IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

AN ORAL HISTORY OF BRITISH FASHION

Percy Savage

Interviewed by Linda Sandino

C1046/09

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THE NATIONAL LIFE STORY COLLECTION

INTERVIEW SUMMARY SHEET

Ref. No.: C1046/09 Playback No.: F15198-99; F15388-90; F15531-35; F15591-92

Collection title: An Oral History of British Fashion

Interviewee’s surname: Savage Title: Mr

Interviewee’s forenames: Percy Sex:

Occupation: Date of birth: 12.10.1926

Mother’s occupation: Father’s occupation:

Date(s) of recording: 04.06.2004; 11.06.2004; 02.07.2004; 09.07.2004; 16.07.2004

Location of interview:

Name of interviewer: Linda Sandino

Type of recorder: Marantz

Total no. of tapes: 12 Type of tape: C60

Mono or stereo: stereo Speed:

Noise reduction: Original or copy: original

Additional material:

Copyright/Clearance: Interview is open. Copyright of BL

Interviewer’s comments:

Percy Savage Page 1 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1)

Tape 1 Side A [part 1]

.....to plug it in?

No we don’t. Not unless something goes wrong.

[inaudible] see well enough, because I can put the [inaudible] light on, if you like?

Yes, no, lovely, lovely, thank you. Could I ask you to tell me your full name and...

Yes, the name is Donald Percival Savage. And I was born, Ipswich, which is a town outside of Brisbane, which is the capital of Queensland in Australia.

Thank you. What sort of, what sort of place was Ipswich?

It was very much a sort of industrial town on the banks of the river, which I think eventually became a tributary to the Brisbane River, and was a... Both my mother and father were born there, and they met after the First World War, when my father was in the Army and my mother’s father was in the Army, so they met on the return trip from Europe to Australia. And I think that as they came from the same town, it was very sort of natural that they should meet up again back in Ipswich, and that’s how my mother and father met. And then they were married in 1924, and I was born in 1926. And they went, she went back to... My father had bought a farm miles away from anywhere, so she went back to her home town to have the baby.

And where was the farm?

Oh the farm was in a place called Brookfield, which was in what is called the Greater Brisbane Area, but it was actually very much in the bush, because Brisbane was only a small town, and we were a good thirty-five miles from the town, which was all a wooded area and farms, and then eventually you got into the town and there was only, Brisbane was only a small town then. But, today the Brookfield area where I was born is one of the very upper class, rich suburbs now. No longer a farming area.

Percy Savage Page 2 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1)

And, can you remember the house that you grew up in?

Yes, it was a typical Australian house in that it was built on stilts, built on the side of a hill, side of a mountain, and, and there were...I think that was basically because of the, it gave greater air-conditioning, and it was, they had no such thing as....you just, for air-conditioning you left the windows open and a draught came through, so, this way you had air circulating around the entire house. The house was entirely surrounded by a big veranda, big wide veranda, which also helped with the climate. And people lived up on the first...on the ground floor, which was raised about twelve feet above the ground at one side of the house, and at the back, only about six feet above the ground.

And do you have any sort of images of, of your life growing up?

Childhood there?

Mm.

Yes. Eventually, eventually... We originally had education by correspondence, that’s to say that they used to send exam papers and material to my mother and she would teach the children. I had two other sisters. And eventually, I think my father received a letter from a local school which was the other side of the mountain saying that if they didn’t send their children they’d have to close the school. So all three children were packed off to school. And I actually went to school, I think at about the age of ten. And my other sister was then, she would have been eight and the other one would have been six. So all three of them, the two of them had ponies and I used to walk on foot and take them up the hill and down the other side, and go to school, and then come back in the evening. It was a long trek to get to school.

So how long was it?

Oh it took a good hour to, to cross, you know, a good hour walking to school, and a good hour back again, at least.

Percy Savage Page 3 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1)

And through, through woods and...?

Oh through, through forests and woods, yes. Mm.

What...can you just, for the purposes of the tape, tell me your parents’ names?

