India Jane Birley

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India Jane Birley (born Jane Birley in 1961) is a British artist and businessperson. She is a co-owner/manager of her father's London nightclub, Annabel's, as well as some of her father's other establishments. ^[1]

[edit] Biography

Born in London, ^[2] India Jane Birley is the daughter of Lady Annabel Vane-Tempest-Stewart from her marriage to nightclub mogul Mark Birley. She is the stepdaughter of billionaire Sir James Goldsmith. She has two brothers, Rupert (presumed deceased) and Robin from her mother's first marriage; and three half-siblings, Jemima, Zac and Ben from her mother's second marriage.

In 1980 while training at an art school in Madrid, she met and married Jonty Colchester, an interior designer. In 1985 they were divorced. The granddaughter of society portrait painter Sir Oswald Birley, Birley's own work as a painter (the 1999 portrait, "Conrad Moffat Black (Baron Black of Crossharbour) and Barbara Amiel", appears at the National Portrait gallery. She illustrated her mother's book, 'Copper: A Dog's Life'. Birley also organized an exhibition on the origins of sex^[3] and has a noted collection of antique erotica.^{[citation needed]}

In 1993 she met Francis Pike, a historian, and they were married. They lived in Bombay and London before Pike relocated to Germany and Morocco. Though they lived separately for many years they remained married and presented themselves publicly as a married couple. In October 2004, when asked by The Evening Standard why she had no children Birley answered, "I'm not able to".^[4] She has since had a son, Eben, and while the father was initially described as her husband, he was later revealed to be Robert Macdonald, her Alexander Technique teacher of the time. ^[5]

Since 2003 she has been the co-director of Annabel's with her brother Robin Birley. He was dismissed in 2006 after India Jane (who says she added the moniker "India" to her given name Jane because she liked India so much^{[citation needed]}) told her father she was livid with Robin for having the father of her son investigated. Robin claims to have done it with her best interests in mind; they are reportedly estranged^{[citation needed]}, and she stayed on to run the club with her father until his death.