Anything my daughter can do...
Millionaire hubby? Check. Fancy house in Spain? Check. A penchant for designer clothes and selfies? Check! How Vogue Williams appears in danger of being outshone... by her own mother!
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree
REALITY TV star Vogue Williams turns heads wherever she goes. But as she attended Leopardstown races last weekend, her glamorous companion gained equal traction.
Proving the adage that the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree, her mother Sandra Wilson, aged in her 60s, looked as carefully put-together and soignée.
The look won’t have surprised her growing army of followers on Instagram, however, where Sandra has spent the past five months building her online profile.
So, who is this elegant new influencer, who has already been approached by brands and whose understated glamour would surely pass muster with the royals her son-in-law’s family has connections with?
Born Sandra Cassidy, she married car salesman Freddie Williams in the 1970s. They settled in the seaside town of Portmarnock, Dublin, and had three children — Fred, Amber and Vogue. When Vogue was six, Sandra and Freddie separated. He died in 2010.
‘For a couple of years Mum was looking after us and she was working two jobs,’ Vogue has said — and one of those was with Aer Lingus. ‘Mum never complained.’
Sandra met Neil Wilson — a software millionaire and one of Scotland’s most successful businessmen — and two years later moved with her three children into his home in nearby Sutton.
Neil is the founder of Dublinbased business Datalex which became a leading software supplier to the airline and travel industry. When his company was floated on the stock market in 2000, he is believed to have pocketed €4million along with at least €90million in stocks.
He and Sandra also have a son together, Alexander, the youngest of Sandra’s four children.
The family lived in a beautiful home on the hill of Howth but when he retired, Neil and Sandra moved to Spain, where they live in salubrious Sotogrande, Andalusia — a privately-owned residential development, where Spanish bankers, French royals and former British prime minister Tony Blair have summer residences.
Sandra’s Instagram photos — all taken by Neil — feature Spanish labels like Zara, Uterque, Massimo Dutti and Adolfo Dominguez.
Whether she can monetise her brand as cannily as her daughter has remains to be seen. But her constant use of the hashtag #styledbysands gives the impression she might like to pursue a styling career. Watch this space...