Well my father was called Percival Savage, Percival James, and my mother was called Marjorie Agnes. And, she was of English origin, and my father was of Scottish and Irish, Northern Irish origin, from Enniskillen. And they’d been out there for some... My father, my father was born in Australia; my mother was born in Australia, but her father was born in Stafford, Staffordshire in England.

And did you know your grandparents?

Oh yes, we used to stay with them at Christmas time, and other holiday times, and so on. Oh they were lovely people.

Could you describe them?

My mother’s father was a chemist, he was a... And my father’s father was a, he had originally started as a young man as a gold miner, and then made a lot of money so he bought a lot of land, and on that land he found, they found coal, so it became quite a rich area. And he, he had always been all his life, after being...he learnt the wrought iron business, and he used to make railings and balconies for houses, and railings for fences, and staircases, and, things like that. And I remember vividly he had a forge where he used to shoe the horses, because the only transport they had in those days were sulkies and carts and horses, so... Eventually my father bought a little car. But he also had a huge great wagon for taking produce to the markets, when he had to cut the bunches of bananas and take them into the markets, and I used to go in with him as a child when he went to market. Because he had about 2,000 acres of land, and, about 100 acres of that was all bananas, and then there was another 100-odd acres of pawpaws and pineapples, and then they had another fruit they called custard fruit which was a delicious fruit that was, you know... And then we had a few cows, and, a few chickens and turkeys and ducks and things in the farmyard. I used to milk the Percy Savage Page 4 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1) cows every morning, and then, what they call separate the milk, you pour the milk into a machine and turn a handle and that would separate the cream, which would come out one spout, and the milk which would come out of another spout. And then, ferment the milk to make it into curds to feed to the chickens. Oh there was a lot of interesting farm work to do. And then I went to work originally, after that I went out to work on the plantation and help with the farming.

So how...how many other people were involved on the farm?

There were...this...this was during the war, and we had some prisoners of war, we had, I remember we had two Russian prisoners of war, and two German boys, had been in, you know, imprisoned in Australia, and then they put them out to work on the farms, because they needed then practically all the labour they could find, all the men to join the Army, so there was nobody left to work anywhere, so they took the prisoners out of the internment camps and gave them to the farms to let them work.

And what was that like, having...?

Oh it was... I didn’t realise exactly what prisoners were; they were very nice young men, and they spoke English very well. But... And then after that I went to a secondary school, from going to the primary school with my sisters I went to a secondary school, back in Ipswich, which was what was called the Ipswich Boys’ Grammar School, which was a very grand establishment. And, where I learnt to play football for a short time, because after that when I went back home again there weren’t enough boys around to form a football team. (laughs) So after that I used to play tennis a lot. And then from there I got a scholarship... Well I started studying art in Brisbane, and, painted and had exhibitions with other painters. And then I got a scholarship to go and study in Sydney, which was a few hundred miles away. And I was at a college called Knox, which was a very Protestant Presbyterian college, and I was a student there, teaching at the school, but at the same time going to a secondary school called East Sydney Technical College, or as they sometimes call it, Darlinghurst, which was the name of the area where it was. And, from there I won another, after three years I won a scholarship to come to London, to go to the Slade, and that was in 1947. Percy Savage Page 5 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1)

But before, before we go there...

Right.

Could we come back a bit?

Yes.

Could you, could you tell me what sort of, what sort of person your father was?

Well he’d been an officer, he’d been a colonel in the Australian Army in what were called the Engineers. And, he was a very good businessman at the same time as being I suppose quite a good farmer. And he started to organise the other Australian farmers in Queensland, to try and get good marketing conditions for their produce, both in fresh merchandise and also in the canned products, you know, canned pineapples and things like that. And he occasionally had to come, he came to, to Europe when I was living in France, he came to London to, to talk about what they used to call in those days the Empire Trade Preferences, which meant that they were able to buy from Australia at a reduced rate, rather than buy from America. And so they had preference, preferential treatment. And also in the buying of materials such as tin for making the tins to put their pineapples in. And he was a good businessman, and a good farmer.

