SHE is the little sister of EastEnders star Jessie Wallace who became one of the hottest stars of the cult TV series My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding after appearing in season two in 2012.
And for eight years before that, Danielle Mason had already enjoyed a lucrative career as a Page 3 pin-up who jetted across the world for glamorous photoshoots earning as much as £10,000 a pop.
But since appearing in the 2019 Channel 5 documentary The Gypsies Next Door, the 40 year-old has swapped reality TV and topless modelling to become a full-time cleaning expert.
The mum-of-two, whose turbulent relationship with cage-fighter, ex Tony Giles was famously charted in the smash-hit Channel 4 series, now has regular clients she does cleaning and housekeeping for.
She also films cleaning hacks under the brand name Miss Mason Cleaning (MMC) on Instagram and TikTok – and it has led to influencer partnerships with brands including Dyson.
Danielle, from Bracknell, Berkshire, explains: “I’ve always done cleaning my whole life, as a thing on the side.
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“Then the TV and modelling work started drying up.
“A lot of the lads mags closed and there just wasn’t the money in it anymore so I looked at what I could do instead.
“Like everyone whose been in those industries can understand, when it’s great it’s great but some people then pretend they have an income coming in when they don’t. You have to humble yourself.
“Tony and I were on and off our whole relationship and I’m essentially a single mum so I had to find other work.
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“And that’s why I’ve focused more and more on the cleaning work and brand since Big Fat Gypsy Wedding ended and am now doing it full-time.”
She is tight-lipped about her regular clients but says: “They are very high-profile and I am very grateful for them but I can’t say anything more than that. Most of my clients are from Berkshire and not too far from home.”
But cleaning loos is a far cry from the life she once led.
After doing her AS-levels at a convent school, Danielle briefly worked as an Account Manager for Hewlett Packard after a friend’s aunt landed her the job.
She briefly worked for the airline BMI before taking a runner job on EastEnders, where sister Jessie was famed for playing Kat Slater.
In 2004, through connections on set, she landed her first glamour modelling gig with The Sun.
She said: “I was c****ing myself with the thought of getting my tits out, but the money was really good. Even though it felt a bit overwhelming, it also felt very exciting.
“I never imagined I’d end up on the front page though as Kat Slater’s sister going topless.”
From there she lived a jet-set lifestyle – travelling across the world to countries including Barbados for topless shoots and lads mag calenders.
She says: “I had a pretty normal upbringing. My dad got made redundant in the recession but otherwise we were OK. Then with the money I could buy a black BMW out-right.
“There were lots of nights out. I remember being on a table with Orlando Bloom on a night at Cafe de Paris.”
She met traveller and professional MMA fighter Tony Giles in 2010 – and fell pregnant the same year with their son Rudy, who’s now 12.
A national newspaper ran their pregnancy chat and it peaked the interest of producers working on Big Fat Gypsy Weddings, who later cast them in the series from season two.
Danielle says: “It was around 2011 when we were asked to take part and we were then in it for several years after that, from 2012.
“It was an amazing time. I was glued to season one and Paddy and used to think how crazy it was so to suddenly be on it was mad.
“It focused on me and Tony and the turbulent times we went through. They wanted to film these two communities coming together – me from a non-traveller community and Tony with his roots – and the struggles of bringing a child into the world from both sides.
“But there were times when I found it a bit much, like when I went into labour with Rudy.
“The crew were coming in and out all the time and then we had to stop filming altogether because I had a haemorrage.
“They did give us lots of expenses. We filmed a big christening for Rudy. We had a black limo. I was in a black, purple and silk dress. We had a big party, big cake. It was very over the top.
“I did lots more TV and press around it because the show was so huge. At one stage I was told we were watched by 15 million viewers!”
In 2019, Danielle appeared in another fly-on-the-wall called Gypsies Next Door, in which she helped coach a traveller girl wanting to go into modelling.
But Danielle, who also shares a daughter Deliliah, 10, with Tony, says she prefers to be known for things other than reality TV now.
She says: “Sometimes, when I look back, I think I should have used my brain a bit more.
“I enjoy what I’m doing now. I want to be growing older more gracefully. I don’t miss anything about that old life. I’m just so proud and happy to be a mum.
“I can’t really be doing glamour as I’m getting older.
“Now I’m 40, I prefer wearing nice dresses and being a bit more demure.
“Plus, things have gone a bit south since I’ve got older and I’ve lost a bit of body confidence.
“Rudy gets really cheesed when I did post one thing recently showing a bit too much.
