Dominic West’s Five Children: Who Are Martha, Senan, Dora, Francis & Christabel West?

Five children, two mothers, three homes across two countries, and one of the most watched royal dramas on the planet. The family picture surrounding English actor Dominic West is, by any measure, unusually cinematic — and not entirely by accident. His five children, Martha, Dora, Senan, Francis, and Christabel, occupy a peculiar position in British public life: they are simultaneously the offspring of a celebrated actor and, in at least two cases, actors in their own right.

For years, West and his wife Catherine FitzGerald kept their four younger children away from the press. The carefully maintained privacy held until November 2022, when Senan West walked a red carpet in London at the premiere of The Crown‘s fifth season — the same night his father played Prince Charles alongside him. The photographs of the two of them together, in suits outside the BFI, circulated globally within hours. Suddenly, the West children were no longer simply a footnote in their father’s profile.

Martha, the eldest and the product of an earlier relationship, had already begun carving out her own path before that premiere — first as a child actor in the 2009 film Creation, then as a playwright and performer at Oxford, and most recently as a working actress in her mid-twenties. The five siblings span roughly seventeen years in age, are raised across different households in certain respects, and yet, by all accounts, form a close and integrated family unit. This is their story — as much of it as verified public sources allow.

Early Life & Family Background

To understand the West children, it helps to understand their father’s world first. Dominic Gerard Francis Eagleton West was born on 15 October 1969 in Sheffield, one of seven children born to George West and actress Moya Cleary. He attended Eton College — hardly a typical path from South Yorkshire — before reading English Literature at Trinity College Dublin, where he met Catherine FitzGerald. He later trained at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

It was during his time at Trinity that he first encountered Polly Astor, the woman who would become the mother of his first child. Their relationship was brief. By the mid-to-late 1990s, West was an actor in his late twenties, building momentum on stage and screen, and Polly became pregnant. He has spoken candidly about the situation in interviews. On the Rosebud with Gyles Brandreth podcast in early 2026, he described feeling “too young” at 28 to commit, and said that the separation from Polly — and the circumstances under which Martha grew up — represents one of the great sadnesses of his life. “I suppose I wish my eldest daughter had had some of the advantages or some of the security that my others have had,” he told Brandreth.

Parents & Maternal Backgrounds

Polly Astor, Martha’s mother, comes from notable British lineage. Her father was the late Michael Langhorne Astor, a Conservative politician, and her grandmother on that side was Nancy Astor — the first woman to take a seat in the House of Commons. Polly’s professional life has largely remained out of the public eye, and no verified career details have been published. After she and West separated when Martha was around three years old, the two parents maintained contact and, according to West’s more recent interviews, rebuilt a genuine friendship. Martha grew up in South East London, raised primarily by her mother, though she has remained close to her father throughout her adult life.

Catherine FitzGerald, mother to the four younger children, is an Irish landscape designer of considerable standing. Born Catherine Celinda Leopoldine FitzGerald on 18 May 1971, she is the daughter of Desmond FitzGerald, the 29th Knight of Glin, and Olda Ann Willes. The FitzGerald family has held Glin Castle in County Limerick, Ireland, for over 700 years — a fact that lends the children’s upbringing a somewhat extraordinary context. Catherine had been previously married to Edward Lambton, Viscount Lambton, from 1995 to 2002. She and Dominic West married on 26 June 2010 in a Catholic ceremony in Limerick, having rekindled their relationship years after first meeting at Trinity College Dublin. Much like the children of other prominent British actors, the younger West siblings grew up navigating public curiosity while their parents made deliberate efforts to shield them from it.

Martha West — Biography, Career & Education

Martha West was born in 1998 in the United Kingdom. She grew up in South East London and, according to her IMDb biography, first auditioned for a professional acting role at the age of nine. She landed a supporting lead in Creation (2009), a biographical film about Charles Darwin starring Paul Bettany and Jennifer Connelly. Martha played Anne Darwin, the young daughter whose death was said to have profoundly influenced Darwin’s work on natural selection. For a child actress with no prior professional experience, it was a substantial part — and she delivered.

Her parents then made the decision to step back. She paused her acting career to focus on education at St Marylebone CE School in London. The choice appears deliberate: in contrast to many children of actors who move fluidly between sets and school, Martha was given a largely conventional adolescence. She trained at the National Youth Theatre and participated in the Young Court programme at the Royal Court Theatre, both of which offer serious, non-commercial theatrical training.

