Jo Malone: I still make the bed for my son, 17 – and spray sheets with cologne!
MOST women facing the impending prospect of an empty nest will admit to indulging their teenagers with a little extra dose of motherly love.
But perfumer Jo Malone seems to be finding it especially difficult to let go – admitting she still makes her 17-year-old son’s bed, and even sprays cologne on his sheets.
The mother- of- one insisted she was a ‘strict mum’ to son Josh, but couldn’t resist ‘terribly’ pampering him. Speaking on the Happy Mum Happy Baby podcast, Miss Malone, 54, said: ‘I am a really hands on mum. I like going shopping, I like cooking dinner.
‘He’s 17-years-old and I still make his bed. I know that’s terrible and it won’t be forever. And I still spray cologne on the bed sheets. I love being a mum, I really, really do’.
Miss Malone’s signature colognes, a staple of well-to-do women, are sold for £90 for a 100ml bottle.
The founder of two companies, Jo Malone and Jo Loves, Miss Malone said that her upbringing on a Kent council estate shaped the type of parent she is to Josh.
She said: ‘Really from the age of 11, it was up to me to make sure there was a meal on the table. But I thought everybody lived that life. I was the adult and it was up to me to make sure there was food in the fridge.’
Miss Malone, who suffered breast cancer and had a double mastectomy, claims she ‘smelt’ her husband Gary Willcox’s cancer. Speaking last year, she said: ‘My husband was very poorly and I kept saying to the doctor, “I can smell this smell down his neck”. They kept saying, “No you can’t”. He was diagnosed with Addison’s.’