A battle for fashion’s sole

AN ASIAN immigrant arrives in Britain in the 1970s without any English, works his way through cobbler school, toils every hour in a shabby workshop and ends up making shoes for film stars, socialites and the world’s best-loved princess.

The story of Jimmy Choo should read like a fairytale but every fairytale has its big bad wolf and in this case, that dark character is played by big business.

It makes its entry early in the saga and from then on, you just know the likelihood of a happy ending is shakier than a high-heel virgin in one of Choo’s classic four-inch creations.