She went on to study at Oxford University, graduating in 2021. During her time there, she performed in and wrote original plays, some of which received positive local attention. Following graduation, she returned to acting professionally. She appeared alongside her father in The Pursuit of Love — the BBC/Amazon adaptation directed by Emily Mortimer — and has continued building her career from there. Most recently she has been linked to the Netflix production Jay Kelly. At the 2024 BAFTA Television Awards, she was photographed beside her father, a visible sign of the close relationship they have maintained into her adult years.

Martha is also a writer. West described her in his 2026 Brandreth interview as “a writer and an actress,” and noted she is fully integrated into his family with Catherine. No further details about her personal life have been publicly disclosed.

Senan West — Biography & The Crown

Senan West is arguably the most publicly recognised of the four younger children, if only because of one very specific professional decision made in 2021. Born around 2008 to Dominic West and Catherine FitzGerald, Senan had — by his own father’s account — never acted in anything, not even a school play, when his agent submitted a taped audition to the producers of The Crown.

The production had spent months searching for a young actor to play Prince William in Season 5. Senan’s tape caught their attention. He was cast at thirteen years old to portray the teenage William across the season’s later episodes — the period covering Diana’s 1995 Panorama interview and the years immediately preceding her death. His father was simultaneously cast as Prince Charles. The coincidence was not lost on anyone.

West described the experience to Town & Country in revealing terms. On one hand, having his actual son play his on-screen son gave the relationship an authentic, physical warmth that no amount of acting could manufacture. “Shortcut to a sort of tactile intimacy that you have with your kids that no one else has,” he said. On the other, as Charles and William’s relationship became more fractured and emotionally complicated through the storyline, West admitted he felt uncomfortable filming those scenes. He was relieved, he said, when Senan was not cast to continue into Season 6, where older actors took over the role.

Senan’s Season 5 appearance marked his television debut. He was 14 by the time the season premiered in November 2022. Whether he pursues further acting is not known; no subsequent roles have been publicly confirmed as of mid-2026. His age as of 2026 is approximately 17 or 18. Much like the children of other British acting dynasties, Senan’s career beginnings have attracted considerable interest, though the family has not encouraged speculation about his future direction.

Full Bio & Career Timeline

Dora, Francis & Christabel West

Of the three youngest children — Dora, Francis, and Christabel — very little has been placed in the public domain, a situation that appears entirely deliberate. Dominic West and Catherine FitzGerald have been consistently protective of their children’s privacy, and the younger three in particular have had limited media exposure.

Dora West is the eldest of the four children born to West and FitzGerald. As of 2026, she is approximately 19 years old. She appeared at the Crown Season 5 premiere alongside her family and has been photographed occasionally at public events with her parents, but no career details or personal statements have been made public. No verified source confirms whether she is currently in education or pursuing a particular profession.

Francis West is the younger of the two sons, born after Senan. As of 2026, he is approximately 14 years old. Like Dora and Christabel, he has not publicly commented on any career aspirations or interests. He was present at the Crown premiere with his family. Whether the acting path that drew both his father and his older brother holds any interest for him is not publicly known.

Christabel West is the youngest of the five children. As of 2026, she is approximately nine years old, having been born around 2016 or 2017 based on the ages cited across multiple interviews with her father. She has been pictured at family public appearances but has, naturally, the lowest public profile of all five siblings. Her first name carries a literary association — it is the title of a poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge — though whether that influenced the choice is purely speculative.

Much like children of other well-known creative figures who grow up between famous parents, Dora, Francis, and Christabel occupy a domestic world that is largely invisible to the outside. The family splits time between a townhouse in Shepherd’s Bush, London; a home in the Cotswolds; and Glin Castle in County Limerick — Catherine FitzGerald’s ancestral estate, which she and Dominic operate as a small hotel and event venue alongside her sister.

The Family Unit — Integration & Relationships

One of the more notable aspects of the West family dynamic is how fully Martha — the child from Dominic’s earlier relationship with Polly Astor — has been integrated into the broader family. West has been explicit about this in interviews, saying Martha is “fully integrated” into his life with Catherine and the four younger children. The 2024 BAFTA photographs of father and daughter together suggest a warm, functional adult relationship.

That integration presumably did not happen without effort or negotiation on all sides. Martha grew up primarily with her mother in South East London while her younger half-siblings were raised in what amounts to a considerably more material context — between the Cotswolds, Shepherd’s Bush, and a medieval castle in Ireland. West’s 2026 reflection that he wished Martha had “had some of the advantages or some of the security” of her siblings was unusually candid for a public figure discussing family dynamics. The candour of it, and the fact that Martha herself appears to remain close to her father, suggests the family has worked through those disparities with some degree of maturity.

