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Her sister Sarah, then working for Savills, a leading estate agent, found what was to become, for a time the most famous address in Britain. A three-bedroom apartment in a mansion block at 60 Coleherne Court was Diana's coming-of-age present from her parents. In July 1979 she moved into the £50,000 ($85,000) apartment and immediately set to work furnishing the rooms in a warm but simple Habitat style. The white walls were repainted in pastel shades, the sitting-room became pale primrose yellow while the bathroom was bright with red cherries. Diana had always promised her schoolfriend Carolyn Bartholomew a room when she got her own apartment. She was as good as her word. Sophie Kinball and Philippa Coaker stayed for a while but in August Diana and Carolyn were joined by Anne Bolton, who also worked for Savills, and Virginia Pitman, the oldest member of the quartet. It was these three who stayed with her throughout her romance with Prince Charles.
Diana now looks back on those days at Coleherne Court as the happiest time of her life. It was juvenile, innocent, uncomplicated and above all fun. "I laughed my head off there," she says and the only black cloud was when the apartment was burgled and she had most of her jewelry stolen. As landlady, she charged the others £18 ($31) a week and organized the cleaning rotas. Naturally she had the largest room, complete with double bed. So that no-one would forget her status, the words "Chief Chick" emblazoned on her bedroom door. "She always had the rubber gloves on as she clucked about the place," recalls Carolyn. "But it was her house and when it is your own you are incredibly proud of it."
At least she never had to worry about washing piles of dirty dishes and cups. The girls rarely cooked in spite of the fact that Virginia and Diana had completed expensive cordon bleu courses. Diana's two specialties were chocolate roulades and Russian borscht soup which friends asked her to make and then deliver to their apartments. Usually the girls devoured the roulade before it left Coleherne Court. Otherwise they lived on Harvest Crunch bran cereal and chocolate. "We stayed remarkably plump," observes Carolyn.
The house-proud teenager was also tidying up her career. Shortly after moving into her apartment she found a job where she was truly in her element. For several afternoons a week she went to work at the Young England kindergarten run by Victoria Wilson and Kay Seth-Smith in St. Saviour's church hall in Pimlico. She taught the children painting, drawing and dancing and joined in the games they devised. Victoria and Kay were so impressed with her rapport with the children that they asked her to work in the morning as well. On Tuesdays and Thursdays she looked after Patrick Robinson, the son of an American oil executive, work which she "adored."
There were still loose ends in her working week so her sister Sarah took it upon herself to tie them up. She employed her as a cleaner at her house in Elm Park Lane, Chelsea. Sarah's flatmate Lucinda Craig Harvey recalls. "Diana hero-worshipped her but Sarah treated her like a doormat. She told me not to be embarrassed about asking Diana to do the washing up and so on." Diana who did the vacuuming, dusting, ironing and washing, was paid £1 ($1.70) an hour and took a quiet satisfaction in her labours. When she became engaged to Prince Charles, Diana referred to her cleaning job in her reply to Lucinda's letter of congratulation. "Gone are the days of Jif and dusters. Oh dear will I ever see them again?"
She escaped her sister's gimlet gaze when she returned turned to the privacy of her own apartment. Perhaps this was just as well since the jolly but rather juvenile japes her sister embarked upon might not have pleased her. Diana and Carolyn would regularly while away a quiet evening ringing people with silly names who appeared in the telephone directory. Another favourite pastime was planning raids on the various apartments and cars owned by their friends. Carolyn recalls: "We used to do midnight runs, we were always skimming around London on undercover operations in Diana's Metro."
Those who offended the girls in some way were paid back with interest. Doorbells were rung in the dead of night, early morning alarm calls were made, friends' cars had their locks covered in sticky tape. On one occasion James Gilbey, then working for a car rental company in Victoria, woke to find his prize Alfa Romeo car covered in eggs and flour which had set like concrete. For some reason he had let down Diana on a date so she and Carolyn had taken their revenge.
It wasn't all one way traffic. One evening James Colthurst and Adam Russell secretly tied two huge "L" plates to the front and rear of Diana's Honda Civic car. She managed to pull them off but as she drove down the street she was followed by a cacophony of tin cans tied to the bumper. Once again eggs and flour were used by Diana and Carolyn in high-spirited retaliation.
Copyright ©1992 by Andrew Morton
