Scottish Daily Mail

The smart set’s talking about... Bella Yentob

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THE BBC’s former arts supremo, Alan yentob, was thrilled when his daughter, Bella, was hand-picked by Burberry for its 2015 advertisin­g campaign.

The striking brunette was billed as fashion’s latest ‘bright young thing’ as she modelled for the label that kickstarte­d the illustriou­s catwalk careers of Rosie Huntington-Whiteley and Cara Delevingne.

now yentob, 71, who stepped down as creative director of the Beeb in the wake of controvers­y over his role as chairman of the Kids Company charity, reveals that 23-year-old Bella has made a curious career change.

‘Bella’s not modelling — she’s given up even though she had lots of offers,’ he tells me. And despite yentob’s chequered history, Bella is working on a book for a children’s charity.

‘She’s interviewi­ng clients and putting that into a book,’ her father tells me. ‘It’s a charity for abandoned kids.’

Bella, whose mother is yentob’s TV producer wife, Philippa Walker, studied English Literature at Manchester, filling her spare time by composing poetry.

She lives at her parents’ home in West London, but is prone to spontaneou­s adventures: last year, she went to Venice for just 24 hours.

‘It seemed a bit reckless to me, but I suppose that’s what your 20s are for,’ muses yentob, who still gets paid as much as £249,999 per year by the BBC for his arts programme, Imagine.

Friends wonder if Bella was too shy to be a model. ‘I’m no one special, so I don’t really know [why they chose me],’ she once confessed. ‘I’ve never been that comfortabl­e in front of the camera.’

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