Oliver Tress: as Matt Hancock releases his bombshell new memoir, who is Gina Coladangelo’s ex-husband?
Sheâs been spotted sunning herself on Australiaâs Gold Coast and embracing her new partner Matt Hancock as he exits the Iâm A Celebrity jungle. And this week, further details of Gina Coladangeloâs relationship with the disgraced former health secretary are set to be revealed in his bombshell new memoir, released tomorrow (December 6).
But what of Oliver Tress, Coladangeloâs humiliated ex-partner of 12 years and father of her three children?
Tress, the founder of Oliver Bonas and Coladangeloâs husband of 12 years, has remained quietly in the shadows since details of his wifeâs affair with Hancock was exposed.
He was seen cutting a stoic figure as he helped her load the boot of her £70,000 Audi Q7 outside their Wandsworth home last year, but since then: a steering clear of public life as he presumably comes to terms with the affair and continues to care for his three young children.
So who is he and what do we know of his and Coladangeloâs relationship? From his humble business beginnings to his ex-girlfriendâs royal connections, this is everything you need to know about the man who found himself at the centre of one of the biggest scandals of the pandemic.
Who is Oliver Tress?
Tressâ upbringing is fitting for the founder of an upmarket lifestyle chain popular with the middle classes. The 55-year-old â known as Olly to his friends â was born in Henley-on-Thames in Oxfordshire to a banker and a housewife and lived a âblissful lifeâ moving from country to country with his parents. âWe were living in Sudan when I was born and from there we went to Nigeria, New York, the Netherlands, Zambia and South Africa, so Iâve been very lucky in that respect,â he told The Independent in 2012.
Tress studied at Marlborough College in Wiltshire. Other former students include the Duchess of Cambridge, Jack Whitehall and Emerald Fennell. He went on to study anthropology at Durham University and was known for his habit of bringing gifts back from his travels for his friends or selling them at country fairs or charity events.
While his friends were interviewing for corporate graduate schemes, he was reportedly selling watches from his living room - the inspiration for his first retail store, which he opened on Fulham Road in 1993, selling handbags and jewellery heâd bought in Hong Kong, where his parents were living at the time. âThe corporate life just wasnât for me,â he told The Daily Telegraph in 2016, recalling how all his friends were interviewing for grad schemes or âproper jobsâ.
Listen to the fab Oliver Tress, founder of @OliverBonas sharing secrets of his success https://t.co/x41PekgxIZ @BIPC pic.twitter.com/9JrJzBTEwS
— Nadine Dereza (@nadinedereza) January 12, 2016
âI did one interview and we [the interviewer and I] agreed within about a minute that I didnât want the job. I thought that being in a corporation of any size was restrictive. To have limitless possibility, you have to do something on your own,â he continued.
Tress has since reminisced about how his idea was born from his travels. âIâd been bringing presents back for friends and they were really popular so I thought, âI wonder if I can make a go of this?ââ He has admitted he âhad no idea what [he] was doingâ but âto my amazement it just worked.â
The store was named after Tressâ girlfriend at the time, Anna Bonas (cousin of Prince Harryâs ex-girlfriend Cressida Bonas, who has been pictured with an Oliver Bonas clutch bag over the years), and âshe very kindly hasnât demanded that I changed itâ, he once revealed.
He moonlighted as the storeâs cashier when it first opened, using a second-hand till and hiring close friends to help with the refurbishment, and says that aside from the birth of his first child, the most âeuphoricâ moment of his life was the end of the first Saturday in his shop. âWhen sales surpassed all my expectations and I realised an exciting future lay ahead of me,â he told The Independent in 2012.
