Born in London on 14 July 1947, Robert Winston Keith Odoni was the eldest of the five children of Walter Anthony and Lois Marie Theresa Odoni. The family name is Italian: grandfather Alfred Odoni had come to England from Switzerland in the 1920s and set up a manufacturing business in Birmingham, later transferring to London. Robert's father continued the business (then making cycle stands) until the 1970s. His mother was from Boulder in Colorado: they had met in America whilst he was on wartime naval service.