“I put a picture of me hoovering in my pants and a top because it was so hot. He asked me why I did it and it did make me think when he said that.
“I think it’s embarrassing for kids nowadays with so much social media and I don’t want him to get any backlash over what I do.
“The cleaning was always something I’ve done on the side since I was a teenager and I started doing cleaning for Travelodge at the weekends from school.
“I won’t say what I charge now but I will say that it’s really grown with the launch of my brand. It’s great because it fits around the family too.
“Now I have three regular clients and can take up to 15, but I prefer to spend the other days doing my cleaning hacks and working with brands on social media.
“Some people say I’m a cleanfluencer. But I don’t like the word influencer. It’s a bit muggy because some of them are such idiots.
“The cleaning work is great too because I’d rather be known for having talent than just being a reality TV star. I’ve been picking up cleaning experience all my life.
“Now I’m looking at launching cleaning products and writing a cleaning hacks book which I’d have never imagined before.”
As well as working for the hotel group, she picked up tips from her East End mum. But it was meeting Tony and joining the traveller community for several years that really cemented her cleaning knowledge and has made her the success she is today.
She says: “My mum taught me all these East End cleaning hacks. There was one where if you’d been eating fish you’d get rid of the smell on the cutlery by sticking them in the mud outside to get the smell off.
“Cleaning was also a massive part of the Traveller way of life. As a full-time housewife I’d easily clean my own home for four hours a day. Some of it was a bit OCD. As soon as I woke up, I’d be polishing the floors with shammy leathers, polishing tables, even cleaning the wheels on the bottom of the beds. Everything was shiny so the kids fingerprints would show up even more. And if you didn’t keep a clean home, you’d get talked about so it became a routine I kept even when I didn’t live on a site.
“As a traveller you’d never keep your shoes on at home and you’d never tip the water you cleaning the house with down the kitchen sink, where you’d have food plates.
“I picked up so much – even down to using baby muslin’s rather than foil when steaming food to improve the flavour.”
She praises Paris Fury for her similar work ethic.
She says: “I absolutely love Paris and Tyson. We know of each other but we’ve never met properly. But a lot of things she says in the way she runs the house and looks after the kids, I can relate to.
“I think there were things about Big Fat Gypsy Wedding that didn’t portray travellers in the right way. It was entertainment. But with Paris and Tyson’s Netflix series that’s come out, you really get to see how hard-working they are and I love that Tyson drives around in that old car and keeps his traditions and she hers.”
Some of her cleaning work has attracted the wrong sort of attention in the past.
She laughs: “I’ve had some guys ask me if I’ll do their cleaning topless and others asking me to send pictures of me in latex gloves.
“You get so many men with fetishes.
“I put one video up of me cleaning in heels and I had so many messages asking for private photos.
“One time I took a friend with me to clean someone’s house. The owner started pulling Magnum ice-creams out of his freezer and sucking them in a really weird way. Then he said in this really odd tone, ‘do you want an ice-cream too?’.” Had I been on my own I’d have crapped myself but instead we laughed and found it funny
Some of her earlier jobs cleaning homes were also icky experiences.
She says: “There was one house where people put all their poo in toilet paper in the bins throughout the house and not down the toilet. I can’t stand the smell and emptying the bins was horrible.
“Another lady wanted me to clean a six bedroom-house in one hour. I was like, ‘are you f***ing joking?’ . Some people literally want your blood for the money.
“I’m so glad now that I’ve got these amazing regular clients and they’re high end and they appreciate me because I’ve got so much knowledge.”
After Covid struck, she says her cleaning really took off.
She says: “People became far more interested in disinfecting things and wanting hacks to keep things clean.
“I did a presenting course and the trainer asked me what my thing was and it was cleaning so as soon as I combined the two and started offering hacks on social media it really took off.
“The next thing I was presenting an Ideal Home Show with Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen to share my hacks.”
Danielle’s also done a u-turn in her love life.
She and MMA Champion Tony got engaged in Thorpe Park in 2012 but they never got married and were on off for years afterwards. In 2019 she briefly dated ex-con Ben Hatchett, with their first date at Broadmoor prison.
But two months ago she met a new man – landscape gardener Lee Dopson, 43, with the pair now planning their first holiday together.
She said: “I was grabbing my son’s lunch in the Co-op. I dropped the change and Lee picked it up and we got talking.
“The next day he sent me flowers and he’s been sending them ever since. He’s so lovely.
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“Everyone thinks that Tony and I got married because we were in My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding. It’s written everywhere – but we weren’t.
“So I would definitely like to get married but I think I’d rather go away and do something a bit privately.”
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