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<\/p>\nForty years ago, Karen Millen opened her first store, in Maidstone, Kent. The designer, now 61, remembers standing outside, painting the shop front with her cousins. \u2018This old boy came past and said, \u201cWhat\u2019s this going to be, then?\u201d I told him: \u201cWomenswear.\u201d He replied: \u201cIt won\u2019t last.\u201d I\u2019ll never forget that. I wanted to prove him wrong.\u2019<\/p>\n
Well, to the old boy from Maidstone: by 2000 the brand had a \u00a350 million turnover, by 2004 there were 400 stores in 65 countries and in 2008 Millen was awarded an OBE for services to fashion. At one point, she even had a shop in Mongolia.<\/p>\n
The story of Karen Millen the brand is, according to Karen Millen the person, a \u2018fairytale\u2019. Born the third of four children, she grew up in a council house in Maidstone. Her mother was a secretary, her father a carpet fitter. Clothes making was part of everyday life. \u2018We struggled for money, so if we had a wedding, for example, my mum would make us something special to wear.\u2019 As a girl, Millen would stitch outfits for her dolls.<\/p>\n
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She studied fashion at college and, at the age of 19, decided to start a business with her then boyfriend, now ex-husband Kevin Stanford. (Millen doesn\u2019t consider herself an \u2018entrepreneur\u2019; that was Stanford. \u2018I\u2019m a creative.\u2019) The pair took out a \u00a3100 bank loan, bought 1,000 metres of white cotton and Millen made shirts on her parents\u2019 kitchen table.\u00a0<\/p>\n
They sold to friends, at markets, in boutiques, and after two years bought the first store in Maidstone. \u2018It was a tiny shop off a backstreet. It was so exciting.\u2019 Setting it up was a \u2018family affair\u2019: there were the aforementioned cousins, who helped with the painting, while her father made the changing rooms and curtains. Millen herself worked on the shop floor by day, then cut fabric patterns by night. The original designs were mostly tailoring: trousers, shirts, blazers with big shoulders \u2013 the sort of things Millen likes to wear. The first item of clothing she\u2019d made as a 14-year-old schoolgirl was a woollen trouser suit; today, she\u2019s got on a black Karen Millen blazer, shirt and tie.<\/p>\n
After a decade, Millen and Stanford had four stores in Maidstone, Brighton, Guildford and Tunbridge Wells. \u2018It was very hard getting finances from the banks to help support us. But in a way, and in hindsight, that was probably a blessing.\u2019 By 1990 there was a recession and businesses were offered premiums to rent now empty shops in London. Because Millen\u2019s company had grown organically, it had barely any debt. So she set up a shop in Chelsea.<\/p>\n
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Closing down in 2019<\/p>\n
By the mid-90s and into the early 2000s, Karen Millen was everywhere. Joan Collins was a fan, and Victoria Beckham loved the label so much she described a shopping trip to Karen Millen in her 2001 autobiography Learning to Fly. Obviously, this was exciting \u2013 but Millen remembers smaller moments, too.<\/p>\n
\u2018We were in Bath with my brother and sister-in-law. It was in the very early days and I saw this woman wearing [one of my designs]. It was a coat dress, black and checked. I didn\u2019t say anything, but I was like, \u201cWoah!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018People often ask, \u201cWhat was it like seeing your name above the shops?\u201d But I got used to that and didn\u2019t really think too much about it. What did grab my attention was when I was driving down the motorway one morning and coming the other way was this big turquoise truck with an orange circle on it. It was one of our lorries. That was amazing.\u2019<\/p>\n
