It’s a question befitting a true eccentric.
“Do you take crocodile in your tea?” asks one of the world’s leading fashion designers, sporting a broad smile as he gleefully waggles a rubber reptile back and forth.
The croc is in its element in Paul Smith’s London office — a cornucopia of colorful collectables, a hoarder’s paradise stuffed with trinkets from across the globe.
Floor-to-ceiling shelves bend under the weight of countless books, huge artworks stand against the far wall while a jacket that once belonged to Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt is casually draped over the back of a desk chair.
But amid this chaos, it is the 68-year-old’s array of cycling paraphernalia that stands out.
Jerseys given to him by the great, good and infamous of cycling — from Britons Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome to Italy’s Marco Pantani — spill from an overflowing box. Bikes line the walls, including one ridden to World Championship glory by famed sprinter Mark Cavendish.
Now very much at the center of the fashion world, the Nottingham-born Smith once dreamed of a life in the saddle.
“I left school at 15 and my dad said to me, what did I want to do?'” Smith told CNN.
“And I said, ‘I want to be a professional racing cyclist.’ My sweet dad said, ‘that’s not a real job.'”
Smith’s first bike was gift for his 11th birthday. The man who sold it to his father invited Paul to ride with the local cycling club and, by the age of 12, he was racing.
His love of “bike riding,” as he calls it, grew as his clubmates told him tales of legendary names like Fausto Coppi and Jacques Anquetil until a life-altering cycling accident derailed Smith’s dreams.
“I broke lots of bones,” he recalls of his collision with a car aged 17. “You would get repaired a lot quicker now but then I was in hospital for around three months.”
After he had recovered, Smith arranged to meet friends he’d made in hospital at a pub which also served as a favored haunt of Nottingham’s art students. It was a meeting that broadened his horizons.
“This world of creativity opened up to me,” admits Smith, whose first artistic outlet was designing displays for the clothing warehouse where he worked.
It set Smith on a path to where he is today, founder of a brand which is sold in 66 countries, with shops in London, Milan, New York, San Francisco, Hong Kong and over 200 across Japan.
With an estimated fortune of £290 million ($450m,) Smith and his wife Pauline ranked 353rd in the 2015 Sunday Times Rich List of Britain’s wealthiest people.
Revered by fashionistas with a fortune far greater than any aspiring cyclist could ever realistically expect, Smith is able to mix business with pleasure.
“We’re still privately owned, never borrowed any money, we own the building we’re sitting in,” he says, 45 years after opening his first shop in Nottingham.
“But I’m still blessed with having the strong link with cycling which is lovely.”
His success as a designer brought Smith back to the sport — or, more accurately, his talents and reputation drew cyclists to him.
He counts Cavendish and Wiggins among his personal friends — and clients — the latter of whom donated an old bike to Smith which he keeps at his house in Tuscany, Italy.
A cardboard box full of photo frames is testament to his cycling connections and passion. One picture shows Smith and Wiggins stood with iconic British musician Paul Weller.
“He’s exactly the same size as me,” remarks Smith of Britain’s first ever Tour de France winner Wiggins.
Having made his name designing suits, it seems only natural that Smith has also dabbled in cycling apparel.
He was tasked with designing the jerseys for this year’s Tour of Dubai having also been responsible for the leaders’ pink tops at the prestigious Giro d’Italia in 2013.
For someone more accustomed with collars and cuffs, performance sportswear presents a new set of problems.
“I forget what the temperatures were but they were ridiculous,” said Smith, explaining the challenges he faced in designing the Tour of Dubai jersey.
“The back of the jersey has got a UV filter in it, the actual material has got 97% coverage for UV so you don’t get sunburned.
“Then on the front there’s a different fabric which is very much about breathing and air and lightness. So there’s a lot of technology that’s obviously gone into how bikes are built, but also the clothes as well.”
It’s a testament to Smith’s cycling passion that his creative flair isn’t just restricted to bike clobber.
In a room adjacent to his office, opposite a cabinet stocked with watches and pocket knives, Smith displays a bike he designed for renowned Italian cycling company Pinarello.
Al this is a far cry from when Smith first wrapped his fingers around the handlebars of his bike, days when woolen jerseys and button-up collars were a cyclist’s outfit of choice.
These days such utilitarian wear would be unthinkable — today’s riders are lycra-clad, precision-designed speed merchants.
“It’s a stupid word to use, but it’s a lot more sexy than it was,” said Smith, although he’s admits to being less than enamored with the sight of riders in skin-tight shorts.
But it’s not just cycling’s superstars and cutting edge designs that fuel Smith’s love for the sport.
Like French novelist Albert Camus’ oft quoted remark — “Everything I know about morality and the obligations of men, I owe it to football” — cycling has provided Smith a rubric of how to live your life.
He speaks fondly of a man called Mauro, who fixes bikes in his Tuscany workshop before heading for a hard-earned glass of a wine at the end of a long day.
The photo on Smith’s Instagram account shows the grey-haired mechanic attentively applying glue to the rim of a wheel.
“I love effort,” says Smith, looking fondly at the picture. “One of the little sentences we use a lot here is ‘effort is free of charge.’
“Unfortunately we’re in a world that is so dominated by greed and ego and finance. So I just like the fact that this guy is a very humble guy. He’s got this amazing passion and skill.
“Effort is free of charge is a good mantra for anybody,” the designer interjects when asked if it’s a fitting motto for a cyclist, adding: “for personal relationships, for careers.
“And the other sentence that goes really well with it is ‘every day is a new beginning.’ If you link those two together, you’ll probably have a really nice life.”
Another Instagram post highlights how different it all could have been for Smith.
“That’s my cycle license, it got a lot of likes didn’t it!” he said, smiling as he looks at the black and white photograph of a slim, dark-haired youth.
“It still has very happy memories, the signature has changed enormously! Lots of happy memories and definitely it was of the contributing factors in me doing OK in my career. The lessons I learned about helping other mates.”
So if that fresh-faced amateur cyclist was offered the yellow jersey of a Tour de France winner or the fame and fortune Smith has since amassed, which would he choose?
“That’s a difficult one because I think Bernard Hinault, y’know the famous cyclist who won the Tour de France five times? He just sent me a yellow jersey signed by him,” Smith responds.
“So I’ve sort of got the best of both worlds.”