Did he ever talk about why he had chosen farming?

No, I don’t think we ever had time to talk about that, because he used to travel quite a lot, but he, he did love the farm, he loved the land. And, he was very disappointed that I chose the art world, and later on the fashion world, because he wanted me to carry on his farm and so on. So eventually they sold all the property that he had there, and moved into town, moved into Brisbane.

And, well why did they move into Brisbane rather than Ipswich, do you think?

Percy Savage Page 6 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1)

Oh, well, Ipswich was a very small, provincial little town, and Brisbane was a much more exciting town. I don’t think my mother would have gone back to Ipswich. And I think by that time also, his parents in Ipswich had both died, and her parents in Ipswich had both died, so there was no great attraction for going back to Ipswich.

What did your father look like?

He was taller than I am. I mean, I’m six foot four and he was six foot six. And my mother was only about five foot eight, so, there was quite a difference between them. They were a lovely couple, very, very lovely. But I don’t think she would have gone, wanted to go back and live in Ipswich, she was too much...she was very social, loved sport, loved tennis, and used to play in... No no, she was much more suited to the life in Brisbane than she would have been for Ipswich.

And what did...what did she do on the farm, did she take any part in...?

Not a great deal, no. I mean she was looking after three children, and as I said, we had the education by correspondence, so she, a lot of her time was taken up basically for looking after the children. Occasionally she would go and work a little bit, but not on the farm itself, no, she was... And she had a very big garden, so she would spend a lot of time gardening. She loved gardening.

And did she have help in the house?

No, we never had any house help, no. Apart from the occasional visiting Aboriginals. And then occasionally they would come by and sort of, you know, just sit outside and, she’d invite the girl in, and the girl would help wash the dishes and so on. But they were, they were very, how shall I say, unreliable, you couldn’t say, ‘You can come and work for a week,’ they’d work for a day, or they might start work for a week and stay there three weeks, I mean... But then they used to also eat with us and so on. When I say eat with us, not necessarily in the house, but I mean we would provide food for them. But they weren’t regular, I mean they would come and go whenever it suited them to wander round. But she never had any house help, no.

Percy Savage Page 7 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1)

And did...

And then she used to do all the washing herself, which was... When I say washing, the washing of my father’s working clothes. There was a huge great copper vat under the house, as I said, the house was raised, and she would stoke a fire and put all the clothes into there, and there was a wooden pole, sort of, push and, you know... And then she’d drum all that against a laundry board, and take them out and hang them on the clothes line in the garden. So she... No, she was very busy, she was by no means a lazy, unoccupied lady, but she had no home help, no.

And what sort of meals did she cook?

We used to eat a lot of meat, and of course eggs, we had masses of eggs, I don’t...and vegetables, you know, we would grow our own vegetables, grow our own peas and beans and potatoes, and broad beans and... We used to eat a lot of fruit, we’d have fruit and, you know, an entire pineapple per person, you know, for breakfast in the morning. And I remember they used to prepare those at night time, because, they would cut the top off the pineapple, and then spoon all the inside out, and then push it all back in, and put it in the fridge, so you’d have a lovely iced pineapple for breakfast in the morning. Or pawpaws, we used to eat pawpaws galore, as, you know, half a pawpaw, a large thing. And then we had melons, we used to grow melons a lot. And citrus, we had quite a lot of citrus trees, oranges and lemons. I remember we had fig trees growing there also. And of course the entire house was surrounded by a large orchard of custard apple trees which were delicious to eat, we used to eat those. And we had very very good food, wonderful food.

And, did you learn how to cook?

Not a lot, not very, no. (laughs) No I didn’t cook much in Australia, I didn’t cook much as a student. I learnt, I basically picked up cooking when I arrived in France, when I needed to sort of economise, and, occasionally went to restaurants but I used to cook a lot at home in France.

