a traditionally sized 38 (7.5–8), which led to some comical moments in the store. For the longest time our only dedicated salesperson was Hannah Colman, my brother Daniel’s girlfriend. Hannah would have the customers lying on the sofa with their leg straight up in the air, struggling to pull the zipper down.
Vassi Chamberlain’s 1996 story in
Tatler
about the launch of Jimmy Choo had confirmed my sense that it was incumbent on me to have a certain look, a certain lifestyle, and plenty of exposure in the media. I never set out to “live” the brand. It just so happened that I had specific interests and friends, and I lived a certain way, all of which contributed to the buzz around Jimmy Choo. After a while, maintaining that lifestyle became part of the job, with all the added stresses and strains of running a company, along with encroachment on what otherwise might be considered “free” time. I was still living at home, I had no car, and I had absolutely no social life other than entertaining related to the business. And all the while, Sandra and I were each making the same £15,000 a year, which meant that I was always overdrawn at the bank.
At the beginning, we made Jimmy available to the press as well asme, but at the events Brower Lewis set up, his only contribution was to complain that he was not designing the collection. This was entirely true, but not for want of our begging him to do so. Moreover, this was not a positive message we wanted conveyed to the public. But then even within the inner circle he remained a pall of negativity. When he came to monthly board meetings, he always brought his attorney, and then he’d have nothing to say. Adding insult to injury, he began to complain to his couture clients. “They stole my name. They’re ripping me off.” These were the phrases that got back to us. Somehow he failed to remember that we had licensed his name. In 2001, we bought it outright.
• • • •
OVER TIME, JIMMY’S ECCENTRICITIES BECAME even more personal, and more problematic.
A girlfriend of Sandra’s invited her to go to a Sting concert, and Sandra adored Sting. Jimmy called the friend and threatened her life. So that was that for the concert.
Then I was in the store one day, on the shop floor, when Jimmy came in. He went downstairs to see Sandra, and almost immediately she started screaming. I called my father and I said, “You better get here quick—something’s going on downstairs with Jimmy and he’s hurting Sandra.” Luckily, Dad was just around the corner at the Lowndes Hotel and it took him about two seconds to get there. My dad went racing down the stairs and told Jimmy to get out of the store. That would be the last time I’d see my business partner for many months.
Still another time, Sandra and Jimmy were supposed to be comingto Motcomb Street for a meeting. They showed up late, and when Sandra walked in I could see she’d been crying. I took her aside and asked her what had happened. She said that Jimmy had hit her in the car on the way over. It seems Sandra had committed the unforgiveable offense of falling in love with Tony, the minicab driver her uncle had hired to spirit her away each evening. It was like something out of a fractured fairy tale. True to the trope, when the controlling uncle found out about this “betrayal,” as he saw it, he went absolutely mad.
A few days later my father and I took Sandra out to lunch at the restaurant across the street from the shop. We said, “Listen, something clearly is not right. If you need our help, we’ll help you.”
Shortly thereafter, Sandra showed up on my parents’ doorstep in an absolute state. She said she’d been sleeping in a car all weekend because Jimmy had chased her down the street with a knife.
“That’s it,” I said. “You’re not going home. You’re going to move in with me.”
So Sandra moved into my house on Chester Row, which gave her the opportunity to really open up and