Both West and Catherine FitzGerald have generally spoken about family life in terms that prioritise protection over publicity. Glin Castle, in particular, offers a degree of physical remove from London media culture. The children have been photographed there, relaxed and away from the formal event environments that tend to produce the most circulated images. It seems to serve, in some respects, as a grounding anchor — a place that exists on different terms to the world their father inhabits professionally. Similar dynamics can be observed in families where one parent comes from significant landed heritage and the other from the entertainment industry.

“The West children represent something genuinely unusual in British celebrity culture: a large, blended family built across two households and two countries, in which at least two members have pursued acting on their own terms — and one appeared on the most-watched Netflix drama of 2022 alongside his father.”

— AB Rehman, Celebrity Features Writer

Financial Overview

Dominic West’s estimated net worth has been reported across various entertainment publications at figures generally ranging from $12 million to $20 million, though no verified financial disclosures exist and these figures should be treated as approximations only. His career encompasses decades of film, television, and stage work — including The Wire, The Affair, Chicago, The Crown, and multiple theatrical productions.

For the children themselves, no individual financial information has been publicly disclosed. Martha West is an emerging professional actress; her earnings are not publicly known. Senan’s appearance in The Crown would have been compensated under standard union agreements, but no figures have been published. The financial positions of Dora, Francis, and Christabel are entirely private, as would be expected given their ages.

Catherine FitzGerald’s family heritage includes Glin Castle, which operates as a boutique hotel and events venue. The financial contribution of that asset to the family’s overall picture has not been publicly disclosed. Any net worth estimates for the children specifically would be speculative and are therefore omitted here.

Where Are They Now? Current Lives in 2026

Martha West, now in her mid-twenties, is the most publicly active of the five siblings. She is working as an actress and writer in London, with film and television credits accumulating steadily. Her IMDb page lists Jay Kelly among her most recent work — the Netflix drama that also features her father. She maintains a relatively low social media presence and has not given extensive press interviews, though she has appeared at industry events alongside Dominic West on several occasions.

Senan West is in his mid-to-late teens as of 2026. His only confirmed professional credit remains Season 5 of The Crown. No subsequent casting announcements have been made. Whether he continues in acting or steps away from it entirely — following the pattern of many child actors who choose education over early career continuation — has not been publicly indicated.

Dora, Francis, and Christabel are understood to be living primarily between the family’s London home in Shepherd’s Bush and the Cotswolds, with periods at Glin Castle. Their schooling and daily lives are private. The family has made no public statements about any of the three younger children’s plans or interests. Catherine FitzGerald continues to work as a landscape designer and is involved in the operation of Glin Castle. Dominic West, now in his mid-fifties, continues to work actively in film and television.

Across the five siblings, the picture that emerges is one of a family that has navigated public life with deliberate care. Two of the children have pursued acting — one very briefly as a child, then seriously as an adult; one in a single high-profile appearance that remains a debut rather than a launch. The other three have been kept almost entirely out of sight. There is no verified evidence of social media accounts, interviews, or public statements from Dora, Francis, or Christabel. For a family of this level of public recognition in the UK, that privacy is notable. The parallel with other British acting families who have shielded young children while allowing older ones to make their own choices — such as the children of high-profile directors and performers — is worth noting, though each family navigates it differently.

Final Thoughts

Taken together, Dominic West’s five children offer an unusual cross-section of what it means to grow up in a high-profile British acting family in the early twenty-first century. Martha has moved from a carefully managed child performance at nine to a working adult career on her own terms. Senan has already experienced the very particular surrealism of playing a royal son opposite his own father, on one of the most watched shows in Netflix’s history. Dora, Francis, and Christabel are being raised, as far as can be seen from the outside, largely out of the public eye, in a family that appears to value privacy without being hostile to public life.

Whether more of the five will follow their father into the industry remains to be seen. The family’s combination of Irish aristocratic heritage, London creative-industry circles, and Oxford academic culture gives its children an unusually varied set of reference points. For now, most of what matters to them appears to be happening away from cameras — which, given what happened when the cameras did arrive in 2022, is perhaps exactly as it should be. For readers interested in similar profiles of celebrity children from British entertainment families, profiles of British figures navigating fame and family legacy offer useful further context.