on to marry again, and she had another long-term relationship. “Obviously, at the time, we both felt like a change,” Simi says. But those relationships came to an end at about the same time — and, by chance, a mutual friend asked them both to house-sit on the French-Italian border in 2000.

“I was writing my first book and Martin was working towards an exhibition,” Simi recalls. “He was painting at one end of the house and I was writing at the other. After two months, we discovered that we still got on terribly well. So, when we returned to England, we decided to trade in our London flats and buy a house together in the country, without compromising our respective freedoms.”

In 2001, they bought a converted corn mill in rural Devon. The only changes they had to make were to accommodate their new arrangement. “We built a studio for Martin to paint in and two bedrooms with shower rooms at the back, so we would each have our own space and still house the whole family,” Simi says. Their idyllic home is more chic than country in its look — unexpectedly modern, in the same way the couple’s domestic arrangements are.

How does living with your ex work on a day-to-day basis? “We’ve stayed friends and, having been married and had three children, we’re familiar with each other’s ways,” Simi says. “It’s like sharing a house with a friend. We operate independently, but we often entertain together.”

And, of course, time mellows all those things that would once have proved irritating, such as the division of domestic tasks. “Martin puts out the bins, empties the dishwasher, feeds the cats, mows the grass and pours the first drink at 6pm,” Simi says. “I do the washing and more of the ironing and cooking. Neither of us has vacuumed for 25 years.”

The pair are totally matter-of-fact about their arrangement — “I’m Simi Bedford and he's Martin Bedford. We don’t explain anything. People can draw their own conclusions” — so it doesn’t seem that unusual. Even less so when you take into account all the children and grandchildren. “An important part of the plan was to have somewhere for the family to gather,” Simi explains. “The five grandchildren range in age from 18 months to nearly seven, so we needed a house with a bit of space, somewhere everyone could be together at the same time.”

All of which goes to show that, these days, family is a more fluid concept than two parents and 2.4 kids. As Simi is the first to admit, a relaxed 21st-century approach to living together can work even better than traditional ideals. “It’s like being married, but without the expectations,” she says.

Eni: 01769 574441, eni-uk.co.uk

Not with Silver by Simi Bedford is published by Vintage at £7.99

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