//Jean Shrimpton in Mr Freedom Minnie Mouse top, Hans Feurer, Fancy Dressing, Nova, December 1970, with the original design on tracing paper by Refna. No reproduction without permission//
Exciting news: Elizabeth Hamey, who signs her work ‘Refna’, has granted me access to her amazing archive of work at the cross-hatches of art, design and fashion in the 1960s and 70s.
//Front cover, Elemental, The Earth, Rare Vinyl, 2016. Design: Ian Harris//
Ian Harris is one of those London characters who turns up at various stages in the capital’s post-war pop culture narrative.
“Anyone who has wondered how the Britain of utility furniture and wartime rationing managed to evolve into Cool Britannia will find this a remarkable book.”
Elizabeth Guffey, State University of New York at Purchase
My case study Tommy Roberts: From Kleptomania To Two Columbia Road forms a chapter in new book British Design: Tradition And Modernity After 1948, which is published by Bloomsbury Academic tomorrow (October 22).
My recent post about the Mr Freedom designs in the V&A collection sparked some memories from graphic artist Ian Harris, who sends this 1972 photograph of himself in a Mr Freedom hamburger print shirt:
//Ian Harris with his then-wife Maggie, Brighton, UK, 1972. Ian Harris Collection//
//Mr Freedom hamburger print shirt in the V&A’s collection. Note appliqué//
In the 1972 photo, the shirt’s hamburger appliqué is obscured; Harris had worked for Mr Freedom partner Tommy Roberts at his 60s boutique Kleptomania, and gave the late Roberts a number of items relating to his career a few years back. Included was the appliqué which Harris had kept for many years.
As Harris points out, his wife Maggie, a model, is sporting an Angie Bowie-influenced look in the photo above. Here she is in another early 70s shot, taken outside John and Lyris Mann’s Kensington boutique Strictly For The Birds:
//Maggie outside 4 Holland Walk, Kensington, London, 1971. Ian Harris Collection//
//Clockwise from top left: Cover, Helen And Desire, 1970; George O'Dowd, photo: Richard Bevan, 2013; Carnaby Street book and Palisades swing tag, 1970 and 1966; front cover, Anarchy In The UK newsprint fanzine, 1976//
I’m involved in a couple of events which open in London this week: artist Lucy Harrison’s multi-layered project Carnaby Echoes in the West End and photographer Nick Knight’s exhibition Punk at his Showstudio space in SW1.
//From the catalogue for next week's auction//
The spirit of great British boutique culture is summoned by a couple of lots in next week’s Pop Culture sale at Christie’s.
One is a previously unpublished June 1967 photograph of Jim Hendrix not in Carnaby Street as captioned, but outside the tobacconist Finlay’s, which was in Foubert’s Place. It’s evident from the carrier bag in his famous left hand that the guitarist had just visited I Was Lord Kitchener’s Valet, which was next door to Finlay’s and the place where he bought the Hussar’s jacket worn in this photograph and at Monterey Pop that same month.
//Mr Freedom 1971 design in archive selection, Vogue UK, June 2012.//
Ahead of Tommy Roberts’ appearance on BBC Radio 4’s Midweek and London Live 94.9’s Robert Elms Show tomorrow, there has been a flurry of media mentions of the mould-breaking boutiques with which he was involved.
This is the front of the jacket of my new book Mr Freedom – Tommy Roberts: British Design Hero.
//Kleptomania in Rave magazine, October 1967.//
Tommy Roberts reminisces about the look of 1967:
By 1967 Haight Ashbury hippie culture had taken off in London.
At Kleptomania – my boutique around the corner from Carnaby Street at 10 Kingly Street – it was embraced with gusto.
Out went red guardsman’s tunics, Union Jack kipper ties, Victorian-style lacy mini dresses, soul music and anything to do with “Swinging London”.
In came trumpet-sleeved kaftans, Gypsy fringed shawls, psychedelic posters, joss sticks, peace ‘n’ love badges, Frank Zappa and Jefferson Airplane.
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