Percy Savage Page 8 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1)

Well we’ll definitely pick that up later. What about your sort of childhood friends, who...?

Very few, because we were living in the country and there were no close neighbours. Very few. But, I used, when I went to school, I had one or two friends at school, and then I came back home from school and, back living in the country, and we... Our nearest neighbours were well over a mile away. And the nearest neighbours had boys younger, they had twin boys younger than I was, and they weren’t much fun.

So what would you do, what...how would you amuse yourself?

Well I used to take my sisters out exploring. I was very fond of plants and wildlife and wild ferns and orchids which grew in the wild forests around the property, and I used to take them out, and we’d gather bags full of ferns and things and bring them back home and plant them. So... But I didn’t have much in the way of childhood boyfriends in Australia.

And so what are your sisters’ names?

The eldest is called Mary, Mary Agnes, and the youngest is called Bettina, Bettina Marjorie. And they both married, and, Mary has just celebrated her golden wedding anniversary, and Bettina married and then divorced and then changed her name back from her married name. Her married name was Morphet, but she’d had three children, and she decided to keep the Morphet bit but add on the Savage name, so she calls herself Morphet Savage, and she’s a physiotherapist and still practising.

And where are they living?

Oh they’re both, both in Queensland, Bettina’s living in Brisbane. And, Mary married a man called Hal Golden, who was a cattle rancher, and they have thousands and thousands of acres of land in central Queensland, and raise cattle. And they’ve had years and years and years and years and years of difficulty, because of drought, drought, drought, drought, drought, all the time. But, they still go on, and, still produce cattle and... They round up the cattle on motorbikes and little aeroplanes Percy Savage Page 9 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1) now. They don’t do it on horseback any more. (laughs) And they get other farmers locally to come and help them, so you will get three or four motorbikes arriving from other farms and they’ll work there for a week, and then when they’re doing their driving, my brother-in-law, Hal Golden, will drive miles to their place and help on a motorbike and help them round up their cattle. And I’ve been there once at a round- up and it’s quite exciting, very.

Do you ride a motorbike, have you ridden one?

I used to, yes, I used to years ago, in France I had a motorbike. But not for years.

Were your parents at all sort of religious, would you say, were they interested in...?

They were, up to a point, they were strongly Protestant, my father’s parents. And my mother’s parents were very strongly Anglican. But I think they developed into, you know, when... I went to both churches, depending on where I was staying for holidays, if I was staying with my father’s parents I went to their very strict Presbyterian church, or if I was staying with the other parents, we went to their rather grander and more beautiful church which was the Church of England church. And then when I came to France, eventually I got married and my first wife was a Catholic, and we got married in London, in the French church in London, Leicester Place. And then she divorced me, and, I married a second time and I married, again a Catholic, who was Polish, who was an actress, and we married in France, in the Mairie du Neuvième in the local town hall. So, I had two Catholic wives and different parents, so I’m a bit of a mix of everything. (laughs)

What are you now?

Well I still go, occasionally I go to the Farm Street church, which is a Catholic church in Mayfair, because I like the church and I know one or two of the priests there, and I... There is a very convenient little Catholic church not very far from me, but it’s a very dull little place so I don’t like to go there. (laughs) I think it depends very much upon whom you’ve got as a, as an orchestra leader, where you like to play your, you know... But Farm Street’s a very, a very lovely church, very nice. And occasionally I Percy Savage Page 10 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1) go to the other, rather grand Catholic one which is the Brompton Oratory, again because I know a few people who go there. But I don’t really go to any of the Protestant churches in London. And then I used to go to St Etheldreda’s, which is a rather grand Catholic church over in, oh near Holborn. I don’t know whether you know that or not, but, it’s the oldest Catholic church, that didn’t convert to Christian...to...when I say Christianity, didn’t join the English church. And that’s lovely. It’s, it’s in Ely Place. It’s basically part of, of Cambridgeshire, this little Ely Place is. There was a thing on the radio about it the other day, how it’s a place within a place, you know.