In 2001, Millen and Stanford divorced. She doesn\u2019t discuss why, but in the past has alluded to the stress of having three children and running a business together. Three years after that, they sold the brand for \u00a395 million to Mosaic Fashions, an Icelandic holding company. Millen netted \u00a335 million. She was 42 years old. By selling the company, the designer lost the rights to her name.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018As far\u00a0as I was concerned, I had done my stint in fashion and didn\u2019t really need to use my name. It came at a time when I was not in a particularly good headspace,\u2019 she says. \u2018I was ready to walk away and say \u201cthank you very much\u201d. I probably should have looked into it more. But, again, you expect your business lawyers to point these things out to you and to ask the questions.\u2019 Millen corrects herself. \u2018But why should I expect that? I should have asked those questions.\u2019<\/p>\n
It made working tricky. \u2018I\u2019d be asked to do a collaboration or endorse something, and I\u2019d say, \u201cWell, I can\u2019t use my name.\u201d\u2019 It was also, she says, distressing to have a company bear your name, despite having nothing to do with it. This was made worse given that, after Millen left, the quality of the products decreased; think less tailoring, more dresses with zips in random places. She told reporters: \u2018I never wear the clothes.\u2019<\/p>\n
There was more trouble still. In 2008, the Icelandic bank Kaupthing, which by then owned Karen Millen, went bust. It turned out that about 40 per cent of the \u00a395 million 2004 buyout deal had not been settled, so Millen herself lost large (undisclosed) amounts of money. Two years later, HMRC successfully challenged her over a tax avoidance scheme and charged her \u00a36 million. Unable to pay, Millen was declared bankrupt in 2017. She sold her \u00a32.5 million Georgian mansion in Kent where she had lived for 20 years \u2013 and which, tabloids gleefully observed, had a pool, cinema room, football pitch and lake. She rented a cottage in Kent and kept quiet.<\/p>\n
In 2019, the British-owned fast-fashion giant Boohoo bought Karen Millen for \u00a318.2 million in cash and took it entirely online. At the time, Millen was unconvinced. Her precise words were: \u2018How on earth do [people] believe that what they are buying can ethically be made for such a price without some kind of sacrifice somewhere?\u2019<\/p>\n
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Christine Lampard and the Princess of Wales are fans<\/p>\n
This May, Boohoo asked her to collaborate with the brand on a 30-piece collection called The Founder. She obliged, and this month Millen is back with a 20-piece collection. What changed? \u2018What Boohoo has done with [Karen Millen] has actually given it a new life. They\u2019ve invested a lot of time and money. The marketing is phenomenal.\u2019<\/p>\n
However, Boohoo also has a reputation for terrible factory conditions and poor eco credentials. Did that bother Millen? \u2018[In 2019] it was a difficult thing to accept that a company that had been accused of all those things was now the owner of my baby,\u2019 she says. \u2018But I think Boohoo has made huge amends with sourcing and manufacturing now. It\u2019s working hard to be sustainable.\u2019 The Founder collection is made in Turkey, where Karen Millen clothes were produced in the 2000s.<\/p>\n
Mostly, she was nervous to join such a young team. \u2018I was a bit unsure how it would be, but my fears were soon put to rest,\u2019 she says. \u2018The experience I\u2019ve had within the company has been nothing but brilliant.\u2019 And, she adds of her 2019 comments: \u2018They were said at a time when I was feeling pretty fragile.\u2019<\/p>\n
In the designer\u2019s defence, The Founder is a lot like the old Karen Millen. It\u2019s not cheap (prices start at \u00a389 for a jersey top, and go up to \u00a31,199 for a shearling cape), but it\u2019s special. The YOU fashion team agrees that the fabrics are all high quality.<\/p>\n
\u2018It\u2019s really good to be back. I feel like I have a purpose,\u2019 says Millen. \u2018It\u2019s been a tough few years and I have finally come out the other end.\u2019 I ask if there will be a third collection: \u2018I\u2019m not allowed to say!\u2019 is her answer.<\/p>\n
When The Founder launched, the company hosted a pop-up shop in central London, for customers to see the collection in real life. There was a wine bar, an onsite seamstress and lots of women. Millen was there, too. Most of the shoppers, she says, probably didn\u2019t know who she was. So the designer happily observed them as they chatted and tried on her clothes: \u2018It was like going back in time.\u2019<\/p>\n