fashion
12/7/2009
Virginia. The first lady of Holland Park!
by Andreas Soteriou
Reunions can be a wonderful thing. In this special encounter, trailblazing menswear designer James Long catches up with his mentor and former boss Virginia Wetherell amongst the treasures at her vintage boutique in Holland Park.
PonyStep was more than happy for a chance to eavesdrop as they reminisced about their friendship and the important things in life. You know, champagne, horror films, Dior, Eastenders...
James Long: So, I was obviously your assistant for years that’s why we are doing this interview...
Virginia: It's probably the most fun time I have ever had, whilst you were here, when we were working together.
JL: It was magical.
V: Those were the days when we could sit outside and have coffee and champagne on the stoop, and sometimes take a bit of money so we could afford another glass. Do you remember?
JL: I do. I was actually just thinking about the day when we spent the whole day on the balcony sunbathing.
V: Yes!
JL: And if somebody popped in we would be like, "Oh, we’ll be down in a minute". And then get our clothes back on and come down. And I was thinking that’s what a lot of you is about, really, other than the fashion, there is a spirit to Virginia.
V: And its all very tongue in cheek. I mean, if someone were to say to me thirty-eight years ago, when I first opened, "First of all you have to stay here for thirty-eight years or you have to stay here for six months", I would have said, 'No way". But it’s only because it's my week, and you know, day by day, if I have a bad week or a bad day, I think, "Right that’s it, I’m closing, I’ve had enough of this, I’m moving on". Then, I look at all the shit I’d have to pack, and then I think, "Oh shit, no, another day, another week".
JL: And it is amazing. You are really dedicated to what you do, aren’t you?
V: Oh totally. It is a passion, I just love junk. It’s as simple as that. And junk became clothes and then they became fashionable junk clothes, but to me it’s always been bits of tat! But they are amazing bits of tat, whether it’s the over mantle, the dressing table, the lamps, the lamé dress, the beaded dress, the jackets, you know, blah blah blah... To me its just bits of fun. If it was normal things, everyday things, things that aren’t unique, I would last five minutes.
JL: That’s not what it’s about, is it?
V: No. I worked once, a million years ago, in Barkers selling hair ornaments for fuck's sake and I lasted three weeks because they didn’t like my dress, or my style. You know, people would just walk past and kind of give me a weird look.
JL: But here you have created a world.
V: Yes, this is just normal to me.
JL: And everything else is abnormal, which is amazing, to be a part of that world. When did you get here? How did you arrive here?
V: It was in 1971, and I was an actress in those days. This was a little village, two butchers, a baker, a proper little village, quite busy. This shop used to be a dairy, and it had been empty for six months. We noticed in the community that it had been done up and painted brown. Who painted it brown? There were bare floor boards and there was nothing in it. A friend of mine saw me outside and came downstairs and invited me in for a coffee. I walked through this empty shop and thought, "What’s happening here?" He told me that a friend of his (an antiques dealer living in the country) had bought it to open an antique shop. And we all thought that it was a bonkers thing to do. In the middle of nowhere, this area was very working class. The friend in question was pregnant, and coincidently was looking for someone to take a temporary lease while she had the baby. I asked about the rent - it was £20 a week. I thought I could just about manage that for a few weeks. I had £20, and had to borrow another twenty from someone else. I don’t think I have ever paid it back, but hey. And here am I.
JL: Brilliant.
V: I sold junk. An old hip bath I had. I lived up the road in Landsdowne Crescent, my parents had just sold their house in Hampstead and in the garage I had a mountain of stuff which had to be got rid of. So, I figured I would do this for a couple of weeks and get rid of the stuff. I had a film coming up anyway...
JL: What was the film?
V: Demons of the Mind for Hammer. I took the shop for two weeks, and the woman didn’t want to come back and wanted to know if I could stay on for another month. I didn’t open until 2 o’clock.
JL: Brilliant.
V: I was open from 2 until 10 at night as I figured I could catch the restaurant trade, which I did. It was May, so there were warm and balmy evenings. Plus, the shop faced the sun and I would sit on the stoop and get my legs brown. Then I did the film, backwards and forwards. Then I did some telly, backwards and forwards doing that. Then I went to LA for 6 weeks, then I shut, and a friend came and opened up for me. It was all very low-key.