No I don’t know, I don’t know that one. I must go and have a look.

Oh it’s a lovely church, yes, very nice. And then I think it’s...because I also have a few friends who are Catholic in London, not, not a great many, I mean it’s, every religion, but... The landlady of this house is French, and I knew her when she was a child in Paris, and then she married an Englishman called Tom Chetwynd, and he’s a writer, and she’s a painter, and they live six months of the year in England during winter and then they go back to live in France, she’s in France now. And she’s Catholic, and, so I go to church with her. And he’s very Catholic also. Although he’s, I think now he’s into Zen Buddhism or something like that, but he’s a very religious person.

And do you think your parents had any view about you sort of marrying a Catholic?

Oh they weren’t very happy about it, not at all, not at all, no no no, no, they didn’t, they weren’t very happy about it. (laughs)

Did they come over to your first wedding?

No, no, and they didn’t come over for the second wedding either, no. But they eventually met, you know, and then, we had a daughter and they were very, you know, very fond of my daughter. My daughter’s had a baby, so all that went very well as far as they’re concerned. But both my parents are dead now, so I mean it’s Percy Savage Page 11 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1) a...but the rest of the family all liked my wife, and, and my daughter, very much. No no, she was welcome in the family.

And what’s your daughter’s name?

Katherine. And she had a baby, and he’s called Riley, for some reason. (laughs) Not a family name on either side, but it’s a lovely name.

So, just to go back to your grandparents. Could you sort of, describe their houses, you know, what going to visit them during the holidays was like?

[coughing] Well their houses were very similar, that is to say, they were typical Australian. They were raised off the ground, surrounded by gardens, and, big, you know, again with verandas all around, and they were very typical Australian houses. They still build them exactly the same way today in Australia, and I think it’s a very sensible way. Especially for the air-conditioning for the, for the climate. And reasonably comfortably furnished, you know, I mean... I remember my father’s parents had an organ, and we used to play Sunday mornings, they played the organ, and we sang hymns, which were a little bit early in the day, but still. (laughs) They were quite severely Protestant, Scottish Protestants, you know, very much.

Were they sort of strict at all in how you were asked to...?

Oh yes, you couldn’t whistle on a Sunday, you couldn’t run on a Sunday, you couldn’t play in the garden on a Sunday. No no no. You had to, you know, be very sober and... And go to Sunday school in the afternoon, and go to church in the evening. So it was a... But other than that, they were... They were very kind, and very happy, and very loving, and... My father’s mother was a very good cook, she was a great cook, it was lovely staying with her. No they were both, both grandparents were lovely people to know as a youngster.

So were you sort of happy to go to either of them?

Percy Savage Page 12 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1)

Oh yes, I was quite happy with either, yes. Oh yes, I mean, oh, they were good fun. And I was able to, you know, enjoy myself and...

And what about your mother’s parents? What was her maiden name?

Hall. h-a-l-l. And, well her father was a pharmacist, he was a chemist, and I used to love to go along to his little chemist shop, he had a shop on the main street in Ipswich, and, a lovely little shop with a roll-top desk at the back and a counter in the front and great big blue glass containers, it was a very beautiful, spectacular looking shop. And he used to sell pills or potions and things there, he was... He used to smoke a pipe, which was... He was a very good-looking man, and I did portraits of him when I was a child.

You haven’t got any hanging here, have you?

No, no. None of my paintings are hanging here, I haven’t got one single, not even... I... Somewhere I think there might be some drawings in an old folder or something like that, but I... No, all of these are paintings that I’ve bought from other people. Oh there’s one, this is one, a portrait of me here, that’s... And that one up there is by Patrick Procktor, who was a well-known painter, and that’s another portrait of me. And then in the kitchen there’s another one of, portrait of me by Jean Cocteau in Paris, which, it’s a lithograph actually, it’s not a painting. But, no they’re all either...they’re all paintings I’ve bought actually.

Oh, they’re wonderful. And who is that portrait of?

That’s a portrait of somebody called Prudence Glynn.

