John Singleton has no designs on romance with decorator Michelle Leslie
Multi-millionaire John Singleton has spoken out about his “love” for his interior designer Michelle Leslie, revealing his relationship with the former model is platonic, Annette Sharp writes.
NSW
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John Singleton freely admits he “loves” his interior designer Michelle Leslie but maintains that despite rumours to the contrary his 12-year relationship with the former model and rock chick is purely professional.
The fact the willowy brunette has been giving his Mount White address as her own for the past year and is currently in residence at his soon-to-be-completed Hawaiian home is due entirely to their shared interior design vision, he said, pointing out the one-time 2000 Miss World Australia pageant runner-up has also transformed his pubs and properties.
Addressing fresh rumours of romance on Saturday, Singleton was quick to inform me his on-again/off-again American girlfriend Venessa Merrin has recently arrived in this country to spend quality time with the multi-millionaire, so the timing for this story is a bit ordinary.
“Michelle’s been working with me for 12 years. I love Michelle. I love our relationship. It’s fun. We have some of the best times ever but serious it is not,” Singleton said, pointing out Leslie is decades his junior. She is 39, he is 79.
Importantly, he denied having named his new Hawaiian retreat – which he plans to make his permanent winter base from next year — after the model.
“It’s called ‘Shells’,” he said, denying the spelling was “Chelle’s” (short for Michelle) as this writer had learned because (in news that’s likely to come as a surprise to his best mate Newtown Jets legend Tom Raudonikis) “I have always loved seashells …”.
Just weeks after Singleton and Leslie were sighted “looking cosy” as they dined together at Peats Bite restaurant on the Hawkesbury River, Leslie is now in Hawaii after flying there recently for a three- month stay.
“She’s putting the final touches on my new house,” Singleton said.
Last year Singleton bought an old house on the beachfront near Waikiki on Oahu. He soon set Leslie loose to employ builders who are now renovating the house to her — and Singleton’s — taste. It’s the same taste that helped Singleton’s Mount White restaurant Saddles to a Conde Naste Traveller ‘Most Beautiful Restaurants in The World’ award last year.
A search through Leslie’s online resume reveals Singleton works almost exclusively for Singleton and is certainly his best client.
She lists his Pretty Beach House (Jan 2014 to March 2015), his Royal Randwick Racecourse suite (August 2013), his Bellevue Hotel (2011) and his Underwood Street Cafe and Offices (2011) as major interior design projects for her company Michelle Leslie Design on LinkedIn.
The jobs represent the bulk of her resume and while it isn’t listed, she also renovated Singleton’s compound at Mount White where he has guest quarters in which she has been living since her break-up with silverchair frontman Daniel Johns last year.
In fact her 12-year relationship with Singleton sets a record of sorts for Leslie who, Singleton has previously confided, looks outstanding in a pair of jeans standing on a ladder.
You and I dear reader will have to take his word for it.
Leslie was previously in a four-year relationship with heir to the Sutton’s Holden empire Scott Sutton. That ended in 2007 after Leslie’s infamous face from grace in Bali.
She then embarked on a seven-year relationship with entertainment producer and promoter Adam Zammit, who helped rehabilitate her career and reputation and encouraged her to take up interior design in 2008.
The pair married in 2012 but had separated before their second anniversary in 2014.
Zammit is understood to have introduced her to Singleton, a friend.
Most recently she had a famous two-year fling with Daniel Johns that ended for last year.
Singleton, who has been married six times, assured us he has no wish to marry again.
“I’d have to be nuts, wouldn’t I?” he said, before adding he simply felt his houses “need Michelle” though he perhaps does not.
Originally published as John Singleton has no designs on romance with decorator Michelle Leslie