Norman conquest
Words | Joanna Hunter From the 1920s to the 1970s Sir Norman Hartnell created famously glamorous, trend-setting dresses for British royalty and high society. His influence can still be seen today, including at this month’s London Fashion Week THE LATE FRENCH couturier Christian Dior said: “Whenever I try to think of something particularly beautiful, I think always of those lovely dresses [...]
Words | Joanna Hunter
From the 1920s to the 1970s Sir Norman Hartnell created famously glamorous,
trend-setting dresses for British royalty and high society. His influence can still be seen today, including
at this month’s London Fashion Week
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THE LATE FRENCH couturier Christian Dior
said: “Whenever I try to think of something
particularly beautiful, I think always of those
lovely dresses that Mr Hartnell made for your
beautiful Queen when she visited Paris.”
This is not an accolade that many English dress designers
might hope to extract from a French rival. Then again, it
wasn’t simply that Sir Norman Hartnell, born in 1901, was
one of the first designers to create statement frocks and
a strong bond with the British Royal Family – in particular
Queen Elizabeth II and the Queen Mother. Arguably, he could
be credited with making London a couture capital in a way
that only Paris had been considered beforehand.
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Yet, it is quite possible that you have never heard of him,
which is why a new book celebrating the designer’s life and
works, Be dazzled! Norman Hartnell: Sixty Years Of Glamour
And Fashion by Michael Pick, a fellow of the Royal Society of
Arts, is a perfect introduction to him.
The coffee table tome is a glossy collection of outstanding
photographs, newspaper cuttings and diary entries (showing
appointments with the Queen, whose intricately decorated
wedding dress and Coronation gown he most famously
designed, the Queen Mother and Princess Margaret all in one
week), as well as invitations, stills from films for which he
designed the costumes and colour swatches.
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Pick charts Hartnell’s progression from his early years
growing up in the south London suburb of Streatham,
the son of publican parents, to his establishment as the
darling of the upper classes and beyond.
A dress designer almost by accident (he had gone to
Cambridge to read modern languages with the aim of
becoming an architect, but spent more time devising
costumes for the Footlights Review drama club than
studying – leading to him being ejected without a degree),
Hartnell could neither cut nor sew, yet he was able to design
frocks – particularly evening gowns and later wedding dresses
– with such grace and attention to detail that women
swooned. “He was the designer who made every woman look
like a fairy queen,” remarked the late romantic novelist Dame
Barbara Cartland, one of his longest-standing clients.
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Most of all, Hartnell understood the power of glamour.
“When I gulped hot chocolate with Mistinguett [the French
musical star] in her Piccadilly hotel boudoir and sipped weak
tea with Mae West at the Savoy,” Hartnell noted, “I found
that both these glamorous women were intelligent and
charming, but I realised how much of their great fame and
fortune they owed to an excess of sequins and dazzle.”
src="http://www.bmivoyager.com/images/2008/Feb/071_voyager_feb_08.jpg" height="175" alt="An early evening dress from 1925 with draped panels at the back and a fine gauze wrap weighted with ostrich feathers.">
It was this very love of abundant sparkle that made him
a designer fit for a queen. Hartnell’s first royal commission
came when he dressed the young Princesses Elizabeth and
Margaret Rose as bridesmaids for the wedding of the Duke
of Gloucester to Lady Alice Montagu-Douglas-Scott in 1935.
It was the beginning of a relationship that was to blossom
and encompass most of the major events in the Royal
Family’s life, as chapters entitled The Queen’s Dressmaker,
From Princess to Queen, Coronation Couture, The Royal
Tours and The Younger Sister show. Hartnell’s creations
were also instrumental in shaping the royals’ image, both
at home and abroad, a role that was recognised with a
knighthood in 1977, two years before his death.
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Yet Hartnell’s influence was by no means restricted to
the rarefied upper circle. Pick writes: “Eventually, his name
appeared on belts, bags, knitwear, dress and embroidery
patterns, cosmetics, nylon stockings, nightwear, menswear,
jewellery, sunglasses and hairspray.”
src="http://www.bmivoyager.com/images/2008/Feb/072_voyager_feb_08.jpg" height="161" alt="A show-stopping design shows how Hartnell excelled at creating evening dresses for grand occasions">
Today, Hartnell’s influence is not forgotten – as witnessed
by the strengthening presence of glamorous evening
dresses on the London fashion scene.
Be Dazzled! Norman Hartnell, Sixty Years Of Glamour And
Fashion by Michael Pick (£60, Pointed Leaf Press) is out now
A new frock star
Words | Robina Dam
Red-carpet glitz is more popular than ever and just as Sir Norman Hartnell took glamour to a different
level, now a raft of UK-based talent is continuing the wave, including dress designer Ashley Isham
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AMONG THE NEW generation of fashion
designers specialising in glamorous evening
wear is Ashley Isham (left), whose frocks have
been worn by celebrities such as Kylie Minogue,
Camilla Rutherford and Myleene Klass. Tagged
the “darling of drapery” by fashion pundits
because of his lavish use of flowing jersey
swathes, Isham takes inspiration from the
stars of Hollywood’s heyday and gives them
a contemporary twist. For example, for his
current Spring/Summer 2008 collection, which
he showed at London’s Royal Opera House last
season, he took a sci-fitheme to his designs.
Born in Singapore, Isham studied at Central
St Martin’s and London College of Fashion and
quickly decided that high-octane glamour was
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going to be his signature. Although only 29, Isham’s
new collections for the Autumn/Winter 2008 season,
which he is showing during this month’s London
Fashion Week, show that he has developed into almost
a veteran since his debut collection in 2000. And now
his fashions are going further afield, as younger royals
from both the British and international royal families
are turning to him for red carpet occasions.
London Fashion Week, 10-16 February 2008;
www.londonfashionweek.co.uk
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ASHLEY ISHAM STOCKISTS |
London
Aquaint 18 Conduit Street, London W1,
+44 (0)20 7499 9658; www.aquaint.org
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Riyadh
Al Multaka
Fatma Al Zahra Road, West Al Rabwa,
Riyadh, +966 1 478 3388
Silhouette Fashions at Harvey Nicho
321-B, 3rd Floor, Olaya Akaria 1, Musa Bin Nussair
Street, Saha Jammal, Riyadh, +966 1 419 1477
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Moscow
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+7499 249 6127; www.plumage.ru
