Colorful fashion mogul
DAV I D TA N G
David Tang, the outspoken socialite and entrepreneur who founded the Shanghai Tang fashion brand, has died. He was 63.
The Financial Times newspaper, for which he wrote a popular tongue- incheek advice column, reported Wednesday that Tang died Tuesday night of cancer at the Royal Marsden Hospital in London with his wife, Lucy, at his bedside.
“David Tang was a remarkable man of many talents whose charm, erudition and wit were ever present,” the newspaper’s editor, Lionel Barber, said in the obituary. “He will be sorely missed.”
The Hong Kong- born, British- educated Tang operated private clubs and restaurants and held exclusive distribution rights to Cuban cigars in Asia.
Tang was knighted in 2008 for his charitable work in both Britain and Hong Kong, an honor his grandfather, businessman and philanthropist Tang Shiukin, also received.
He was planning to throw a farewell bash Sept. 6 at London’s luxury Dorchester hotel after learning he only had a few months to live, said Ewan Venters, chief executive of the luxury department store Fortnum & Ma- son.
“Personally, I think the world is a little duller for the loss of David, and at such a relatively young age,” Venters said.
Tang was best known for starting the Shanghai Tang luxury brand in 1994, which pioneered the use of Chinese retro design themes as fashion motifs. He later sold the brand to the Swiss luxury goods company Richemont.
He caused a stir by opening the members- only China Club in 1991 in Hong Kong’s financial district, expanding it to Beijing and Singapore.
Actor Russell Crowe called Tang “witty, charming, intellectual, salacious” in a tweet Wednesday.
Tang is survived by his wife, and two children from a previous marriage.