What Cath did next

Having turned her distinctive style into a much-loved business, Cath Kidston brought a beautiful 17th-century house in the Cotswolds back to life. Now, she's back at the drawing board

- Giles Kime

LAURELS are never quite as comfortable a place to rest as people imagine, especially when you've had the satisfaction of building the most distinctive high-street brand since Laura Ashley to create that holy grail of retail: a magical mix of originality, desirability and accessibility. In such a case, what next?

For Cath Kidston, the circuitous route to this particular dilemma started after a stint working for the interior designer Nicky Haslam, when she co-founded a shop selling curtainalia on the borders of Chelsea and Fulham in London. Five years later, she struck out on her own, selling fabrics and accessories in bold florals that flew in the face of the prevailing taste for pallid Modernism. Initially, she ploughed a lonely furrow, but, soon, word spread and, over the following decade, her business grew from a single store in west London to 136, including one next to Fortnum & Mason on Piccadilly. Cath Kidston tents, phones and radios followed.

The subsequent pace at which the business flourished was built not on a desire for world domination, but an ability to garner the influences of foreign trips, exhibitions and days spent rootling around antiques markets and galleries—and turn them into well-made furnishings and clothing that made her customers happy and didn't cost the earth.

'Luxury was not a hot tub, but deep shag pile in the bathroom and a pretty eiderdown in the guest bedroom'