Next week I will be taking part in a panel discussion on the fashion legacy of the late cultural iconoclast Malcolm McLaren at London’s Institute of Contemporary Arts.

The other participants in the chat – chaired by Young Kim of the Malcolm McLaren Estate – are Louis Vuitton menswear artistic director and McLaren/Westwood collector and expert Kim Jones and Ben Reardon, editor of Man About Town; the new issue of his magazine contains a huge section dedicated to McLaren’s stylistic forays with and without Vivienne Westwood, including a fashion story photographed by Alasdair McLellan and styled by Olivier Rizzo and my essay Been There Done That Going Back.

The panel will be followed by the launch of Man About Town S/S 16 in the ICA Bar in partnership with specialist dealer Idea Books.

Tickets for the event are £7/£8 available here.

Tags: Alasdair McLellan, Ben Reardon, ICA, Idea Books, Kim Jones, Louis Vuitton, Man About Town, Olivier Rizzo, Vivienne Westwood, Young Kim

//Cover, Man About Town SS16. Otto in Buffalo hat and Rigby & Peller bra (prototype for Nostalgia Of Mud, 1982). Photography: Alasdair McLellan. Styling: Olivier Rizzo//

//Above left: Frankie in Buffalo hat, white Nike socks and my George Cox Diano creepers. Right: Natalie in Malcolm McLaren’s Chico hat (Witches, 1983), Buffalo jacket (Nostalgia Of Mud, 1982) and Bondage Trousers (Seditionaries, 1976). Photography: Alasdair McLellan. Styling: Olivier Rizzo. Hair: Duffy: Make Up: Lynsey Alexander. Man About Town SS16//

On a warm London afternoon last July I enjoyed a meeting with Ben Reardon, editor-in-chief of the biannual Man About Town, the magazine’s senior fashion editor Danny Reed and Young Kim of the Malcolm McLaren Estate.

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Tags: Alasdair McLellan, Alexander Trocchi, Ben Reardon, Bravo, Buffalo Gals, Danny Reed, Diano, Gallery International, George Cox, Helen And Desire, Honey, Idea Books, Man About Town, Natalie Westley, Olivier Rizzo, Olympia Press, Sado sex For The Seventies, Smash Hits, Wally Wood, Young Kim

//T-shirt purchased by Malcolm McLaren at The Pleasure Chest, Los Angeles in January 1978. Private collection/Malcolm McLaren Estate. Photo: Paul Gorman Archive. No reproduction without permission//

//Prick Up Your Ears, t-shirt design, Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood for Seditionaries, 1979. Courtesy: Hiroshi Fujiwara Collection//

The trickster’s function is to add disorder to order, and so make a whole; within the fixed bounds of what’s permitted, an experience of what is not permitted.

Karl Kerenyi quoted in Prick Up Your Ears: The Biography Of Joe Orton, John Lahr, 1978

In January 1978, after the break-up of the Sex Pistols in San Francisco on the last date of the group’s ill-fated US tour, their manager Malcolm McLaren shifted base to Los Angeles for a few weeks to work out his next move.

Discussing options with record companies and holding meetings with movie companies to drum up business for biopic The Great Rock N Roll Swindle, the late McLaren had a ball, staying at the legendary rock’n’roll hang-out The Tropicana Motel on Santa Monica Boulevard, hard by Duke’s Coffee Shop and a few blocks west of the sex shop The Pleasure Chest.

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Tags: Alasdair McLellan, Ben Reardon, Cowboys, Dances Of The World's Peoples, Duke's Coffee Shop, Folkways, Joe Orton, John Lahr, Karl Kerenyi, Man About Town, Olivier Rizzo, Pop Porn, Prick Up Your Ears, Pussycat Theater, The Pleasure Chest, The Warriors, Tropicana Motel, Vive le Rock!, Walter Hill

//Ben Reardon, Lou Stoppard + Dean Mayo Davies. Photos: Diane Pernet, Nik Hartley + SHOWstudio//

//Stills from Savages and Nostalgia Of Mud McLaren/Westwood catwalk collections, staged October 1981 and March 1982 respectively. Courtesy Malcolm McLaren Estate//

The cream of British fashion journalism – Dean Mayo Davies, Ben Reardon and Lou Stoppard – will be discussing the indomitable body of design work produced by Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood at tomorrow’s event Be Reasonable Demand The Impossible.

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Tags: Ben Reardon, Dean Mayo Davies, Duck Rock, Lou Stoppard, Man About Town, Nik Hartley, Nostalgia Of Mud, Pompidou Centre, Savages, Showstudio

From the SS16 menswear collections to the people flocking to Somerset House’s current celebration of The Jam, the aesthetic of “clean living under difficult circumstances” (as summarised by The Who’s first manager, Pete Meaden) is at one with what’s happening now in fashion…

Read the rest of my piece – with quotes from Dylan Jones of GQ/London Collections: Men, Soho tailor Mark Powell and Man About Town’s Ben Reardon – on the enduring appeal of Mod here.

Tags: About The Young Idea, Ben Reardon, Dylan Jones, GQ, London Collections: Men, Man About Town, Mark Powell, Paul Weller, Pete Meaden, Somerrset House, The Guardian, The Jam, The Who