Linley no longer in the chair
AFTER parting company with Russian oligarch Sergei Pugachev, who extended him a £400,000 loan, the Queen’s nephew Viscount Linley has lost control of his beloved furniture company, which he set up in 1985.
Like a scene from TV’S Dragons Den, Linley, 50, has given 60 per cent of his bespoke business, known simply as Linley, to the man who replaced financier Pugachev, British yacht-broker Jamie Edmiston.
Following a £4million investment, Edmiston is now the chief executive officer of the company, although the peer remains a director and a minority shareholder.
However, I gather Lord Linley, whose wife, Serena, has her own successful fragrance and beauty products business in Knightsbridge, is ‘very upbeat’ about the company’s future, despite the recession.
This week, he was launching a limited edition walnut ‘Britannia’ jewellery box, to celebrate the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, with a ticket price of £3,900.
Edmiston, meanwhile, tells me that business is buoyant and the company’s two main stores have been totally re-vamped since Pugachev’s departure.
Pugachev, 51, nicknamed the Cashier to the Kremlin, is the tycoon who fell for British beauty Alexandra Tolstoy after she gave him English lessons in Moscow: she has two young sons by him, and a luxury lifestyle to match.
I am told that Linley remains on good terms with Pugachev, who took him on a bear hunting expedition in southern Siberia. In turn, Linley invited the banker to a shoot in the Home Counties.
However, their friendship was put to the test after Pugachev’s Russian bank, Mezhprombank, went into liquidation and the authorities in Moscow demanded immediate repayment of the loan to Linley.
The peer resisted their claims and, I gather, is determined to stick to the original terms of his agreement.
Edmiston tells me: ‘ It’s a phenomenal business. We have invested lots of money and I am happy to say we have had record month.’