Madoff, the Mayfair greasy spoon and Boots face cream

Bernard Madoff memorabilia has become a hot item on eBay just as details of the alleged fraudster's eccentric habits while in London emerge.

Madoff was arrested last month after allegedly telling investigators he lost as much as $50 billion (£34.37 billion) of investors' money in a giant pyramid scheme.

Julia Fenwick, 38, his London office manager for nearly eight years, has told of the obsessive behaviour of a man who has lost investors, including Hollywood director Steven Spielberg, tens of millions of pounds.

"Bernie is the most anally retentive person I have ever met," Fenwick said. He had a loathing for rooms that were not square. He often travelled to London accompanied by an interior designer and once had a curved wall in his Mayfair office remodelled after spending a whole day sitting and staring at it.

"We'd spend days before his arrival levelling the blinds, making sure the computer screens were an identical height, lining every picture up," Fenwick told the Mail on Sunday.

Madoff collected vintage watches, favouring Piccadilly specialist George Somlo of Burlington Arcade but had decidedly plainer tastes in food, favouring fry-ups in a cafe in Mayfair. "Even though he is Jewish, he loves pork sausages. When he came to London, he'd always visit a particular greasy spoon in Mayfair."

He also bought up big supplies of Boots No 7 Protect and Perfect Beauty Serum face cream. "I was buying five or six tubes at a time," Fenwick said.

Madoff's love of the high life was boundless. He always stayed at the Lanesborough Hotel at Hyde Park Corner, which is thought still to have a trunk full of his clothes.

He would send for his tailors, Kilgour, to come to his boardroom from Savile Row. As he was measured up, his wife would sit there knitting.
Madoff put his firm's name on everything from T-shirts to cigar humidors.Dozens of the keepsakes are now being sold on eBay.