VICKY NICOLSON-JAMES A LIFE OF GLAMOUR, GRIT
AND EXTRAORDINARY GRACE
I am speaking with Vicky Nicolson-James barely two months after the passing of her dear daughter, Clementine. It is also just a few weeks since the birth of her eldest daughter Lucy’s baby and Vicky’s first grandchild. Yet somehow these conflicting circumstances feel like they are meant to be, in this lady’s life of cataclysmic contrasts.
BORN TO BE WILD
Vicky’s life is one of extremes. Born “up north” to Liverpudlian parents with high expectations, she rebelled from the start. “I was a social butterfly. Mum was an occupational nurse for a local factory group which handled Elizabeth Arden make-up products, and I would share them with my friends, so I was very popular,” she muses. Deemed plain naughty, she was eventually sent to boarding school, where she kicked against every boundary in search of something that could hold her restless mind.
After a secretarial course and a Camp America season, her mother found her an affordable Cordon Bleu course at Hereford Tech College, Vicky was thrilled: “I thought it was Hertfordshire and near London....I did wonder why there were so many sheep!”
THE FRENCH CONNECTION
She had a ball and met her future husband, Andrew. “There were only four of us on the course. Andrew was older and a Herefordian, so he knew the local social scene. He went to chef on a yacht in the South of France, which sounded incredibly glamorous. I joined him
as cabin crew and we had an amazing time, just like the TV series, Below Deck.” Her mother instantly approved. Then came a job in Cannes for a wealthy Arab arms dealer. “When my parents visited, the owner told me to collect them in the black chauffeured Mercedes, with flags on the front. My father exclaimed ‘Bloody Hell!’ in very loud Liverpudlian” she laughs.
After three raucous years travelling the Mediterranean, Vicky longed for a working experience in London. The couple returned to Britain, where Vicky took a marketing course at a City surveyors. She and Andrew married, and in Hertfordshire (yes, she got it right this time!) welcomed their first daughter, Lucy. Vicky worked everywhere from a TV company to selling rags and wipers to industries around the M25, revealing her natural gift for making connections.
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LOCAL PEOPLE VICKY NICOLSON-JAMES
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