Who Is Lois Gaskin-Barber? Sam Ryder’s Girlfriend of 14 Years

Lois Gaskin-Barber has been with Sam Ryder since October 2011, through his years as a wedding singer in Essex, his TikTok breakthrough during the pandemic, and his second-place finish at Eurovision in Turin in 2022. When Sam told the BBC in 2025 that he had come close to quitting music, he said two things kept him going: his faith, and Lois.

The same year, he released Heartland, his second album. He said publicly that at least half of it was written about her.

She has not spoken about any of it.

Lois Gaskin-Barber, in Brief

She is a 34-year-old British entrepreneur, jewellery designer, and publicist, and the long-term girlfriend of Sam Ryder. She runs Lone Wolves Creative, a handmade jewellery and clothing brand that ships worldwide, and has directed Little Den Ltd, a registered UK manufacturing company, since October 2020.

How Sam Ryder and Lois Gaskin-Barber Met

They have been together since 4 October 2011. Lois confirmed the date herself in an Instagram post.

“Today, nine years ago, I finally gave in and said, ‘Yes, let’s see how this goes,’ when we were just two foolish youngsters.”

Sam grew up in Chelmsford, Essex. Before his music career took off, he spent years in construction, including a stint on the Wembley Stadium project according to his own Capital Radio interview, and took wedding-singing jobs wherever he could find them. The money was inconsistent and the gigs were often poorly attended.

On their eleventh anniversary in October 2022, Lois wrote on Instagram: “Recently celebrated 11 years of big belly laughs and love together.”

Lone Wolves Organic: The Juice Bar in Coggeshall

In 2017, they opened Lone Wolves Organic Juice together in Coggeshall, Essex. It was a vegan juice bar that ran for two years.

When they closed up and headed out for the day, the sign on the door said: gone surfing. Both Sam and Lois were serious about surfing and snowboarding, and the bar’s hours made that obvious.

Lucy Long, who took over the space after it closed, spoke to The Sun about the couple who had run it before her.

“They were a couple of hippies. With Sam you always felt as if you were among friends. He is horizontal, that man, he is so chilled.”

The bar closed in 2019.

Lone Wolves Creative and the Business Behind It

After the juice bar, Lois continued building her own work.

Lone Wolves Creative is her handmade jewellery and clothing brand, sold and shipped worldwide through @lonewolvescreative on Instagram. Her bio currently describes her as a “multi-dimensional creative” and a publicist. She also holds an IMDb listing consistent with that role.

Behind the brand is a formally registered company, Little Den Ltd:

• Company number: 12931132
• Incorporated: 6 October 2020
• Status: Active
• SIC 32120: Manufacture of jewellery and related articles
• Last accounts filed to: 31 October 2025

The Year Sam Ryder Nearly Walked Away

After his debut album reached number one in the UK, his record label let go of the entire team that had signed and worked with him. He left with them.

The period that followed was hard. He told the BBC:

“I lost my self-esteem, my positivity and my optimism. I felt what I was doing was worthless. I felt I was worthless.” — Sam Ryder, BBC, 2025

He locked his phone in a drawer and stopped writing. He has described going close to a year unable to make music and questioning whether to continue at all.

In the same BBC interview, he said two things helped bring him back: his faith, and Lois. He told the BBC that she “reminds me that so long as we have each other, we’ll get through whatever life throws.”

Nashville and the Making of Heartland

When they first got together, Sam had told Lois his dream was to live in Nashville. More than a decade later, they went. They moved to a log cabin in the Tennessee woods, where Sam wrote Heartland on long walks and in studios across the city.

He had spoken about what her presence meant well before the album came out. At British Summer Time Hyde Park in June 2023, he told HELLO! Magazine: “It’s good to have a partner to do that with, to hold yourself accountable, with life rapidly changing and not getting swept up in changes.”

Heartland was released on 17 October 2025 on Artist Theory. Sam has said at least half the record is about Lois. The BBC confirmed two tracks in particular:

• Better Man (track 9): Sam scrapped the original vocal on the day he handed the album in because it felt too clean. The version on the record was done with hay fever, six hours before the deadline. The BBC called it “yacht rock.”
• Electric Marine Blue (track 12): Described by the BBC as “dreamily devoted.”

While finishing the album, Lois sent Sam a message: “By the way, we forgot our anniversary.”

He told the BBC he made it up with a hotel break from a concert booking. “We used that experience as a little kind of getaway. You can really do wonders with eight hours.”

Are Sam Ryder and Lois Married?

They are not married and not engaged, as of June 2026. Sam Ryder does not have a wife.

Speculation appeared in 2022 after Lois posted photographs that looked like they were from a wedding. She addressed it directly on Instagram and confirmed the images were from their eleventh anniversary, not a ceremony.

Smooth Radio confirmed in February 2026 that they remain together. They have no children.

Where Is Lois Gaskin-Barber Now?

Over the past three years, she has appeared at several major public events, all confirmed by wire photography:

One Battle After Another, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson and starring Leonardo DiCaprio, went on to win six Academy Awards including Best Picture.

Three weeks before Heartland came out, Lois was at one of the biggest film premieres in London that year, photographed by every major wire agency. She spoke to none of them. Fourteen years in, her answer to any question about Sam Ryder or the music he has written about her has always been the same: silence.