Susie Watson never imagined herself as founder of a celebrated design brand, nor did she envisage the roller-coaster ride that she’d go on to create it. Brought up in Wimbledon, which she considered ‘rather boring and suburban’, Susie’s father ran a family business that sold some of the first sewing machines and bought up most of Peckliam High Street in its early days.‘My mother’s family were rather different’, she says. ‘Obsessed with travel and collecting beautiful things. This diverse set of genes may have served me well.’
Sent away to boardingnaughty. I ended up taking only one A-Level at an expensive London crammer.’ Unsure wlrat to do next, and with university options blown, she trained as a radiographer and a speed writer, then tried work as a doctor’s receptionist, an elocution teacher and a cleaner. Each job ended disastrously until, much to her father’s relief, she met her future husband Hamisli and married, aged 20.
