TOMMY YEARDYE was an irrepressible businessman and a friend of the stars with a relentless desire to reach the top. He achieved his greatest success in partnership with Vidal Sassoon, and in later life channelled his ambitions through his daughter, Tamara, the chairman of the Jimmy Choo shoe empire.

Yeardye was born in Ireland and grew up with his single mother in Mill Hill, North London. As a youngster he was quick to fall into gangs and schemes, and for several years he was in the “smudge” business — taking photographs of tourists at London landmarks and then persuading them to buy the snaps.

He was desperate to become an actor and frequented Soho nightspots in the hope of being noticed. And he was hard to miss: with his 6ft 4in frame, chiselled features and sartorial flair, Yeardye looked the part of a gangster’s muscle, and soon he began to mix with the underworld clientele of hangouts such as Winston’s, a hostess bar near Bond Street. It was rumoured that one of his Mill Hill friends had a run-in with the Krays and had his fingers broken with a hammer.

But Yeardye was able to distance himself from the seedier side of London as work picked up. He played a stunt and body double for Victor Mature and Rock Hudson. While playing a bedroom scene for Mature he was required to embrace Diana Dors. Unhappy with her thuggish husband and manager Dennis Hamilton, Dors then began a relationship with Yeardye in which he was variously described as her “confidant”, “bodyguard” and “companion”. Never fazed by violence and keen to play the white knight, Yeardye kept Hamilton at arm’s length. Yeardye moved in to Dors’s mansion by the Thames in Maidenhead, but Hamilton did not go away. He often threatened the couple, and in one exchange Yeardye knocked him unconscious.

The love triangle showed no sign of breaking, and it all became too embarrassing for J. Arthur Rank, who had started the Rank Organisation to promote “British” values. Dors’s contract with the organisation was cancelled in 1957 at the height of tabloid stories.

When Dors dropped him for the comedian Dickie Dawson, he simply said “I have never fooled myself that I’m the only man in her life.” He later added that looking after the emotional star had been “a 26-hour-a-day job with no holidays”. Dogged by Dors’s allegations over money, he eventually invited the police to be present when he opened his safe deposit box.

Backed by the businessman Balfour DeHavilland, he opened the Paintbox restaurant near Portland Place, a novel enterprise where diners could paint nude women while eating. Yeardye also bought up Soho’s Condor Club for £10,000, but he soon had to sell up because of gangland threats and demands for protection. The Paintbox, too — though fondly remembered by diners such as Michael Winner — did not last.

Yeardye built his fortune in property, and he eventually owned 31 houses in Holland Park and Notting Hill. His most astute investment, though, was in Vidal Sassoon’s hairdressing revolution. By 1963 Sassoon had perfected his “five-point cut” and given Mary Quant her trademark bob. His third-floor walk-up in Bond Street had become crowded with stars. Yeardye had already enjoyed some success with an investment in electic curlers, which he had sold to Clairol. He advanced the Sassoon brand and eventually moved, like Sassoon, to America. He bought a house next to Nancy Sinatra’s and lived there with his wife, Ann Davies, a former Chanel model. He counted among his friends Michael Caine, Tony Bennet and Michael Parkinson.

After the hair products empire was sold in the early 1980s, Yeardye invested in sportswear and Microcool, an outdoor air-conditioning system. The wedding of his daughter, Tamara, to the American business scion Matthew Mellon was one of the biggest society events of 2000, with guests including Hugh Grant and Liz Hurley.

Tamara approached her father in 1996 with a business plan for a young, Hackney-based Malaysian shoe designer named Jimmy Choo. Yeardye was impressed, and put up £150,000. Tamara ran the business, with Yeardye as its chairman. It now has a turnover of £30 million and 30 shops worldwide. One of Yeardye’s proudest moments came just before his death, when Tamara met the Queen at a ladies’ achievement lunch at Buckingham Palace. He is survived by his daughter, Tamara, and by two sons.

Tommy Yeardye, businessman, was born on July 18 1930. He died on April 21, 2004, aged 73.