David Bowie: Late singer recalls the 'corny' way he asked Iman out in archive footage

The nervous singer asked his wife of 24 years out for afternoon tea

Iman and Bowie were married in 1992 (Getty Images )

David Bowie met the supermodel Iman at a dinner party in 1990 after being introduced by their hairdresser. Within weeks, the pair officially became an item and two years later, they married, becoming one of music and fashion's most enduring couples.

Both were fiercely private and kept “the press and editors and everybody out of our house”, according to Iman, only giving the world an insight into their lives on rare occasions.

One of those occasions came during an interview with Entertainment Tonight, who released archived interview footage of the meeting this week to mark his death from cancer on Sunday.

In it, Bowie, who once described being "overwhelmed" by the strength of his feelings for Iman, recalled asking her out on a first date by nervously inviting her out to afternoon tea - despite not actually being a tea drinker himself.

"I found her intolerably sexy," Bowie explained. "I think I did something really corny the next day. I think I invited her to afternoon tea somewhere."

“He told me he was so nervous he just said ‘tea’, he doesn’t drink tea, he never drinks tea. He had coffee,” Iman added, laughing.

Bowie proposed along the River Seine in Paris and the couple married in Italy.

In the footage, Iman recalled how she had spotted a ring she liked in Florence two years earlier. Bowie visited Florence and tracked down the ring. The fact that the ring had already been purchased didn’t put Bowie off and he ended up buying it from the owner.

“It was sweet and of course I said yes,” Iman said.