Here’s a lawsuit fit for Fashion Week.
Former Jimmy Choo co-founder Tamara Mellon has made good on her threat to sue her former employer for forcing her eponymous shoe company into bankruptcy by allegedly sabotaging her relationships with luxury leather producers.
In the new $4 million Manhattan civil suit, Tamara Mellon says she waited out her one-year noncompete agreement with Jimmy Choo before launching her brand in 2013.
After Choo executives learned that Mellon was about to publish a memoir that laid bare the company’s “personal and business ethics,” they “set out to punish her,” the suit says.
Mellon’s cofounder, London shoemaker Jimmy Choo, sold his share of the business in 2001.
The shoes, which run up to $4,600 for a pair of crystal-encrusted stilettos, are a favorite accessory for red-carpet celebrities like Jennifer Lopez and The Duchess of Cambridge.
Mellon stayed on through 2012, when the company was bought by the Labelux Group. She quit after a dispute with Labelux’ senior management over pay, the suit says.
After leaving, she reached out to master artisans from Venice and Florence to manufacture shoes for her new brand. Mellon says in court papers the factories not only work for Choo but also for other competitors such as Christian Louboutin and Chanel.
Then Mellon started promoting her memoir, in which she called her former bosses from Labelux “soulless liars and fraudsters,” according to court papers.
The jab prompted the execs to pressure the factories to stop working with Mellon, the suit says.
She lost the valuable relationships just after she launched her inaugural collection, the suit says.
“Defendants knew Ms. Mellon had been successful in selling her collection to the wholesale distribution channel and thus initiated its boycott at a time that was calculated to cause her the most embarrassment and damage,” the suit says.
The loss of supplies cost Mellon millions and forced her into Chapter 11 reorganization, the suit says.
Reps for Jimmy Choo did not immediately respond to requests for comment.