India Jane Birley (born 14 January 1961) is a British artist, heiress and businesswoman. She was a co-owner/manager of her father's famed London nightclub, Annabel's, in its later years, as well as some of her father's other establishments. [1]
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 has two brothers, Rupert (presumed deceased) and Robin; and three half-siblings, Zac, Jemima, and Ben Goldsmith from her mother's affair with the man who would become her second husband. In 1980 while training at an art school in Madrid, she met and married Jonty Colchester, an interior designer. In 1985 they were divorced. She was subsequently engaged to Amir Farman-Farma, a wealthy Iranian aristocrat, but the marriage was called off. 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".[3] 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. [4]
Birley, the granddaughter of society portrait painter Sir Oswald Birley, is a painter whose 1999 portrait, "Conrad Moffat Black (Baron Black of Crossharbour) and Barbara Amiel", appears at the National Portrait Gallery (London). She illustrated her mother's book, 'Copper: A Dog's Life'. Birley also organized an exhibition on the origins of sex[2] and has a noted collection of antique erotica.
Beginning in 2003 she was co-director of her father's nightclub, Annabel's, with her brother Robin Birley. He was dismissed in 2006 after India Jane 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, and she stayed on to run the club with her father until his death. Her father left her the club and the bulk of his estates; her brother Robin (disfigured from a childhood animal attack) sued to overturn the will and a settlement was eventually reached between the siblings. She has since sold Annabel's for over $100 million and is no longer involved with the enterprise.
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