He says a Hans Christian Anderson quote (âJust living is not enough: one must have sunshine, freedom and a little flowerâ) is at the core of what he does. âIt touches on the human experience - you canât just get up, eat, go to bed,â he told The Telegraph in 2016. âYouâve got to have experiences. As a business, our role is to be the little flower - or we might as well give up and go home.â
Tress no longer handpicks the items himself - most gift, homeware and furniture products are now designed in-house - and the homemade feel clearly proved a winning formula. The chain is now a multi-million pound business, but it hasnât always been smooth sailing. Oliver Bonasâ sales plummeted by 20 per cent in December 2008 amid the financial crisis, and during the London riots of 2011, Tress was badly beaten by looters outside one of his stores on Northcote Road in Battersea, requiring hospital treatment for head injuries.
âI just canât fathom what happened,â he told The Telegraph after the attack. âMy experience was that it [the looting] was known about and nothing was done about it. To me that just seems like the police havenât done their job.â
Tress likes to treat his staff well - and clearly it pays. In 2015, his company became the first UK high street chain to pay its staff the living wage in 2015, which Tress said reflected âhard work, loyalty and the real cost of livingâ. In 2019, a £15 million HSBC loan enabled him to open eight more stores. There are now 85 across the UK, mostly in London and the south of England.
According to accounts, the company made a £2.7 million profit in 2019 and Tress is estimated to have a net worth of around £12 million.
How did he meet Gina Coladangelo?
Coladangelo and Hancock met while studying PPE at Oxford University, but little is known about how she met her husband. She and Tress married in 2009 and Coladangelo has spent recent years working as the marketing and communications director for her husbandâs firm alongside her work for the Department of Health and Social Care.
The former couple have three children together, who have been pictured on Oliver Bonasâ official Twitter account over the years. The family moved from their home in Clapham Junction to a £4 million, five-bedroom Edwardian house in Wandsworth in 2015, where they employed a live-in nanny. âOn the walls are bright chevron patterned frames and prints of quote art; a retro wooden chest with painted drawers sits in the corner of the kitchen with a fish tank bubbling above,â according to a writer for the Times who visited in 2014. âIn the living room, a black and white tub chair sits next to a brass-topped coffee table with yellow legs that is soon to hit the shops.â
Tress is also known to own or have owned a second property near West Wittering beach in West Sussex, where his wealthy neighbours include Sweaty Betty founder Simon Hill-Norton.
Perhaps it was Tressâ fellow millionaire neighbour who inspired his own range of activewear: in January, his company launched OB Active, a collection of leggings, sports bras and other athleisure in a similar playful style to Sweaty Bettyâs.
How has he responded to news of the affair?
Unlike Hancockâs wife Martha, little has been seen of Coladangeloâs husband since news of her affair.
The Oliver Bonas founder has kept out of the limelight since the announcement last year, but hours after being tipped off that his wifeâs affair was about to be exposed at the time, a bearded Tress was spotted outside his home in Wandsworth in grey trousers, a white shirt and canvas shoes as he helped Coladangelo pack her belongings into the boot of her car, a £70,000 Audi Q7.
Mum-of-three Coladangelo is married to Oliver Tress, founder of Oliver Bonas.
She is a director and major shareholder of lobbying firm Luther Pendragon. pic.twitter.com/8fLeyYZdEA— Capital Moments (@CapitalMoments) June 25, 2021
Pictures showed them having a conversation before she left but Tress did not leave with her. She was not believed to have returned to the home in the week since and whether he and since met Hancock is unknown.
Reports suggest Tress knew little â if anything â about the affair. Asked in 2012 who he admired, he said his wife, âwho teaches me something new every dayâ and in 2016, he told The Telegraph his favourite way to unwind was to put the children to bed and have dinner with his wife.
âI imagine he is just falling apart over this,â a friend of his told the MailOnline following the revelation at the time. âHe had no idea that this was happening. He trusted them both.â
Neighbours near their home in Wandsworth have since confirmed this. âGina and Matt are giving it a proper go and Olly was left reeling,â one told the Daily Mail this week. âThey had lots of friends here so we are all trying to help look after Olly.â