In this fifth chapter of his professional memoirs, to be published in six parts, Oliver Ash recalls how one of the greats of Paris real estate helped shape his career in the boom of the late 80s. To read or re-read the first four chapters of French Reconnection, please follow the link at the bottom of this piece.
Miles above all: starting development
I joined Ciprim on 4 May 1987. Miles d’Arcy Irvine (MDI) made me a written offer after one interview. It was hugely exciting. My starting salary jumped to a then astronomical 30,000 francs a month, with a commission top-up on any acquisitions we made. In addition, Miles offered me a car and I chose a brand new, shiny, white VW Golf Cup. I had definitely hit the big time.
I arranged to spend the first week in the office with John Sanders, who was going to show me the ropes and then return to Spain, where he was setting up an office for Miles and his partners. This meant that effectively I was going to be trying to find new Paris office-type renovation deals on my own. This was quite a daunting prospect. I sat down in my new office in the Avenue de Messine, near Place St Augustin, on day one, before John arrived, feeling utterly inadequate. I had moved up from agency to development, a field of work which sounded to me significantly more glamorous than letting office suites, but about which I knew next to nothing. Yes, I had studied development appraisals when at Central London Poly, but that was just theory. The numbers on the blackboard were just numbers. What they might actually mean in real life was just a blur to me that day as I sat in my office, stared at the door and thought, “What on earth am I supposed to do?”
Thankfully, the first week provided a few answers to that question. John ran through the financial appraisals we used and explained what each line meant. He informed me of the routine for each deal we wanted to go for. A friendly agent or intermediary would offer us an old, tired, Haussmanian building in the Paris CBD. If the brochure or verbal presentation hit our sweet spot, we would go into overdrive. First thing would be an urgent inspection. If the initial impression as to location, layout and price was good, and if the agent gave us positive vibes as to the likely complexity of the sale process, we would then call the architect. The studio we used was JJ Ory. Miles had helped Jean-Jacques Ory get his agency going a couple of years earlier in a deal on the Place d’Iena. Now Jean-Jacques had a small team and knew exactly how we, or rather how Miles, liked to work. His right-hand man was Jean Ribereau, known as ‘Mousse’, a nickname from birth meaning something like ‘Junior’. Mousse was a quietly spoken, warm-hearted, highly professional architect, who went on to become Jean-Jacques’ Chef d’Agence when the business had grown to some 60 members of staff.
I absolutely loved our brainstorming meetings, when we would take a set of plans of an existing building, consider all the planning and construction challenges, and work out together how best to restructure it
His key skill when working with us in the early days was in knowing exactly what we wanted from him and realising we wanted it on our desk before he had even got back to his studio to draw it. As a result, we wasted no time in getting the drawings perfect, together with revised floor areas. I absolutely loved our brainstorming meetings, when we would take a set of plans of an existing building, consider all the planning and construction challenges, and work out together how best to restructure it. Could we dig out parkings below the building, without needing one of those impossible car lifts? Could the floor plates be reorganised to optimise natural light in offices? What sort of entrance hall could we accommodate and would it be the right ‘standing’? How could we increase the useable floor area within the planning rules? Getting the plans ready meant we could then go to our quantity surveyor, the phlegmatic John Shears of Cyril Sweet, and ask him to produce costings in the next 10 minutes. Ciprim, thanks essentially to Miles, was very highly thought of at that time, which meant that our team of service providers bent over backwards to produce what we wanted, when we wanted it and knew they would be well rewarded for their commitment. This way of working has stuck with me ever since.
As well as getting down to work with John in that first week, I also met Miles’ two partners, Robin Crowther and Mark Tomkins. Nobody had explained to me who they were, what they did and how the partnership worked. As I had not met them prior to being appointed, I guessed they were not central to the plot. This turned out to be true. In fact, they were in the process of separating from Miles. Meeting them at the time was therefore a rather cat and mouse affair. They asked lots of odd questions about what Miles was planning to do with the company, which I might have assumed they would know rather more about than I did. In the end they disappeared from the scene quite quickly. Robin, who was blessed with immense charm and good looks to go with a sharp real estate mind, set up on his own and did very well until he met a tragic end in the crash of 1992/3. Mark disappeared to Spain. In any event, only a few weeks after I joined the company Miles had got to where he liked to be: in complete control.
