Cheltenham Racy: the sexedup Sloane ranger
It’s country dressing, but not as you know it. Forget mud and thistles, Hannah Betts has fallen for the blinged up rural style of Holland Cooper
With catwalk shows and street style both Covid impeded, television has become the place where we get our clothing kicks. Last week saw the return of that ultimate fashion-fest, The Crown. And, where we once thrilled to the rig-outs of the Princesses Margaret and Anne, so we now enter the era in which aristocratic ingénue Lady Di morphed into fashion-plate Princess Diana.
Not only did the Princess of Wales favour polka dots, big collars and novelty knits, but her Sloane roots and royal lifestyle meant she did a fabulous line in country classics. Think of the Bill Pashley tweed skirt suit she posed in on honeymoon at Balmoral, or the racy equestrian garb she donned for a Snowdon family portrait a decade later. About town, she gave heritage fabrics a city spin, resplendent in tartans and houndstooth.
Our heroine would have swooned over Holland Cooper, the go-to brand for rural living with urban dash. Her niece, Lady Kitty Spencer, is a fan. Ditto Zara Tindall, Autumn Phillips, Viscountess Weymouth, and every woman who knows that country style requires metropolitan tailoring. After all, tweedy chic is all very well in theory, but there’s a reason why Coco Chanel felt forced to create her own when holding hands with the Duke of Westminster. At its worst, tweed is stiff, bulky, scratchy, turd-toned and cut for chaps rather than chapesses. At its best, it is Holland Cooper.
The label was established in 2008 by Jade Holland Cooper, 33, the scion of a farmer and a fashion designer, who dropped out of the Royal Agricultural College to revolutionise the ghastly garb she saw about her. “It was all a bit archaic,” she tells me. “Here was a large group of women being offered such a small selection of mediocre, poorly made products. Heritage fabrics are so beautiful – one has only to look at Diana – yet nothing was being created that was structured, tailored, designed to show off the female figure.” If this has Sloane appeal, then it’s sexed-up Sloane. Some elements can be a tad bling, but one would rather look Made in Chelsea than
Last of the Summer Wine.
Holland Cooper started by selling tweed minis at country fairs, cutting designs herself using the best Scottish and Yorkshire tweed. All the brand’s tailoring continues to be from this source, crafted in its London factory. Naysayers informed her that she would only ever be dealing with a limited market. More fool them.
Today, she boasts a swish Cheltenham headquarters, Edinburgh flagship, Harrods concession and thriving Bicester outlet. She employs about 60 people. Online growth has been 150 per cent up during Covid, with Americans, Germans and Swedes lining up for a bit of Brit action. The brand is worth in excess of £20 million. As for being confined to the country crowd, check out November’s Vogue, which features the label’s form-fitting lace shirt (£119) in its party checklist.
All things considered, Holland Cooper is feeling extremely now. Lockdown has put the focus on outdoor living, as a means both of exercise and social activity, while even the most high-street addicted are turning their attention to sustainable wares. HC’S tweeds could be described as “inadvertently eco”: an affordable luxury that is local with longevity. As Holland Cooper notes: “These are long-lasting products, true investment pieces. We’re never trying to chase a trend, or create fast fashion. I want women to be able to wear our pieces forever.”
Her clothes feel ageless in a way
Diana would have swooned over this go-to brand for rural living with urban dash
‘I’ve enjoyed talking to the customer and taking time to reply to everyone’
that is also very 2020. When I checked out the Bicester boutique, it was full of teens bagging bargains, my fortysomething self, and a couple of extremely modish septuagenarians. Holland Cooper is delighted: “Ralph Lauren is a brand I’ve always admired for the way in which it dresses everyone from babies to grandmas. There’s no one who couldn’t wear it. It’s the same for us.”
I first came across HC in January, instantly falling ng in love with the Kempton, an impeccable, thighskimming riding ing jacketcum-coat (£449). 49). Months later, I worship my Prince of Wales check Kempton so ardently that it reduces me to happy tears, and have since acquired da a houndstooth version. In them I feel like Chanel muse Amanda a Harlech – all long-limbed bed equestrian chic. Both are sex on legs – my boyfriend goes es weak at the knees when I sport them – while also being ng fabulously female-friendly: dly: never before have I been stopped topped so often by women demanding nding to know where I sourced something. mething.
Recent bestsellers tsellers have included the Marlborough ugh Shearling Trench in dashing Black ack Watch (£995), the Regency Coat (£599), snug Aviator Gilets (£449) and the swish Knightsbridge e and Mayfair Blazers (from £349). Given how competitive the jeans market ket is, Holland Cooper is proud of her r take’s cult following (from £99). Meanwhile, eanwhile, her ultra-flattering g T-shirts (£39) are frequently bought ught in batches of nine.
Communication ation between Holland Cooper and her buyers uyers is as close as it is constant. One need eed only look at her Instagram account nt to see the way in which she plays poster oster woman for her label, embodying ying its aesthetic for her 58,800 followers. lowers.
She can find herself elf answering 200 questions a day, ay, but argues that it has proved an “invaluable nvaluable lifeline” during the Covid crisis when so many brands have e foundered.
“To be honest, I’ve enjoyed talking to the customer omer and taking time to o reply to everyone,” she explains. plains. “The bigger you get, the e more remote you can become. ecome.
This way the consumer umer is part of the thought ht process.”
The pandemic resulted ulted in products a appearing in stages rather than as coh coherent collections, meaning she explain explained each element piecemeal; something she plans to continue. The latest drop is HC’S Sherpa-lined Regency W Wellingtons (from £149), marking a first foray into footwear. One longs for her riding boots. Riding r remains her favourite form of escapism – and there’s a lot to escape. Fo For Holland Cooper doesn’t only tak take responsibility for her own multim multimillion-pound business, she is marr married to Julian Dunkerton, 55, co-foun co-founder and recently reinstated head of the fashion brand Superd Superdry. Together, they own Dowde Dowdeswell Court, a £50 million Georgi Georgian mansion set in 250 acres near Ch Cheltenham.
From here they play the part of the Cot Cotswolds’ most glamorous power couple, juggling a string of busi businesses and a private jet. So significant sig is the pair’s hold on th the area that locals are said to refer to Cheltenham as “Dunker-town”, about which Holland Cooper c can be spotted in Galvan a and Balmain evening dr dresses, rocked with vint vintage Chanel jewellery. Wh What would surprise us about their fa fantastically glamorous life? “The d degree of grunt work,” she laugh laughs. “We’re incredibly lucky, but w we work all day every day.” At 3 39 weeks pregnant, she is sup supposed to be on maternity lea leave. However, work-life balance is something she i is hoping will arrive with t the stork. Can we expect a m maternity line? “In time. Th The maternity offering is gha ghastly, just so depressing. Why should being pregnant mea mean having to wear the worst clo clothing known to man?” H Holland Cooper may be ex expecting a newborn for Christmas Christmas. I shall be hoping for some Holla Holland Cooper. A Greenwich Cable swea sweater (£125), perhaps, or the Marlbo Marlborough Trench Coat in (the very D Diana) purple and green heather tar tartan I have my eye on; sumptuou sumptuously slow style one can buy now and lo love forever.