Paul Gorman

2010s

The Gentlewoman celebrates a decade of fabulousness with special mini-edition

Small is beautiful when it comes to the inventive mini-edition of The Gentlewoman, a greatest hits package celebrating the exemplary British magazine’s “10 years of fabulousness”.

During that time (after all print had been roundly declared as “dead” in 2010), editor Penny Martin and her team have consistently confounded expectations around independent print publishing and the traditional editorial stances of periodicals aimed at female readers.

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A code for kicking against the pricks: THEM (Slight Return) with Peter York interview in Arena Homme +

//Opening spread of my interview with Peter York, Arena Homme + Winter/Spring 2020. Portrait: David Sims//
//From the Them fashion story. Photography: Julien Martinez Leclerc; fashion: Tom Guinness//

The jury is out on this autumn’s relaunch of the print edition of venerated British style magazine The Face; as I suggested here it’s going to take more than one splashy issue to assess whether the proposition has legs as we enter the 2020s (next May will mark the 40th anniversary of the founding of The Face by Nick Logan).

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A matter of scale: New exhibition casts an intriguing and intimate light on Robyn Denny’s working practices

//Maquette for Great Big Biggest Wide London, 1958. 5.6 x 61cm//
//Robyn Denny, 1961. Photo: Bernard Jacobson Gallery//

The late British abstract artist Robyn Denny is best known for his large-scale works, such as Great Big Biggest Wide London, the giant 1959 mural for menswear company Austin Reed’s Regent Street store.

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Experimental + inspirational: Wild Daughter

//Wild Daughter at the ICA last month. The gold phalus worn by James Jeanetta was
//Wild Daughter at the ICA last month. The gold phallus worn by James Jeanette was created by leathermakers Whitaker Malem//
//Still from Wild Daughter’s Mr G, directed by Douglas Hart and styled by Elie Grace Cumming//

I was flattered recently to receive an email from Jacob Shaw, bassist in art-rockers Wild Daughter, about the effect my work has had on certain visual elements of the group and in particular a performance during their recent ICA night The Moon Sextiles The Sun.

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Romantic revolt to change our lives: George Cox catwalk show and in-conversation celebrating 70 years of creepin’ at Port Eliot next week

// In George Cox creepers: Malcolm McLaren, 430 King’s Road, January 1972. Photo: David Parkinson / Slowthai, Northampton, 2018. Photo: Ewen Spencer for Arena Homme + //

“Those blue suede shoes had a magical association that seemed authentic. They represented an age of desperate romantic revolt to change your life.”

Malcolm McLaren, notes on his life in fashion, 1997

I’m celebrating the 70th anniversary of the introduction of George Cox & Co’s first creeper at the Port Eliot Festival next week with Adam Waterfield, the fourth generation owner of the great independent British brand, and his son Alistair, a Central Saint Martins student and model who is very much involved in the family business.

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My essay on the Malcolm For Mayor campaign in DB Burkeman’s Stickers Vol 2: More Stuck-Up Crap

//My essay on Malcolm For Mayor with stickers by Scott King and Matthew Worley//

“The sticker may be the most efficient art form ever invented”

Jeffrey Deitch, 2019

I have an essay in DB Burkeman’s just-published follow-up to his 2010 survey of the use of audacious and eye-catching stickers in art, design, fashion, music and social activism.

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Recent journalism: Baggies with attitude for MacGuffin + the colour black in street style for Fred Perry Quarterly

//MacGuffin No 7, spring 2019//
//Fred Perry Quarterly Issue 2, Spring 2019//

Here’s a couple of pieces of recently published journalism, one filed for the Netherlands-based biannual MacGuffin, the other for the second issue of Fred Perry Quarterly.

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Pungent + prolific with a million miles on the meter: Sayonara Mary Cigarettes

“I want to die with a million miles on my meter,

I want to die with well-used and worn tyres”

In The Land Of The Harley Davidson, Mary Cigarettes, 2011

It’s been a month or so since the death of the extraordinary singer-songwriter Mary Cigarettes; today I’m marking his passing with this selection from his Youtube channel.

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