Tina Knowles-Lawson and Richard Lawson wed on April 12, 2015. Photo: TNS
Tina Knowles-Lawson has filed for divorce from All My Children actor Richard Lawson after eight years of marriage.
The fashion designer — and mother of superstar musicians Beyonce and Solange Knowles — cited irreconcilable differences as the reason for the split, according to her petition filed Wednesday in Los Angeles Superior Court and obtained by the L.A. Times.
The Wearable Art Gala co-founders wed on April 12, 2015, and she listed their date of separation as Tuesday.
Knowles-Lawson, 69, who filed for divorce under her legal name Celestine Lawson, is asking the court to restore her previous last name — Knowles — which she took from her first marriage to Mathew Knowles, Beyonce and Solange's father. (She and the singers' former manager divorced in 2011 after 31 years of marriage.)
She and Lawson, 76, do not have any children together and she asked to terminate the court's ability to award spousal support for the both of them. They are still sorting out their property, including assets and debts, the filing said.
Earlier this month, burglars made off with a safe containing more than US$1mil in cash and jewels from her Hollywood Hills home while she was out of town. Investigators told the L.A. Times that they are examining security camera footage from the home and neighbouring properties. In April, a man was arrested after damaging Knowles-Lawson's mailbox.
The couple last appeared together on her Instagram feed in March, when she posted a shot of them at the Vanity Fair Oscar party with a rundown of their fashion specs: "Never been one to waste some good light!!! so we had to sneak a picture at the Vanity Fair Oscar Party last night with my boo. @mrrichardlawson," she wrote.
In 2021, the Poltergeist and For Colored Girls actor revealed that he was first introduced to his future wife by his sister when Knowles was married and pregnant with Beyonce.
"I thought you were one of the most beautiful women I had ever met. Breathtaking.!!" he wrote in an anniversary Instagram post accompanying a waterside wedding portrait. "The thing that was so striking was that your beauty continued to be enhanced by your incredible heart, compassion, empathy, generosity, and philanthropy. You were pregnant with Beyonce at the time, and married, so my incredible attraction for you then, could only live in my fantasy.
"As we remained friends throughout the years, I took great pleasure in observing you become the ultimate mother, especially for your own daughters, but also for the way you care for and nurture women all over the world," he wrote, adding that it took "32 years for my attraction for you to come full circle. It was well worth the wait."
Lawson was previously married to actor Denise Gordy from 1978 to 1989, and the former couple shares daughter Bianca Lawson and son Ricky Lawson. – Los Angeles Times/Tribune News Service
