The mother-daughter duo who define Cotswolds style

Telegraph

19-06-2025

If you are one of those people who is obsessed with the Cotswolds – its wisteria, its stone, its famous inhabitants – then a visit to Tetbury will only fan the flames. Were you to play Cotswolds Bingo, you'd rapidly score a full house; a sandstone one, with neat window-boxes and a sage-green door. On the pretty high-street, there's a butcher, a baker and a cult jacket-maker, the latter of whom, Caroline Smiley, is being photographed with her daughter, Sarah Corbett-Winder, when I pull up from Kemble station in my Uber (yes, they have Ubers in the Cotswolds).
Caroline owns Moloh, a Tetbury boutique that's also a Cotswolds institution, while Sarah is an influencer who followed in her mother's footsteps by launching her own tailoring label, Kipper, in 2023. The rain is pouring down, but Caroline and Sarah are redoubtably cheerful, as is the Cotswolds way.
Like most successful brands, Moloh (named to rhyme with the name of their family dog, Rolo) was born from a desire to create something its owner couldn't buy. Being the Cotswolds, this wasn't the perfect summer dress, but the perfect pair of overalls. 'You'd take the dog for a walk, pouring with rain, but you're going to do something later,' explains Caroline once we've settled in her office, which is above the shop. 'You put your Molohs over what you're wearing, come home, take them off, and out you go again. I'd wear them for decorating, gardening, mucking out horses, cleaning the shed. Dirty jobs. They were fun. That's what the ethos of Moloh is. It's adding fun to your life.'
'Fun' is a word that comes up frequently. After friends started wanting to buy the overalls, Caroline and her business partner, Butts Dancer (a fun name if ever there was one) thought it would be wise to branch out into making skirts, jackets and jumpers. Moloh was officially launched in 2003, with the Tetbury store opening some five years later. 'The clothing was introduced organically over the years,' says Caroline. 'We listened to our customers and what they really liked.'
Their hero piece is the best-selling military jacket, which comes in a plethora of tweeds, checks and suedes (there's a Prussian Blue one in store now for £675). 'Any age can wear it. It buttons three ways,' says Caroline. 'My father was in the army and my husband was a second lieutenant in the Grenadier Guards. I think the military bit came from that. The jacket is actually based on a traditional hunting jacket, then we put the military twist in, and made it double-breasted.'
'You saw that everyone was wearing their Barbour, and thought you could make this more fun,' adds Sarah. 'And chic. You saw that gap.'
Most of Moloh's customers are Cotswolds locals, but many are from London and Wales. 'We're very much a destination store. People will come to spend a couple of hours here. Age-wise, it could be a very lucky 19-year-old girl whose grandmother has bought her a jacket. We get lots of 18ths, girls who've been borrowing their mother's jacket and eventually the mother wants hers back. Then we've got lovely Anne, our eldest customer. She's 85, and buys a new military jacket every season.'
They're fiercely proud of Moloh's low carbon footprint. Everything is manufactured in factories in north London ('You can go to Portugal or Spain, but you genuinely don't get the quality'), while 90 per cent of their cloth is sourced from mills in Scotland and Yorkshire ('if you traced the journey of some fabrics, it really is 100 miles'). Everything is made in short runs of 30 to 40, and once an item's gone, it won't be repeated. 'We can't afford to do it any other way,' says Caroline. 'It's probably not cost-effective, but we'd rather have more styles than see people going around in the same thing.'
What do they think constitutes modern country style? 'I think it's become quite eccentric and fun,' says Sarah. 'People are more adventurous. They want to look unique and different, cool and chic, but also practical.'
'They don't want to look frumpy country,' adds Caroline. 'They'll wear trousers, jeans, a polo neck, a great jacket and a wonderful scarf. It's not so much the article of clothing as the way you wear it. We're much colder down here than London, so we're more into layers. When I go up to London, I'm always taking layers off, particularly in the winter, when you go into people's overheated offices and shops. In London, you're always on a mission.'
