From his early days designing belts through to his first ‘It’ bag and the launch of Kilver Court and Sharpham Park, Mulberry founder Roger Saul has enjoyed a successful and varied career – and he shows no sign of slowing down anytime soon…
Was it always your ambition to have your own design label?
I came out of school at the end of the Sixties and went to London with the dream of going to the big city where everything was happening in music and fashion and got a scholarship to study at Westminster College. Having arrived, I realised that what I actually wanted to do was be a fashion boutique manager, which was the rockstar job of the day. So I went to John Michael, who was a Carnaby Street guru, and asked if I could be his business trainee.
What inspired you to launch Mulberry?
John Michael gave me a job buying belts for one of his shop groups, Guys & Dolls. We’d have hippies coming off the street with belts that I would mark up by a massive percentage, and I thought to myself, “This is crazy, I can do better than this.” My father’s background was at Clark’s shoes – which was making 60,000 pairs of children’s shoes a week – so I said, “Where can I get some leather and some buckles?” His advice was to go down to Bermondsey where all the leather makers, tanners and suppliers were at the time, and having found some amazing leathers and coloured snakeskins, I then made my first neck chokers and started selling them to shops like Biba. It was an amazing mini success, and I thought, “I really can do this.” That’s when I went to my father and said, “Dad, can you please come in with me as a partner?” Obviously that wasn’t possible as he was still working for Clark’s, so instead he said, “Why don’t we ask your mother if she would like to be a 50/50 partner?” She agreed and they gave me £500 for my 21st birthday, and off we went.
You started out designing and manufacturing belts. How did that come about?
In those days the belt had the same emotional pull for ladies as handbags have done for the past ten years. The belt was the fashion item of the day, and that continued for the first five years of my Mulberry career. We built up a design-manufacture from an old forge at the back of my parents’ house in Somerset. Then, while I was out visiting on the fashion circuit, I met designers like Enrico Coveri, which led to me becoming the belt designer for everyone from Ralph Lauren and Burberry to Kenzo. Because I was very adept at knowing what shapes and textures and colours were coming next season, the magazines all featured them in their editorial. By 1975, 75 per cent of our turnover was coming from America, and it was all down to belts.
When did Mulberry branch out from accessories and really appear on the fashion map?
In 1975-76, when I met my future wife, Monty, I launched a collection based on hunting, shooting and fishing, called Le Style Anglais. The collection was very much about using the countryside but in a city environment. This was the first time I’d used Englishness in my collection, and it was hugely successful. What that did was give us a look that was identifiable. It was the first time you could say you knew Mulberry for a look as opposed to being a great belt or accessory designer. Up until that point Britain had been seen as either very hip or very classic, and what we did with Mulberry was to take the nuances of both and bring them together.
When was the Mulberry ‘It’ bag born?
In 2001 we took a style from our 1975-76 collection and employed a very cool, very hot young designer called Luella Bartley to do a ready-to-wear collection for us, with Stuart Vevers, a handbag designer who had been with Bottega Veneta. Her New York show opened with the model Gisele Bundchen carrying this enormous harness-strapped bag with heart-shaped charms [the Gisele] down the catwalk, and the famous photographer Chris Moore took the shot which straight away featured in the Evening Standard and then went in to British Vogue. That was the first time we had manufactured an ‘It’ bag by working all the way through the process, and was the base of the Mulberry ‘It’ bag success from 2002 up until the past couple of years.
When did you open your first Mulberry shop?
Our first Mulberry Corner and shops really came out of the exhibition stands we used to do in Paris. In 1975/76, I took the idea of the directors’ chairs, which my sister had bought from a theatre in the Strand, covered them in white canvas, and got old gymnasium bars, and put together a theatrical look. We used to get people wanting to buy things off the stand and it laid for me the foundation of how I’d then design a shop. We opened our first two shops in 1980 in St Christopher’s Place, London and Place de Victoire in Paris.
Mulberry Home was the next step in your evolution as a brand. What was your inspiration?
Having raced through the Eighties at a million miles an hour, by 1990 we had really established the brand, but we had actually become too safe. At that time Prada and Gucci arrived in style – Prada with their nylon bags and Gucci with their glitter bags – and suddenly, for the first time, we had serious competition. We had become ‘English boring’, in my view. It didn’t matter what we did, nobody noticed, so we looked every which way to see how we could become fashionable again.
What I did was take Mulberry home – we took what we had done with the exhibitions and the shops and decided that we really needed to sell that feeling of cocooning. The whole home interiors mood was about to take off, so it was perfect timing. When the hot new magazine of the day, Elle Decoration, came out we almost dominated the first issue.
