Not for Ali Hewson the
traditional rock chick's pursuits of shopping and partying.
Bono's wife is far too busy raising a family and worrying
about saving the world. Could she also be an Irish
president-in-waiting, asks Justine Picardie
There was a time when one might have expected a meeting with a
rock star's wife to be attended by a certain amount of mayhem -
temper tantrums and trashed hotel rooms, perhaps, or at the very
least a retinue including a drug dealer, masseuse, hair stylist and
personal astrologer.  | | Ali Hewson: 'When he climbs up on the kitchen
table at 11pm to play a gig, I have to tell him, I'm not
60,000 people!' |
But the softly spoken 47-year-old woman sitting opposite me in a
suite in Claridge's is anything but the cartoon version of a
hell-raising, hard-drinking rock chick; she is wearing a black
calf-length Comme des Garçons skirt with a Victorian bell-sleeved
blouse; raven hair neatly brushed, porcelain skin unadorned by make-up. She is, in fact, very much her own woman - Ali Hewson rather than
Mrs Bono - and as such it is not wifely duties that have brought her
to London today, but a meeting with her business associates in Nude,
a thoroughly modern, impeccably ethical skincare brand. And, as
befits her role as a long-term environmental campaigner, she has
travelled here from her home in Dublin not by private jet but by
scheduled airline, and she won't be partying in the suite
tonight, but returning in time to see her four children before they
go to bed this evening. When I arrive she is concluding a conversation with two of the
aforementioned business associates - Bryan Meehan, the Irish
entrepreneur who set up Fresh & Wild (and is therefore a major
player in the green business world), and Julietta Dexter, the
founder of the Communications Store, one of this country's most
effective and influential PR companies. They make a formidable trio
(backed up by Christy Turlington, who also has a say in the company,
having tested each and every one of the Nude products) and, as a
result, the range has none of the hippy-dippiness that has sometimes
been an ingredient in organic skincare. But, as Hewson makes clear, Nude lives up to its green promises,
with recycled (and recyclable) pots and biodegradable packaging,
right down to the non-toxic, water-soluble inks. 'We have to
maintain the integrity of the brand,' she says. 'That is
the first requirement.' Meehan nods his head. 'It was Ali
who insisted on the packaging,' he says. 'We could have
done it cheaper, but it had to be distinctive.' Spend a little time in her company, and you begin to realise that
Ali Hewson has a quietly distinctive way of getting things done, not
only with Nude, which was launched last year, but also its sister
company, Edun, an ethical clothing company established in 2005 that
has been at the forefront of bringing Fairtrade into fashion. Thus,
for all the gentleness of her demeanour, Hewson is also a force to
be reckoned with, possessing the strength of character that has
doubtless played a part in the success of her marriage to one of the
most famous men on the planet. They are generally regarded as having an unusually stable
relationship - surviving an industry notorious for wreaking havoc on
marital life - that has remained rock-solid for over three decades,
since they met at Mount Temple school in Dublin, when Ali was 15,
and Bono (who had already shed his real name, Paul Hewson) just a
year older. 'He was my first real boyfriend,' she says,
and when I ask her if she ever wanted to go out with anyone else she
laughs and shakes her head. 'He's enough man for any woman.' Clearly, U2 was part of their lives from the very start. 'It
was 1976 that we got together - the same year that the band formed.
I saw their first gig, in our school gym.' By 1982, when the
couple married, Bono was already a fledgling rock star, with a
touring schedule that kept him away for months at a time; a pattern
that continued after the birth of their four children, as he
conquered the globe, while she stayed at home. 'There is something to be said for those periods apart,'
she says. 'It's a great way not to take someone for
granted. Mind you, according to him, when he gets home after being
on tour I just keep trying to tidy him up. When he climbs up on the
kitchen table at 11 o'clock at night to play a gig, I have to
tell him, "I'm not 60,000 people!" But it's
never boring, that's for sure.' As a way of life, it might seem to be a world apart from her own
upbringing - her father worked nine to five in the electrical trade,
her mother was a housewife, 'we were a good Protestant family,
just the two children, me and my older brother' - but there are
similarities. She remains very close to her own parents, who live
nearby and have helped look after her children ('There's
no one better than your parents - you can trust them to love your
children just as you do'), and says she can't imagine a
different kind of marriage to the one she has: 'I've never
lived in any other way.' |
