Jimmy Choo never designed a single shoe for the company named after him, its co-founder Tamara Mellon has said, speaking ahead pf the launch of her autobiography, In Her Shoes. The multimillionaire businesswoman said that she conceived the ideas for the shoes - which were then sketched by Choo's niece Sandra Choi - and that she never received a single sketch from Choo who was a "cobler"."The original ideas was for Jimmy to design the collection, and I would run the operations of the business," Mellon told America's Today show. "But it soon became very clear that Jimmy's skill was in making shoes. He's a cobbler."
Jimmy Choo - who now has his own company creating bespoke shoes - left the business in 2001, and Mellon more than a decade later.
"By the end of 2000, Jimmy Choo was turning a profit of around $3 million a year," Mellon writes in the book. "We had our own London boutique and were represented at 450 more stores, including Harrods and Selfridges. To top it off, we'd won a British Fashion Council Award, which Jimmy insisted on accepting on our behalf, even though his design contribution had been nil."
The book also reveals the full extent of the drink and drug problem that saw her leave her job at British Vogue to enter rehab at just 27. She also talked openly to the Today Show about her difficult relationship with her mother, who she alleges was also an alcoholic - although Mellon's brother recently told the Daily Mail that this was not the case.
Tamara Mellon will host her only UK book signing at Harrods on Friday October 11 at 4 pm.
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