//The premises of Jack English Snr’s lighting shop in Leicester’s Granby Street provide the book’s cover image//

//Will English (right) with Helen Robinson and Steph Raynor in a transport cafe c.1970. Photo by Rose Kendall//

//David Parkinson and his Messerschmitt bubble car, 1974. Photography: Will English//

Perfect Binding, the recently published book by British experimental filmmaker/broadcaster/bookseller William English, is a psychogeographic portrait of a particular strain of cultural activity in a particular place at a particular time: the Midlands city of Leicester from the 1950s to the 70s.

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Tags: Acme Attractions, Bill Burns, Boy, Captain Maurice Seddon, Cecilia Green, David Parkinson, Helen Robinson, Hugh de la Cruz, Jansje Schoen, Jim Mellors, Kirby Muxloe, Leicester, Perfect Binding, PX, Ray Gosling, Steph Raynor, The Dining Room, Victoria Ashley, Vivienne Westwood, William English, Young Fabian

//David Parkinson in the Eight Young Photographers catalogue, 1971. Image courtesy Mark Trompeteler//

//Front, catalogue/fold-out poster, for the show which ran at the Photographers Gallery in Great Newport Street from April 6 to May 2, 1971. Courtesy Mark Trompeteler. No reproduction without permission//

Eight Young Photographers was the third exhibition to be held at the newly-opened Photographers Gallery at its original premises in Great Newport Street in London’s West End.

The gallery opened in January 1971 with a group show entitled The Concerned Photographer featuring, among others, Robert Capa, and followed that by simultaneously staging three exhibits, including a display of Polaroids taken by Andy Warhol.

Visitors to Eight Young Photographers, which ran during April and into early May that year, recall it as being an important staging post in the acceptance of photography as a subject worthy of artistic appreciation. Among the contributors was the late David Parkinson, about whom I have written often. He showed work alongside Mark Edwards, Meira Hand, Roger Birt, Sylvester Jacobs, Tim Stevens, Bob Mazzer and Mark Trompeteler (who has kindly retrieved the catalogue/poster for me from his archive).

//From the Photographers Gallery listings. The show was preceded by an exhibition of Andy Warhol’s Polaroids//

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Tags: Acme Attractions, Album, Andy Warhol, Belmacz, Bill Jay, Bob Mazzer, Bush Holyhead, City Lights Studio, Club International, Colin Watmough, Creative Camera, Eight Young Photographers, Great newport Street, Hag, Hipgnosis, Ian Hargreaves, John Krevine, Mark Edwards, Mark Trompeteler, Meira Hand, NTA Studios, Paul Raymond, Photographers Gallery, Polaroids, Robert Capa, Roger Birt, Steph Raynor, Steve Ridgeway, Sylvester Jacobs, Tim Stevens, Tommy Roberts, Vivienne Westwood, Willy Daly

//Marx, the Great Gear Market, 85, King’s Road, Chelsea, 1979. Photo: Salvador Macasil//

In the histories of London street style, Kenny MacDonald’s King’s Road outlet Marx receives rare mention, yet from the mid-70s this unusual and tucked-away boutique was important in the development of the type of English tailoring-with-a-twist which has subsequently dominated a strand of menswear around the world.

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Tags: Acme Attractions, Boy, Futurama, Great Gear Market, Hoofer, Jah Wobble, Jeanette lee, John Lydon, John Wardle, Kenny macDonald, Marx, Peel + Lift, PiL, Pinto, Public Image Ltd, Salvador Macasil, Tom Salter, Trickers

//Malcolm McLaren, 1973. Photo: David Parkinson. Bryan Ferry, 1976. Photo Richard Wallis//

A couple of years back I showed examples of photography by the late David Parkinson to car-nut graphic design maestro Jules Balme; I knew he would be interested in the incorporation of a 1959 Cadillac Eldorado in a 1973 Let It Rock fashion shoot.

What drew Balme’s eagle eye was not the car fin detail, but the fact that Malcolm McLaren in the shot below sported a tie of the same distinctive Atomic-style 50s pattern as worn by Bryan Ferry in the video clip for his 1976 solo hit Let’s Stick Together (and subsequently on the sleeve of the compilation of the same name rushed out to capitalise on the single’s success that year).

//McLaren and models in Let It Rock attire – right are examples of the so-called “Alan Ladd” and “Jazz” suits – photographed in Acre Lane, Brixton for Club International by David Parkinson, summer 1973//

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Tags: Acme Attractions, Bryan Ferry, Chris Spedding, Club International, EG, Jules Balme, Let It Rock, Paul Thompson, Petticoat Lane, Polydor, Richard Wallis, Steph Raynor, The Golden Age

//Front cover, Club International, 1974. Paul Raymond Publications. Photo: David Parkinson//

Ahead of the publication of my piece about the late photographer David Parkinson in GQ UK in a few weeks, here are a couple of masterful images which demonstrate his stylised,  simultaneously gritty and glamorous approach.

//Front cover, Man Only, 1974//

Both stem from issues of men’s magazine Club International; the 1974 cover shot model is wearing Parkinson’s decorated Lewis Leathers jacket which he used to dress other fashion photo-sessions. The image was also used on the cover of Italian soft-porn title Man Only.

