Indeed, after nearly a year of legal entanglements with his former business partner, the 32-year-old entrepreneur and reality star is making his footwear industry comeback on his terms.

“I think everyone wants to know what’s going on,” Mallet told FN in an exclusive interview. “I’m literally getting thousands of messages. It has been a very hard and serious journey for me the last few months.”

Since December, Mallet, who’s real last name is Fordham, has been fighting an injunction filed by Mallet London cofounder and business director Evren Ozka following the announcement of his new shoe brand CTRNE.

According to legal documents, Ozka was alleging that Mallet could not launch a competing shoe company like CTRNE, work with previous retail partners and sales agents or poach Mallet London staff for the 12 months following his resignation from the company per a non-compete agreement. But Mallet countered the claim stating that CTRNE does not compete with Mallet and that halting his new self-funded business operations would produce enough financial damage to cause him to close entirely.

Mallet told FN that that the main retailer his former business partner was worried he would bring CTRNE to was Saks Fifth Avenue, but ultimately, he was restricted in doing business with a total of 10 different stores, he said.

Ultimately in April, a judge ruled to enforce Mallet’s non-compete and bar him from doing business with retailers that currently work with his eponymous shoe brand as well as hire previous colleagues until Oct. 31, 2024 — the one-year mark from when he resigned his director position at Mallet London.

“I don’t want to do any damage to either of my businesses, as I still own 50 percent of Mallet London, so I agreed to not talk to retailers through Oct. 31,” Mallet said. “It’s what I’ve had to do. I had to go and take a long holiday. I’ve lost a lot of money, but I’m at the end of this now. I’ve got another kid on the way in November, and I don’t want to have to deal with this mess. So, all that the injunction has done to me was make me even more eager to go out and get to work. I’m ready to go.”

Mallet went on to call Nov. 1 basically a “relaunch day” for when he can actually do what he wants with CTRNE going forward. And he hasn’t been resting on his laurels beforehand. During his downtime related to the injunction, Mallet said that he has been busy working to understand CTRNE’s customer, developing new footwear styles and building out the brand’s infrastructure.

“When I first launched CTRNE, there was a lot of excitement around the brand,” Mallet said. “But I sort of lost some of that buzz because I had to deal with this legal sh*t. But everything happens for a reason. We are still the first spiritual footwear brand in the world, and we have a story to tell. But I’m literally starting from scratch.”

The UK sneaker exec said that he has launched a new U.S. version of his brand’s e-commerce site, signed on a new marketing agency to promote this new site and has added a distribution center stateside to improve delivery times.

“My main priority right now is to pick who my retailers are in the States,” Mallet said. “I definitely want to open my own retail store over there, because I want to be able to give the full experience of CTRNE. I’ve also done a partnership in the paddle space. We’ll be affiliated to paddle as a sport, and then we’ll also be doing a lot of workshops where we’re not just doing fashion, but like teaching manifestation and law of attraction, and bringing that positivity to the community. We are not just trying to sell sneakers in stores. It’s about teaching and brining the experience to people and showing them that anyone can be better.”

But in the meantime, Mallet insists that there is “no bad blood” between him and Ozka. “I still own 50 percent of Mallet London and I’m still a shareholder. Whether anyone likes it or not, I still co-own the business,” Mallet insisted. “I may not be a part of the daily operations, but it’s in my interest to try and just keep both brands alive, which is tough when you’re fighting. But I ain’t going nowhere.”

He does admit, however, that perhaps he may have made some wrong decisions throughout the process of launching CTRNE. “Everyone is human, and everyone makes mistakes,” he noted. “I think I might have said a few things that I shouldn’t have said, but with that said, my partner thinks he should be getting the brand for free. That’s what this is all about. And obviously, no one’s getting nothing for free from me, man.”

“I thought I knew it all before, but turns out, I knew nothing,” Mallet admitted. “I learned that making sneakers is the easy part. Having been through so many different emotions over the last six months, I would never with it on my worst enemy. I’ve really had to put the message of my sneakers into action and have a taste of my own medicine.”

Bottom line, Mallet is ready to chart a new path. “I think I’ve been done well to stay quiet this long,” he added. “But it wasn’t for anything other than I was just enjoying my peace. But time’s up now.”