Tina Knowles: Beyoncé’s mother files for divorce from Richard Lawson after eight years

Fashion designer is apparently divorcing her second husband, citing ‘irreconcilable differences’

Tina Knowles-Lawson has filed for divorce from husband Richard Lawson after eight years of marriage, according to US media reports.

Tina, the mother of Beyoncé and Solange Knowles, married actor Lawson in 2015. The pair had known each other for over 30 years, but both had previously been married.

On Wednesday (26 July), however, Tina filed for divorce from Lawson.

According to legal documents obtained by TMZ, Tina, 69, lists their date of separation as Tuesday (25 July), and cites irreconcilable differences from the Poltergeist star, 76.

In the documents, fashion designer Tina has allegedly asked the court to terminate their ability to award spousal support to her or Lawson. She also wants her name to be changed back from Celestine Lawson to Celestine Knowles.

The Independent has contacted Tina’s representatives for comment.

Before Lawson, Tina was married to Mathew Knowles. The pair married in 1980 and soon welcomed daughters Beyoncé and Solange.

In the Nineties, Mathew became the manager of vocal group Destiny’s Child, featuring his daughter Beyoncé, Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams. The “Say My Name” trio performed together from 1990 to 2006.

Tina and Lawson, pictured in 2022 (Getty Images for BET)

Tina and Mathew split in 2011. She initially filed for divorce in 2009, but dropped the matter in 2010 before refiling the following year, citing “discord or conflict of personalities” she said prevented them from “reasonable expectation of reconciliation”.

Last year, Tina opened up about a past experience where a white woman criticised her for “allowing” her daughter to marry Jay-Z.

“I can remember getting on a plane, and an older white woman saying, ‘Oh, your [son-in-law] is a gangster rapper, right? How did you let him marry your daughter?’” she recalled.

“It was just shocking to me and I said, ‘No, actually, my [son-in-law] is a CEO.’ She didn’t think of him as a CEO, or even a talented celebrity that was a great businessman.”

Tina continued: “At that time, I remember thinking, I can’t be mad at her, because that is what the media portrays. I sat there and I thought about how the media portrays Black men and how that is typical of the things that they would focus on, the negatives.

“[They] try to portray us as dangerous, our men as dangerous, uneducated. Gangster rapper, that’s all she could come up with, but that’s what she had been seeing on TV and all in the media. That’s how we’re portrayed, unfortunately.”

Beyoncé and Jay-Z married in 2008 and share three children: Blue Ivy, 11, and twins Sir and Rumi, six.