JL: Was that how London was at that time? Was that unusual?
V: Well for my style of people, that’s very much how it was, yep. None of us had any money, none of us had a car, nobody owned a place, you didn’t have to own anything, you just sort of went with the flow, you know? My parents had just got this place in Beith and I would go backwards and forwards there and drove sometimes, sometimes go on a cheap flight. I remember filming once at the airport; a film called 'I Love You', with Peter and John Kennery, and I thought, "I’m at the bloody airport, I’ll see if I can get a flight". I got a flight and that’s sort of how we all were in those days, we took off for a week, two weeks and then came back home, made a bit of money and sped off again.
JL: Just to go back to that Hammer Horror 'scene', what was that like?
V: In those days you did a horror film because it fitted in with your life, and it was a bit of a joke - no one would ever really see it, so it would be fine. I remember doing a film in Cornwall called Cycle of Death. I think the whole film took a month, a whole feature film. I had two or three weeks on it. I learnt my lines on the way, and we did all the dialogue the following day which was an absolute nightmare, on Bodwin Moor, in some terrible little house somewhere. I remember being chased around by Ronnie Lacey, who became my best friend. I absolutely adore him, a wonderful actor. But that was the thing, in all these films you had amazing actors. They all did it because we weren’t doing anything for two or three weeks. That and the fact that you could go and stay in Cornwall and they would put you up in a nice hotel, blah blah blah... All expenses were paid, but you didn’t make much money on the films. You had a laugh and you worked with fantastic people. And then, years later, you fast forward, none of us are ever remembered for any of the quality work that we did, we are all remembered for the shit that we did! it’s hilarious.
JL: Do you mean like A Clockwork Orange?
V: Well, Clockwork is different but all these horror films, Demons of the Mind, erm, Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde... Thankfully I met my husband, Ralph Bates, on a film... But Once Upon a Time, Cycle of Death, and a few other films I did (none of them my best work), you are remembered for those. I’m not remembered for the stage stuff, for the performances at the Royal Court, or my television work.
JL: Well, the Doctor Who fans love you.
V: Yes. Well, that’s alright.
JL: That was a laugh wasn’t it? When we went to…
V: Absolutely hilarious!
JL: The fan signing, where was that? In Barking?
V: Yes, in Barking.
JL: They were the most amazing bunch of people I have ever met.
V: And I did another one with your sister Charlotte this year. We went to Manchester, no, Birmingham. Same thing, got off the plane and we were wondering where to go, then saw all these Stormtroopers, and I said to Charlie, "Let’s follow them!"
JL: I remember you once saying that your mother's career as a make-up artist fuelled your passion for film. Is this true?
V: As a kid, as a weeny kid, I was taken to Pinewood Studios. My mother was a make-up artist, and she was the first female make-up artist to be employed in this country. Mary Wetherell. I guess that’s it, I must have been four or five, maybe younger. I don’t remember anything else except being at the studios, and sitting, looking out on set, just watching. Silent. And the smell of a film studio is just magic for me. That will never, ever leave me. And I guess this shop is as near as I can still get to it.
JL: Did you idolise the women you would see there, the actresses?
V: Totally. But then, of course I totally took them for granted. I mean, I didn’t realise how iconic they were, to me it was just seeing Vivienne Leigh walking down the corridor, or someone like Marilyn, or Sophia Loren, and they came with an aura. They would arrive from Hollywood with their own make-up people. I mean, Loren, you never ever saw her in anything less than the full works, you just didn’t. She had her own mafia of people around her and they were just always super-talented. I think my mother worked on The Prince and the Showgirl. But the corridor was closed when Marilyn came on.
JL: And you have gone on to have those real-life goddesses in your life now. I mean, I know we don’t talk about who comes here and who doesn’t because you are quite private about that, but that still a part of your life.
V: Totally.
JL: And you always used to talk about your goddesses, those people around the world you know and think of as your muses.