Next stop for Mulberry was the world of hotels, with Charlton House Hotel opening in 1996. Why did you decide to go down this route?
It was very much about creating a home environment that you could walk into, live in, and buy the product. We got a Michelin star in our first year, so food became a new focus as well as the environment, and then we opened a spa and launched a collection of organic-based products. But running a hotel is testing. It’s one thing creating a handbag you love, it’s another thing creating an environment where you’ve got someone for 24 hours, and thinking, “If any of my staff get it wrong, I’ve damaged that relationship.” So huge pressure but very exciting!
Racing historic cars have always been a passion of yours. What is the attraction?
I have raced historic racing cars all my life and I brought that into Mulberry in the Nineties when I did Goodwood and Mulberry historic Grand Prix series. At that time, classic cars were rocketing away in value and they were our way in to the wealthy end of the international male market.
When I came out of Mulberry in 2003, I took racing much more seriously and started buying ever-faster cars, from a P3 1936 Alfa Romeo to a gull-wing Mercedes and I’d do Monte Carlo rallies with Monty. After a near big accident – and having then seen a friend have a very big accident – I realised that perhaps it was time to stop. But I had a glorious departure. My last race at Brighton was a speed trial, and we won that with the fastest time of the day. Then I hung up my racing gloves. I retired from racing just at the right time.
How did you make the move from fashion into farming and your Sharpham Park range of spelt products?
In 2004, the 300-acre Sharpham Farm estate came up for sale for the first time in 100 years, and I sold my Mulberry shares, bought the farm, and started farming. We still had Charlton House Hotel and we had a great chef who shared my passion for thinking about the quality of the food and where it comes from, so we headed out to find the right cattle and the right sheep. At that time my sister got cancer and was struggling with diet, so she suggested we plant spelt instead of wheat. I hadn’t a clue what it was and went on the internet to find out. I discovered this seemingly amazing ancient grain, with extraordinary health attributes and fantastic slow-release energy, which can be used in pretty much anything. I like to think that anything wheat can do, spelt can do better.
In 2011 you launched the designer outlet village, Kilver Court. How did that come about?
We owned it as the Mulberry headquarters and moved the factory shop there in 1996, so when I left Mulberry in 2003/4 it was already a £3.5million business in the middle of nowhere, with about 50,000 visitors a year. In 2008 we opened Sharpham Farm farm shop and opened the gardens up to the public, and I persuaded Mulberry to move out of the headquarters and then settled down to consider how best to turn it into a designer outlet village. The first steps were taken in 2011 when I began talking to a few of my old fashion friends, among them Margaret Howell and Joseph, and they said, “Yes, we know you and the success of the Mulberry factory shop, so let’s give it a go.” So having peeled back woodchip wallpaper, carpet tiles and ceiling tiles to find the most amazing white-washed wooden ceilings and heavy floors – very Victorian industrial – we had the perfect backdrop, and got off to a great start. It happened to be Mulberry’s 40th anniversary in 2011, and so there was big PR around the brand and the fact that I was getting involved again in fashion.
Today we have about ten shops, a restaurant and a café at Kilver Court but in those ten shops we have about 40 brands, including Jack Wills, LK Bennett, Toast, and Orla Kiely. This year alone we will be running around 35 per cent up, like for like, with about 150,000 visitors a year. We recently brought in Daylesford, the cycle brand, Rapha, and Trickers men’s shoes. It’s a constant edit around style and brand.
The three-acre gardens at Kilver Court are open to the public. Can you describe them?
A combination of amazing features completely hidden from the public, a real ‘Secret Garden’. There’s a vast viaduct behind that leads out in the countryside, a lake and a giant rockery garden. I put in a topiary parterre and herbaceous borders when I bought the site in 1996 to bring my style to the gardens. Last year we had BBC Gardeners’ World come down and do a programme. Next spring we will launch our own new nursery and garden shop.
What has been the secret to your success in business over the years?
Keeping a finger on the pulse – not only knowing what’s happening in the fashion world but in the wider world too. At Kilver Court, we got exactly the right recipe when we went into recession – giving people something at a special price which they couldn’t normally buy, wouldn’t normally find, and bringing that alchemy of product and design and brand together to constantly excite the customer.
What would you say are your everyday luxuries?
A special plant for the garden, definitely. I also like little things that are tactile, and recently bought myself an amazing set of carving knives to cut my steaks from our beef. I have been so lucky to have had the most amazing racing cars, the most amazing clothes and experiences, but to me now time with family and really good friends is what’s important. And, of course, I enjoy my garden and farming and seeing people smiling and having a good experience at Kilver Court.
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