'The country gives you more freedom to be fun than London does,' says Sarah. 'The Cotswolds is quite accepting. They like you to be quirky.'
Grooming is low-key and natural. 'It's not overly made-up,' says Caroline. 'You know, the false eyelashes, the thick make-up, the fake nails. That doesn't really fit here. Keep it simple.'
'People want to age, and embrace that,' adds Sarah. 'We can't pretend we're 18 if we're not.'
'It's so easy to be older today, compared to our parents or our grandparents, who wore headscarves with a knot under the chin,' says Caroline. 'What's that quote? Ageing – just crack on with it.'
How would they spot a townie? By looking at their feet. 'Our boots are muddy because we walk the dogs round the fields,' says Butts. 'They're not box fresh.'
'It's confidence, too,' says Sarah. 'With a townie, you can feel they're not comfortable. They're slightly overdone. Whereas a proper country look is to throw on the coat and scarf, and just get on with it. Even in white jeans. If they get dirty, you put them in the washing machine.'
Ellen DeGeneres famously moved to the Cotswolds last year: is it vexatious when random celebrities rock up and invade their turf? 'I think they've really tried to blend in, and are becoming more accepted as time goes on,' says Butts, with some diplomacy.
'We try to share,' smiles Caroline. 'We'll share the grass. They bring in their ways that are different to our ways. But sometimes, it has a benefit. Variety is good. So long as they support the community, and respect they're coming into one.'
They were very happy to share the grass with the cast of Rivals last year. 'Some of it was filmed right outside the shop, which was fun,' smiles Caroline. 'We had Aiden Turner sitting out there for quite a few mornings. He was charming.'
As well as a second season of Rivals, a rumoured 'Real Housewives'-style reality TV show seems destined to shine yet another spotlight on England's fabled 'golden triangle', whether its inhabitants like it or not. Can they spill the tea? 'Caroline's in it!' shouts Butts. 'I'm joking.'
We bat around potential names, including the author Plum Sykes and designers Savannah Miller and Jade Holland Cooper. 'I've heard she's doing it,' says Sarah. 'I wouldn't be surprised.'
'We know Jade very well,' confirms Caroline. 'She could do it. I thought Victoria Beckham could be in it, because they live in the Cotswolds. Jilly Cooper could be in it. And Lisa Hogan. But I've got no inside information. They'd probably love to have Carole Bamford. She has the most incredible taste. She's the top end of the Cotswolds. But she wouldn't do it, I don't think.'
Lady B, as she's known in these parts, is something of an icon to the Cotswolds set, on account of her sprawling Daylesford empire of farm shops, to which she's recently added four pubs, a string of holiday cottages, a hotel and a spa. 'It just grows and grows every time you go there,' says Caroline. 'So inspiring. Oh, the other thing, of course, that we've got in the Cotswolds is the King. He lives down the road.'
'Do you think that's one of the reasons people are so fascinated by the Cotswolds? Because of the royal connection?' muses Sarah.
'Kate comes into the shop,' says Caroline, one of the few British subjects with genuine cause to be on first-name terms with the Princess of Wales. 'Which shows how relaxed and calm our community is. William and Harry used to come into the bicycle shop in Tetbury when they were little. Sadly, it's not there any more.'
Have they met them? For the first time in our interview, they look guarded. 'Yes, in the past,' says Caroline.
'I used to go out with Harry's best friend,' says Sarah, declining to name him. 'This was in my late teens. We used to go to the local pubs together, and he [Harry] was so wonderful to all the locals. There was no 'oh, look at me'.'
'People actually ignored them,' says Caroline.
They're fiercely proud of the area, its bucolic pace and camaraderie. 'We've just done Chelsea Flower Show,' says Butts. 'Every morning I'd walk to work. No one talks to you. I'd look at them and say, 'Good morning!' It's like I was the village idiot. Everyone says 'good morning' here. Even if they're putting a ticket on your car.'
'We're very fortunate here,' smiles Caroline. We love to travel. But god, we love to come home.'
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