Annette Sharp: Charges the latest chapter for Wayne Cooper and Sarah Marsh

If the relationship between fashion bad boy Wayne Cooper and his wife of 26 years Sarah Marsh does end, there’s every chance no one will believe it, writes Annette Sharp.

Wayne Cooper and Sarah Marsh in 2010.

If the relationship between fashion bad boy Wayne Cooper and his wife of 26 years Sarah Marsh does end, there’s every chance no one will believe it.

Together Cooper and Marsh have spawned more break-up and reconciliation stories than any high-profile Sydney couple this writer can recall.

Along the way they’ve also made good money selling their private angst to media, fuelling public intrigue in the enduring partnership between Australian fashion’s first headline-grabbing enfant terrible and his statuesque former muse.

In the latest torrid chapter, Cooper, 58, was arrested on Friday on domestic abuse allegations involving Marsh, 54.

He’s been charged with two counts of common assault.

Wayne Cooper with model and muse Sarah Marsh.

It’s the second time the designer has been arrested by police on assault allegations involving his defacto wife.

On the first occasion, in June 2008, the couple, then 44 and 40, had argued over money at their Tamarama home.

Cooper leaving his home under police supervision in 2008.

That row came three years after Cooper’s fashion label Brave was placed into voluntary administration owing $3 million.

Cooper, through his lawyer and before a captivated media pack, told the court the couple had consulted a counsellor to save their marriage before matters imploded.

The fashion designer was placed on a two-year good behaviour bond after pleading guilty to one charge of common assault in court in October 2008.

Within seven months – though not before Cooper had quit the family home on court orders and before the couple went to battle in the NSW Supreme Court over maintenance and property – the pair reconciled.

During their estrangement, both started new relationships and sold interviews to media to help pay the bills; Cooper to Woman’s Day and Channel 7 current affairs program Today Tonight, and Marsh to Channel 9’s A Current Affair.

Cooper told Today Tonight: “I regret with all my heart what happened there, people don’t need to know the details of what happened but whatever happened is wrong. I take full responsibility for what I did,” he said.

Cooper adjusts the hemline on one of his creations worn by model and muse Marsh in 1996.

Upon reconciling around the time of Australia Fashion Week 2009, Marsh told media: “We’re very happy. We were a little worried about how people might perceive the situation but we’re doing what is best for us.”

“The children (Ruby and Jude, then 10 and six) really want us to be together and we don’t want to disappoint them by not being back together in a good and healthy way,’’ she added.

The glamour couple had been rowing and reconciling for years before their 2008 break-up.

It was in 2004 that Cooper first shut down industry chatter that the pair were on the rocks: “I’m living in my own house and sleeping in my own bed. If we have a tiff one week and I sleep on the couch, big deal,” he told The Sunday Telegraph.

By the summer of 2006-07 there were yet more reports the couple’s relationship was dissolving.

This followed a report claiming the two had a disagreement on the public boardwalk in Bondi.

According to that article, Marsh wanted out.

Cooper denied any split.

“No, we haven’t broken up … I’m sick of people talking about our private lives,’’ he said.

The following year they did.

While the sale in February of the family home in Tamarama for $11.05 million — and the subsequent purchase of a luxury property near Byron Bay for $5.09 million — should ease any financial burden the couple may have been experiencing due to the latest contraction of the fashion industry, it also leaves the couple well-positioned to buy a second property, in the event one is required.

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