V: Well, in a way when I’m buying I look at a dress and I think, "That will be a Nicole Kidman, she would look amazing in that". Or there will be a Daphne Guinness dress. These people are not actual fantasies because they are real people. But if I didn’t know those people they would be my fantasy of the person who would be in that gold dress, or in the lamé or whatever, and happily they come here. And they are my screen idols. My fantasy for my book, for my little shop world. And I’m sure that comes from Pinewood, sitting there. I was very friendly with one of the wardrobe ladies, Maggie, and I would sit and look at all the frocks. I remember all the period dresses, the artists would have these special things that you stand and lean against, because they couldn’t bend down or sit down, because of the corsets. And of course that is the real world of filming. And none of us really appreciate that, it's agony. I didn’t really appreciate that until I worked on horror films where you had to wear all that gear, but it's agony.
JL: But you still have to look glamorous.
V: Well, you have to talk and breathe and not faint or fall over. It’s hard.
JL: If we are talking about your fabulous fantasy people and getting into how you create an imaginary world where know you’ll be whisked off because of these parties... We used to spend hours talking about it. So, who would be at your real fantasy dinner party, and where would it be? Paris, New York, London?
V: I think I’d like to be in a stately home or a grand palace here but I don’t think there is a place, maybe Chatsworth, but probably Versailles. A bit like the Dior party two years ago, that would be cool, and that would be for the Daphne Guinnesses and yourself, all that crowd. It would have to be terribly, terribly private so that we could all go completely crazy and let our hair down. Also, in my fantasy dinner there would be a dressing-up room, and we could all go in and play.
JL: Which would you say is your most memorable fashion show? Versailles Dior?
V: No, I think the Paris opera. The first show I ever saw was Dior Couture where they had the show at the Opera House and the girls all came down the stairs and at the bottom they had champagne and lilac cakes and you sat six or seven at a table, and the girls walked around, and it was sensational!
JL: Was that Galliano’s first show for Dior?
V: Yeah. Well, I think it was. It was the first show I had ever been to. And I dressed up, I didn’t realise that you didn’t dress up, and I dressed in a lamé coat with a great big velvet collar. And the invitation said 2.30, and I got there at 2.15 and there wasn’t a soul, except me, standing outside the Paris Opera House, looking like a complete prat. A load of tourists appear, and I’m trying to disappear at this point because I look bonkers, and then people started arriving, and there were a few people that I knew, fashion stylists and editors, and they were just wearing little black raincoats carrying little black bags, and flat shoes, and I’m dressed in fantasy land. I felt so stupid until we went in and it could have been made of me. The whole thing, down to the fantastic extras leaning over the balcony. They had these beautiful boys and girls, then the show started and they were all wearing my gear, and I looked like one of the extras. I was so relieved after that. But then I had to go outside again.
JL: I remember the first Dior Couture show you took me to in Paris, and it is just beyond anything else, you kind of think, "What’s the point?" when you see the work there.
V: Yes, I guess for you as a designer it must be insane, but there is a point.
JL: No, that’s what I mean, there is a point. How could you compare to such amazing work? It’s just... It is art really.
V: Totally. Every piece is a work of art, a major creation, really.
JL: And hugely inspiring as well.
V: And inspiring for me too, in buying and finding stuff, because I would think Galliano, even if it’s sort of something with a wrecked piece of silk tullé, I think John would love that. Whereas in the old days, before I might not have bothered with it. But now that’s part of the glamour. When he gets there, and you both look at something together, you want to bring that thing alive again.
JL: And you get inspired by the whole story of it as well. I was going to ask, because I know that you love Eastenders, and I thought that was really funny…
V: Yes, it’s my favourite. Actually can we hurry up because there’s a really important episode on soon.
JL: (laughs) So who is your Eastenders style icon?
V: Style icon? I don’t know that I really get anything from them, in a way, its all so dreadful that it's riveting. I don’t want to be any of those people, or if I met any of those people in real life I would just get a cab, and get out of there fast. I have long conversations with about five friends and we go on and on about how Ian did this, and then Peggy what is she doing, kissing Archie..?
JL: it’s kind of like a little Eastenders set here in this square.
V: Yes, it is.
Virginia's.
98 Portland Road, Holland Park, London, W11 4LQ
Tel: 020 7727 9908
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