I’m still incredibly ambitious, but I’m also more relaxed, says Victoria Beckham

On a recent balmy Sunday, Victoria Beckham sank onto a bench at the Fasano Fifth Avenue, a swanky hotel on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, her pout a little more swollen than it used to be, her slender figure encased in a black silk suit of her own design.

Tucked away in a corner, but still visible, was a pair of black crutches so sleek and shiny they could have been mistaken for a fashion accessory. In fact, they were a testament to Beckham’s dogged determination.

A fall at the gym this winter left her limping, but it didn’t stop her from bowing on crutches at her brand’s Paris Fashion Week show in March. It didn’t stop her from celebrating a milestone birthday, her 50th, at a lavish party in London. Nor did it stop her from flying to New York, where she’s come to oversee and star in an advertising campaign promoting the fragrance line she launched last fall.

The perfumes were an expansion of the Victoria Beckham Beauty brand she started in 2019, which in turn was an expansion of the Victoria Beckham fashion line she started in 2008 — when many still remembered her as Posh, the sophisticated Spice Girl who happened to be married to British soccer star David Beckham.

After her transition from pop star to designer, some self-proclaimed critics were quick to dismiss Victoria Beckham, who grew up in Hertfordshire, England, as an uneducated country Barbie. Her career has generated much speculation among fashion insiders: Is she for real? Is she selling a stake in her company to luxury giant LVMH? Will the deal be profitable?

But Beckham is, above all, tenacious. And 16 years after starting her brand with her husband and American Idol creator Simon Fuller, she is more inclined than ever to dig in her heels.

“If I’m still being judged, I don’t really care,” Beckham said in an accent that seems to have become more refined over the years. “It’s been a real rollercoaster for this brand. But I’m feeling grounded and proud of what I’ve achieved.”

At that, she flashed a rare smile. “For so many years in photos I didn’t smile,” she said. “That was definitely a sign of insecurity.”

Beckham has reason to be optimistic these days: At a time when some luxury fashion businesses are faltering, the Victoria Beckham brand appears to be finding its footing. The business, which had lost money nearly every year since its launch, recently emerged from the red after expanding into beauty and handbags.

Marie Leblanc, who heads the brand’s fashion arm, said 2022 was a turning point for the company. That year, it reported revenue of about $75 million, up about 44% from 2021, when its revenue was about $52 million. Over the same period, the company’s reported operating losses narrowed to about $1.1 million, down from about $5 million.

“For the first time, both fashion and beauty were profitable,” said Leblanc, who joined Beckham’s brand in 2019 after working at others including Isabel Marant and Celine.

David Belhassen, founder of NEO Investment Partners, a private equity firm that invested about $40 million in Beckham’s brand in 2017, told WWD in May that the company’s operating cash flow, or EBITDA, grew in 2023.

Beckham has been chasing success since her early years. “At school, I was never the brightest kid,” she said. “I had to work really hard.” And as hard as it is to conceive, the designer, whose recent birthday party attracted celebrities including Salma Hayek and Tom Cruise, once considered herself a misfit. “I had terrible skin and was quite clumsy.”

She credited pop stardom with giving her more confidence — and business acumen. “What better way to understand PR and marketing than being a Spice Girl in the ’90s,” she said.

Ed Burstell, a retail brand consultant in New York, described Beckham as “a shrewd businesswoman,” someone who recognized that expanding into beauty could broaden her audience.

Burstell met her in the early 2000s, when she was an aspiring designer and he was a senior vice president at Bergdorf Goodman. By the time Beckham started his fashion line, he had become the managing director of Liberty, the luxury department store in London. Burstell considered taking the collection there, but concluded that it wouldn’t resonate with customers.

“The style, the cut of the clothes, were good,” he recalled. “But the clothes were understated at a time when fashion was less understated. She didn’t get the credit she deserved for being at the forefront of understated luxury.”

When she first introduced her line, Beckham insisted on getting to grips with the details of her craft: pricing, turnover and how costs were managed. She learned the design process in part by draping dresses on herself. “I’m not claiming to be a master draper,” she told The New York Times in 2010. “The question is, would I wear it?”

Indeed, she operated largely on instinct. And, said David Beckham, her husband of 25 years, she was never afraid to roll up her sleeves. “I have always been impressed by her determination and work ethic,” he wrote in an email. “The business has faced many obstacles over the years, but she has maintained her vision.”

Even now, Victoria Beckham admits she is “a control freak.”

She had to curb her urge to call the shots during the production of “Beckham,” the four-part documentary series about her husband and their family that Netflix released last year. “I found out that you can’t control every shot, every scene,” she said, “and it took me out of my comfort zone.”

Her candidness in her scenes almost stole the show. But the experience was challenging. More challenging were the moments when she was asked to address her husband’s alleged affair with his personal assistant, Rebecca Loos, in 2003. Although David Beckham has consistently denied that it ever happened, there was friction in the marriage. “I was the most unhappy I’ve ever been in my life,” Victoria Beckham said in the documentary.

She seems to have made amends since then — and made some discoveries, too. During filming, “I wasn’t asking questions, I wasn’t checking the monitor, I wasn’t checking the lighting,” she said. “There’s something quite liberating about that.”

Getting comfortable with letting things go hasn’t diminished her determination. “I’m still incredibly ambitious,” she said. “But I’m also more relaxed. And isn’t that the great thing about getting older?”