The Boy Friend: Outfit Illustrations

It’s only recently that I’ve realised I’ve got a bit of a thing for fashion illustrations, perhaps I always have, but after sharing those from the Biba Story and then buying those Vogue pattern catalogue pages which I intend to frame, well that’s confirmed it for me.

It won’t be a surprise then that I’ve some more to share, this time from the mini exhibition of The Boy Friend which was on at the Fashion and Textile Museum when we visited last summer.

These illustrations look to have more of a collage approach to them - the skimpy outfit above with treble clef motifs on the triangular-bikini like top, show this - though the headdress looks to be larger than the skirt, but maybe that’s a perspective thing, not just me showing my age!

The red outfit on the left below looks to have the text ‘The Boyfriend - Hortense - Barbara Windsor’ in the top right corner, which is intriguing. Hortense was the maid, and it’s only now that I’ve googled it, the part was played by Barbara Windsor, who would have been 34 in 1971.

The sophisticated white trouser suit top right in the photo above, was one of Twiggy’s outfits as the main character Polly Broome. They take wide legged trousers, and flares to a whole new level don’t they?!

Shirley Russell had a fondness for the 1920s, so The Boy Friend must have been the ideal project for her. Twiggy shared Shirley’s love of the era and often joined the Russells for film shows to watch Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers pictures. She also accompanied Shirley on trips to source original costumes, learning more about the costume history of the period, and started collecting clothes from the period too. I wonder if she still has them?

These last two illustrations are the pixie outfits for Twiggy as Polly Browne and Christopher Gable as Tony (the two main characters), though I’m not sure where these featured, as I’m sure in the finale fancy dress ball they were dressed as Pierrot and Pierrette, I need to find out more clearly!

But these illustrations reminded me of my part in the chorus, for the fancy dress ball I was the jester - thankfully there are no photos I’m willing to share, but my outfit, complete with jester hat with bells on, made in what I remember as itchy brown and mustard material, which also thankfully no longer exists!

Memories that may well have remained well and truly buried had they not been reawakened by these illustrations - I’ll let them off though, it was great to see these illustrations!

A Brace of Embraces

* I was invited to the press preview of Gardeners’ World Live and provided with a pair of tickets to visit the show, therefore all my posts will be marked as 'Ad’ though as usual my views and opinions are very much my own.

The Urban Gardens were a new feature at the 2024 show. They were both designed by Cherry Carmen but the gardens were brought to life by two teams of landscapers both vying to win the competition hosted by World Skills UK. Each garden was designed to embrace issues related to climate change - one focussed on Shady & Wet, and yeap you’ve guessed it, the other on Sunny & Dry. But which would win out?

Determined to have its own say, the weather wreaked havoc with both of the garden signs - the wind managed to rip the board from the wood for the Shady & Wet sign - ironic much? And both signs ended up laying down alongside its garden - you couldn’t make it up could you?

Shady & Wet

This garden was landscaped by Anna Mcloughlin and Ceri Furber and showcases a waterlogged or boggy garden. It’s a north-facing garden so doesn’t get the sun to dry it out, and so the planting demonstrates how to work with your garden’s reality and how by using correct techniques and plant choices you can still achieve something quite special.

I liked the planting in the Shady & Wet garden and I think that each of us can do more to work with what our garden gives us - just because we like a plant, it doesn’t mean it will thrive in the space we have - and we have to learn and respect that. In our previous garden we rarely had any bedding plants, save for a few around the patio, as there just wasn’t the light they needed given the large shrubs and trees we had. It’s something we came to accept, and obviously saved a lot of work trying to force things to work where they really weren’t happy.

Sunny & Dry

The landscapers for this garden were Aimee Copland and Jacob Mercer, and as you’d expect from its name this garden is south-facing and so becomes very hot in summer. Once again the planting and design has been adapted to work with, rather than fight against, the garden’s conditions.

This garden has a lot going for it and the plants appealed to both MOH and I. In fact this was MOH’s favourite garden in the show, which kind of surprised me and kind of didn’t. He likes strong sculptural plants - and has his eye on a banana plant, which while I’d be happy to have in the garden, so far I’ve resisted as I don’t think we’re quite ready to care for it, or have the supporting plants and infrastructure around it which I think it will need (but that’s a whole other post!)

I do think that there is something to learn from the dry gardens that we’ve seen, both here in this garden and previously at the show and in other gardens, such as the RHS Hyde Hall - and I think that is definitely something we’ll be incorporating into our future garden. I think more and more of us will do that too especially as the climate continues to change.

Oh, and I almost forgot - the Sunny & Dry garden was awarded a gold medal, so I guess that garden won, and I’m not disappointed by that.

* With thanks to Gardeners’ World for inviting me to Gardeners’ World Live, it was just as good as I expected! I’ll be sharing more from my visit to the show - I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Reminiscing through the retro clothes of the 1971 Boy Friend film

When we visited the Fashion and Textile Museum to see The Biba Story I was pleased to find a smaller exhibition dedicated to The Boy Friend which included memorabilia and more from the 1971 film by Ken Russell, featuring Twiggy. Of course I’m way too young to remember the film - I was four in 1971 - but much later in 1982 The Boy Friend was our senior school production, so it holds a special memory for me. I didn’t have a big part in our production, but like many of us in the chorus I knew the words to the majority of the songs, and the scenes.

And my biggest claim to fame for the school production? I provided the ‘peasant-style dress’ which Hortense wore in one of the scenes. It came from C&A and I wish it was a dress I’d kept, though of course 1982 was a long time ago, and well, I’m not sure I’m the same size today as I was then!

But you know, memories and all that.

But anyway, back to the exhibition. I knew that Twiggy was in the film, and I knew it was directed by Ken Russell. I didn’t know that his wife Shirley Russell was responsible for the costume design, nor that the fashion at the time was obsessed with a nostalgic glamour, with a camp twinkle in its eye. But I do now.

It was fantastic to see the Pierette and Pierot sketches, they became a big thing in the eighties, with the designs on everything from clothing to bedding, stationery, stickers and more. I had a duvet cover and pillowcase, I remember and I still have a ring binder folder adorned with the design - and I’m sure there was more.

Twiggy’s Pierette dress was remade in her size for the film from an original 1920s costume in Shirley’s collection; these were favourite character costumes for fancy dress which was popular in the 1920s.

One of the exhibition boards said that Shirley’s hunt for original clothing became an all consuming occupation which the whole family were involved in, and she became known as ‘second-hand Rose’ for dressing her five children in vintage clothes, and this at a time when second-hand goods were still tainted with the stigma of poverty, it was a radical fashion statement.

The striped shirt and skirt by Biba in the photo above was from Shirley’s personal wardrobe and fitted perfectly with the 1930’s clothing, which no doubt is the (or one of) the connections for this being shown alongside the Biba Story.

Some of the designs above wouldn’t look out of place in today’s high street - the chevron jumper and 1920s patterned two piece above especially. It was great to reminisce about our senior school production, but I think it’ll be a while before the drop waisted dress, and hopefully the Pierette/Pierot costumes reappear - though never say never, all fashion seems to come around again at some point…