Robin Birley: The fight to save my family name

The family firm: India Jane, Lady Annabel, Robin and the late Sir Mark Birley
Edward Black10 April 2012

It could be the High Court showdown of the summer. For decades the Birley family name has been synonymous with London's most high-profile clubs such as Annabel's and Mark's Club but now it is the subject of a legal feud between clothing tycoon Richard Caring and Robin Birley.

Some are billing it as a fight to the death between the old and the new order. Mayfair has certainly never seen anything quite like it.

Representing the old order is Robin Birley, whose late father, Mark, sold the family club empire to fashion millionaire Richard Caring for £90 million in 2007. Caring now runs such iconic London venues as Annabel's in Berkeley Square but has become alarmed at Robin's plans, unveiled to The Evening Standard, to build his own multi-million-pound private club on the doorstep of Caring's ventures in Shepherd Market, Mayfair.

In a bid to recapture the glory days of his lost family business Birley wants to put his own name above the door of his new venture. Not possible, says Caring, who feels that when he bought the Birley stable of clubs it gave him exclusive rights to use the Birley family name. Birley said he was "stunned" to receive a letter from Caring warning him that any attempt to use his own name for his own club would be illegal.

"My name is Robin Birley," he explains. "It never occurred to me I'd have a problem and I don't quite know how I'm going to handle it. I wish he'd [Caring] just called me and said, Can we talk about this over coffee or over lunch, talk it through?'

"The last thing I want to do is be fighting a legal battle for the next year and a half. I want to focus everything I have into making the club a wonderful place for people. I'm mortified really, rather than angry. He's [Caring] basically sent a legal notice that he's going to take me to the High Court as of Thursday unless I stop using the name Birley in any capacity, including my own name. I cannot see how that's equitable and fair, quite frankly. That's very painful for me. I'm stunned."

Birley, who is married to Bryan Ferry's ex-wife Lucy Helmore, insists he has no personal truck with Caring or that his new club would signify any commercial threat to his rival's much larger empire: "I'm a minnow compared to Caring with all his restaurants and clubs, and good luck to him. I've met him a couple of times. I've got no personal rancour against Richard Caring at all."

Birley insists that the 2007 sale of the clubs did not cede control of his family name to Caring. "It's not true to say the name went with the clubs," he adds. "Caring bought a series of world-renowned clubs, and good luck to him. It's five clubs he bought, each with their individual trademark.

So why is Caring worried about the Birley name? "Why? Because I think he's frightened. I can only look at it as a backhanded compliment. I could do without it, frankly. But I can only look upon it in that way. I think it's going to make very little difference to him."

The Caring camp insists that the 2007 sale did give him, and him only, the right to use the Birley name. Caring explains: "Robin cannot, in my understanding, open a club called Birley's because his father, Mark Birley, sold the brand and its properties for over £90 million in 2007.

We have no problem with Robin Birley opening a club in Mayfair. I have had no contact or approach from Robin Birley regarding his proposals for a club, despite him being fully aware of our prior registration of the name Birley's, which was done at the request of Mark Birley following the purchase of Mark Birley Holdings."

However, a Caring spokesman later adds, in a more conciliatory tone, "Subject to certain provisos, Richard Caring has never said that he would not be willing to discuss Robin using the name Robin Birley."

To add further spice to the story the 2007 sale of the club empire to Caring came against the backdrop of an extraordinary bust-up when Mark Birley sacked his own son Robin from running Annabel's a year earlier. At this stage Mark had ceded control to his son Robin and daughter India Jane because of fears for his health.

Robin had hired a private detective to investigate the background of his sister's lover and father of her child, Robert Macdonald, after a tip-off that he was a bounder. In fact, the tip-off was all lies, with the result that Robin fell out spectacularly with both his father and sister over the whole affair.

Has there been any rapprochement with India Jane in the interim? "No," is Birley's doleful reply. "It's a non subject for me. It has to be, I have to move on, really. She's got no involvement in the club. Look, it's terribly sad for me because she has an incredible eye. She's inherited the full thing of my father's and she'd be a colossal asset but it's just not going to happen. I am sad about it."

But Birley does have the backing of the rest of his influential family, including his mother, Lady Annabel (who subsequently married Sir James Goldsmith).Lady Annabel has always been fiercely protective of Robin after allowing him at the age of 12 to venture into a tigress's enclosure at Howletts zoo, owned by family friend John Aspinall. The beast turned on Birley, who required extensive plastic surgery on his face.

Half-sister Jemima Khan has even started a Facebook campaign against the man she dubs Richard un-Caring' to stop him "stealing" the family name. Stephen Fry has signed it in support. Others such as his half-brother Zac Goldsmith will have a stake: "It's a family affair. My mother, Jemima and my brothers are all going to be shareholders. Jemima's got incredibly nice friends, glamorous or otherwise. They all add to it."

Such support is very important to Birley, who admits that he wants to re-establish the family line of business and sees the Shepherd Market site as his future home where he can live "with his dogs". This venture is clearly a personal as well as a commercial journey for him; a chance to right several wrongs.

Additionally upsetting for Birley is the edict from the Caring camp that no members of staff may work for Birley's new club, no matter how strong their former ties. Birley says he has known several of the staff at Annabel's and other venues since the age of 11 and their close friendships give a club a "family feel".

He adds: "I miss that desperately. It's a vast hole in my life and I want to renew that, I want to put that back again, and staff are part of that. I want this to go on as multi-generational, as my father's clubs should have done. I'm desperately sad it's not being carried on by my sister and me to this day. Those clubs were my home from my earliest childhood. It's natural that I want to recreate a home."

As to the Shepherd Market club, located opposite the Curzon cinema, the aim is to have something between 2,000 to 3,000 members on a strictly invitational basis. Birley's aim is to create "an oasis in Mayfair", which members can use as a "clubhouse" throughout the day. The venue spreads to 23,000 square feet over several floors and will, in his view, "revive Shepherd Market".

There will be an oyster bar and cigar shop with dining rooms by Turkish designer Rifat Ozbek, who studied at Central St Martins School and has worked for Monsoon.

Adds Birley: "I know it sounds very genteel but it's dinner and dance. So it's got to be all ages, really — a bit like a good party. So it's not — quadruple underlined — not a disco."

After overcoming objections from some Mayfair residents, including the wife of Sir Stirling Moss, Birley is confident he can win over the locals. He points out that a former club on the same premises, Tiddy Dols, held a 3am licence for 44 years. It's also a no to the footballers' wives crowd. "You can safely say that," Birley adds.

As to the sums of money involved Birley is refreshingly vague saying only "millions and millions", but it's clear it represents something of a gamble with the Birley and Goldsmith coffers. He hopes to open the club at the end of next year.

Beneath Birley's charm is a man who won't give up easily. "I've always been tenacious," he says. "This club will open." And he doesn't want this to get personal. When I ask if he would describe Caring as a gentleman, he says diplomatically: "I can't answer that."

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