Crime pattern is a blow for thief and top designer

A VERY stylish thief is on the loose in Chelsea.

Aristocratic interior decorator Jane Churchill was shocked to find her car windows smashed and pretty fabric samples stolen after she left them in a canvas bag on the back seat of her vehicle.

But she takes comfort from the fact that the robber may not have bagged his dream haul.

‘I would have loved to see his face when he went through it,’ she tells me. ‘There is nothing very valuable in it, but he will have a very pretty house.’

Jane, 73, who was married to Lord Charles Spencer-Churchill, the late son of the 10th Duke of Marlborough, says the theft has, nevertheless, robbed her of valuable time on a personal family project.

‘The samples were very upmarket but weren’t worth a huge amount. I had just done the whole scheme for my son’s new house and they bloody took the lot.’

Jane, who is the sister of former Sotheby’s boss Henry Wyndham, is known for the quintessentially English style of her eponymous interior designer business.

She warns: ‘Never leave anything in your car.

‘It’s the time element really — time is money.’