The Dutch city of Amsterdam became a launchpad for a new life.

uesday February 7, 2006
And sew the story goes
By SANDRA LEONG
Ashley Isham’s home in Singapore – a tropical–style, four–bedroom
split–level bungalow off Bukit Timah Road – is one that will sit well in
the pages of a posh home interiors magazine.
It has four storeys, including a basement garage, each accessible by a
lift. The open–concept living room is decorated with Balinese artefacts
and fringed by a U–shaped infinity pool.
“I furnished it myself,” the London–based, Singaporean fashion designer
tells you proudly. “Everything had to be perfect. I wanted a contrast
for the Asian tropical home with the streamlined European look. But I
don’t remember how much I spent, probably in, the hundreds of
thousands.”
Ashley Isham found his calling in London as one of the city’s successful
fashion designers.
But there is a catch: Ashley does not own it. Yet.
Although he won’t say how much he is renting it for, the house has been
his Singapore hideaway since 2004. He comes back three to four times a
year, but his mother and two younger sisters also live in it.
“Bit by bit, I hope to make enough money to buy it one day,” he says
dreamily.
If home is where the heart is, then the 28–year–old fashion upstart is a
Singaporean boy through and through. After just five years in the
business, he is now regularly touted as one of London’s hottest young
designers.
He owns his own label, Ashley Isham, and two multi–label boutiques named
Aquaint in Covent Garden and Ashley’s off Bond Street.
He is famous enough, too, to have been invited by American supermodel
Tyra Banks to be a guest judge on the fifth season of her reality show,
America’s Next Top Model.
In the penultimate episode already screened in the United States, he
plays a part in convincing the regular judges to think twice about their
hot favourite after the models flew to London for a shopping spree.
They respected his opinion enough to change their minds, much to the ire
of the show’s fans.
Yet he is your regular chap who attended neighbourhood schools in
Jubilee Primary School and Nan Hua Secondary School. He still gets a bit
wide–eyed when talking about his celebrity fans – singers Kylie Minogue
and Mariah Carey, Zara Philips (daughter of Princess Anne), MTV host
June Sarpong and British actresses Michelle Collins and Miranda Richardson.
And despite being offered British citizenship thrice, he has I turned it
down. “I love Singapore too much. I would miss my family, my friends and
the food.”
Humble beginnings
Several things strike you when you meet Ashley. He has a smouldering
gaze, thanks to the grey contact lenses he wears. In his Alexander
McQueen shirt and DSquared Jeans, he is also razor–thin.
He is, by his own admission, an irrepressible chain smoker who goes
through one pack a day. “One and a half if it’s during London Fashion
Week,” he adds.
He air–kisses, has a British accent – picked up from hobnobbing with the
fashion elite there and drops words like “lovely” and “brilliant”. But
he is not averse to slipping into bouts of Singlish with his mother and
sisters.
He is the product of a conservative Malay upbringing and his is truly a
rags–to–designer togs tale.
His mother was a seamstress and his father a supervisor working in the
Housing Board. The family lived in a three–room HDB flat in Clementi.
Born Eshamuddin Ismail; Ashley Isham is his professional name because it
is “more memorable”.
His mother, Rokiah Abu, 55, a shy, but friendly woman who is now
retired, recalls: “He used to love watching TV programmes like Miss
Universe and Elite Supermodel.
Later, fed up that shops in Singapore did not carry the designs he
wanted, he tried his hand at cutting patterns and asking his mother to
sew them.
He experimented on his younger sister Khaty, now 23, and a fashion
marketing student at Raffles Design Institute. He other sister Lily, 26
is currently not working.
He was an average student and a self–professed “daydreamer”, scoring 16
points for his O levels.
When he was about 15, his parents divorced. Their flat in Clementi was
to be sold and the money split between them. His father was also made to
pay alimony but he reneged on both agreements.
Overnight, Ashley – who was then doing his National Service (NS) in the
police force – was forced to grow up. He no longer talks to his father
but believes the latter remarried several times and is now in Malaysia.
The family moved to a small studio flat in Jurong and times were hard.
After NS, he worked for six months as a sales assistant at a perfume
boutique before deciding that he wanted to “see snow”.
In December 1995, he gathered his savings and nearly broke his mother’s
heart when he told her he was going to Amsterdam.
She made him promise two things: Never forget his roots, and never
forget her.
Going Dutch
The Dutch city of Amsterdam became a launchpad for a new life. He got by
working odd jobs, mostly as a fashion stylist. He toured the Van Gogh
Museum and the Rijksmuseum, and soaked in everything.
In September 1996, he took a gamble and travelled to London to try to
enrol in the prestigious Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design
with the savings he had amassed.
It was his first time to the British capital. It was also the first day
of the semester, three months after applications had closed.
“There was no bloody way I was going to get in,” he drawls.
A model in an Ashley Isham creation presented during last year’s London
Fashion Week.
But the school’s director, impressed with his portfolio of sketches and
mood boards told him to go to a waiting room. Five minutes later, she
returned and said: “Go straight to class.”
The course cost him about £7,500 (RM50,250) and he paid for it with his
savings and his job as a part–time stylist.
He graduated with a diploma in fashion folio. By then, his work at the
school’s fashion shows had caught the attention of a bank executive from
Swiss investment bank Substantia Invest AG. The bank agreed to sponsor
his further education.
He took up pattern–cutting at the London College of Fashion for another
year, then moved on to Middlesex University where he earned a Bachelor
of Arts with honours after three years.
Although he won’t say how much he was sponsored for, he admits that the
opportunity would probably never had arisen had he stayed in Singapore.
At the age of 23 in 2001, he began life as a struggling designer,
working on his first collection of 15 outfits.
Renting an apartment in Chelsea with some friends, he took pains to
“watch my pounds and pence”. He hardly ate out, whipping up home–cooked
mee goreng, nasi goreng and curry instead.
He applied twice to show “on–schedule” – meaning amid the main
activities – over two seasons of the 2001 London Fashion Wee