//Acme Attractions photoshoot for Club International 1975 including (left) Martin Brading and Don Letts and far right Steph Raynor. Photo: David Parkinson//

The spread above focused on the suits and menswear available at Acme Attractions, the Kings Road vintage/retro outlet co-owned by Parkinson’s Lesicester friend Steph Raynor, who appears in the photograph with Acme’s manager, filmmaker/DJ/BAD member Don Letts, and Parkinson’s assistant, photographer Martin Brading.

Raynor is among those who contributed to my feature on Parkinson, who is granted the accolade of ‘GQ Icon’ in the June issue (available at the beginning of May).

Tags: Acme Attractions, Club International, Don Letts, GQ, Lewis Leathers, Man Only, Martin Brading, Steph Raynor

//Original print of photo for Club International, 1975. Models include, from far right, Stephan Raynor, Don Letts and Martin Brading. Photo: David Parkinson//

I’ve been enjoying researching materials relating to the late photographer David Parkinson for a feature for GQ magazine, so thought I’d share some of the images I dug out of the Parkinson archive concerning the 70s King’s Road retro clothing store Acme Attractions.

Parkinson’s position as fashion editor of Paul Raymond’s sophisticated soft-porn magazine Club International enabled him to style and present Acme clothing for a wide readership, on occasion using the shop team as models.

Acme was opened by Parkinson’s friend Stephan Raynor (they’d known each other since they were part of a gang of style-obsessed teenagers in Leicester in the early 60s) with John Krivine, previously a Brixton-based jukebox dealer, in 1974.

//As the Parkinson photograph appeared in the magazine, flipped and tinted. Note ref to “Acme Tailors”//

//Parkinson used ties from his collection – including some sourced from Acme – for this March 1975 Club International feature//

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Tags: Acme Attractions, Antiquarius, Club International, Don Letts, GQ, Jay Strongman, Jeanette lee, John Krivine, Lord Snowdon, Martin Brading, Paradise Garage, princess Margaret, SEX, Steph Raynor, Too Fast To Live Too Young To Die, Vivienne Westwood

//Richard Wernham, Nick Garvey, Robert Gotobed, Rob Smith on the front cover of Teenage Head/Lights Out by The Snakes, Dynamo Records, 1976//

I went to a good school (it was approved, as my first editor would have it in the late 70s. You had to be there).

I was taken on as a scholarship boy, one who showed enough promise for the fees to be paid by the council.

But I was lazy, not as bright as I made out, unhappy, an under-achiever. Aside from winning the cross-country race when I was 14, my life there was almost entirely undistinguished, so preoccupied was I with music, clothes and girls. I had pretensions to vast knowledge in all three areas undercut by lack of experience in the latter regard.

//Booklet with Quadrophenia, an album about "a cat with four personalities" according to me, 1973//

//School report 1975: "If Paul is as familiar with DG Mackean's Introduction To Biology as he is with the NME, he will pass his O-Level. As it is, he isn't, so I fear he won't." And I didn't//

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Tags: Ace Skudder, Acme Attractions, Bazooka Joe, Bull & Gate Kentish Town, DG Mackean, Dr Feelgood, Ducks Deluxe, Eddie & The Hot Rods, Flamin' Groovies, Hawkwind, Introduction To Biology, Keith Richards, Kickers, New Musical Express, Nick Garvey, Pink Fairies, Quadrophenia, Robert Gotobed, Rolling Stones, Royal College Of Art, Sensational Alex Harvey Band, Sex Pistols, Shakin' Stevens & The Sunsets, Stewart Wernham, Teenage Head, the 101'ers, The Motors, The Snakes, Wire

//Jah Wobble, 2009.//

NAME: Jah Wobble (real name: John Wardle)

RESIDES: Cheshire

OCCUPATION: Musician

It’s well documented that, in his teenage years, Jah Wobble was a member of the Four Johns, the gang of youths who gravitated to each other while at Kingsway College Of Further Education on the fringes of the City Of London in the mid-70s.

The other members included John Beverley, aka Sid Vicious, John Lydon – later Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols – and Lydon’s friend, John Gray.  Knocking around east and north London, the quartet followed football and voraciously consumed music from Bowie to Can to Hawkwind to Big Youth and beyond.

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Tags: Acme Attractions, Daniel hechter, Dennis Morris, Don Letts, Jah Wobble, Jeanette lee, John Lydon, John Wardle, Kenny macDonald, Marx, Missoni, Public Image Ltd, Sex Pistols, Sid Vicious, Terry Jones, versace

//Elisabeth Photo Library, Cleveland Street, London W1. Summer 1977//

11.30am July 1977: Strolling back from a parcel delivery in the shadow of the Post Office Tower,  past The Tower Tavern.

Three Teddy Boys already in there, sitting by the ceiling to floor window. There had been several Teds picking off stragglers the previous night after the screening of Sex Pistols Number 1 at The Other Cinema in Tottenham Street.

These three were evidently having a livener after being up all night in Soho and surrounds.  My brothel creepers probably did for it, with Hoofer army greens and a 60s shirt from Acme Attractions. I had black spiked hair (the vegetable dye ran blue down my neck in the rain) and afterwards one of the cops said: “Well, what do you expect walking around like that?”

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Tags: Acme Attractions, Cleveland Street, London, Post Office Tower, Teddy Boys