Oh.

Who was Lady Windlesham. Her husband David Windlesham is the head of the Hennessy clan, you know the Irish family, and they own that French brandy called Hennessy. Which now belongs to the French conglomerate called LVHM, that’s Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy. And she was married to him. And she was the Percy Savage Page 13 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1) fashion editor of the Times, but, and she had her portrait painted, and shown in an exhibition, and I bought it. She was a good, very good friend, she wrote a few books and she was a very good friend. She is now dead. And her daughter, Victoria, is now working as the press officer for Gucci in Italy.

Just to go back for a moment to your, to, to your maternal grandparents.

Yes.

So, were you allowed to whistle on a Sunday there?

Oh yes, yes yes yes yes yes. No, they had no, no restrictions about that whatsoever, no no no no. And both my grandmother and grandfather, he smoked a pipe and she smoked cigarettes; whereas my father’s family, neither of them smoked, and they disapproved of it very much. Whereas my father and mother both smoked. (laughs) So we had to be very careful when we stayed there, they couldn’t smoke. (laughs) No no, but I got used to that. I didn’t smoke at that age anyway, so I didn’t mind.

And so, which of your parents would you say was, if either of them, was the disciplinarian?

Oh my mother was a very strong disciplinarian. I remember she always used to have a, a willow stick behind a painting, sitting on the wires, and you know, she used to rattle that stick, and I’d then be careful, otherwise she’d get it out and whip you across the calves, you know, across your backside or... (laughs) No she was quite strict, but we were probably all, you know, naughty little children. So she didn’t...didn’t have to use it often, but... No my father wasn’t a very strong disciplinarian, I mean I don’t think so, no, I don’t remember any... I mean, not really, no.

So what was... Actually I’m just about to turn over, but I’ll ask the question on this side.

Yes.

Percy Savage Page 14 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side A (part 1)

What was it like, sort of, being taught at home, you know, I mean, can you remember what kind of lessons and things you...?

Well, yes, my mother used to receive, whatever the lessons it was, by correspondence, it was all typed. And she would either, geography or history or, English, and she would teach us. And she had three children of different ages that she had to teach simultaneously. And we had to do our homework, and then she would have to post it back to them for, for correction and examinations and so on. So I think it was a great relief when we eventually were packed off to school.

[End of Tape 1 Side A] Percy Savage Page 15 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2

Tape 1 Side B [part 2]

And which did you prefer, going to school or having your lessons at home?

Oh I much preferred going to school. I mean first, it was the first real introduction to other, other children, you know, they were neighbours, although they all came from within, eight to ten miles away you see. The two, the twin boys living next door, they used to go over their hill to go to the school; we went over our hill to go to the school. And that was called Upper Brookfield, because the area where we lived was called Brookfield. And Brookfield was actually about eight miles away from our house, at the end of what was called Savage Road, it was a road built by my father, and it was called Savage Road and still is. So, it was at school that I actually sort of began to meet the other, other neighbour children. And occasionally we were invited out to the, you know, they’d have a, a school concert, and we’d go to the concert, and have to sing or dance or play the piano, or, whatever we were able to do. My sister was a very good pianist; my mother was a very good pianist and had taught the...the two girls learnt music from my mother, I didn’t.

And why was that do you think?

I don’t think there was really time. You know, I was out working on the farm a bit, and, the two girls, they stayed at home.

Would you like to have learnt a musical instrument?

I think I would have enjoyed, yes, I think I would have, but I think I would have enjoyed basically, the clarinet or the oboe, I liked wind instruments more than... I wouldn’t have wanted to be a violinist, although I love the violin, and I...the piano is, is rather fun, yes, but I mean... We had a piano, so that was why they learnt to play the piano.

And did your parents listen to music on the radio at all?

Percy Savage Page 16 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2

Well when we were...in the Thirties the radio didn’t sort of exist. We had a, what was called a crystal set, and you had to use earphones to listen to it, and only one person at a time could listen to the radio. And it was a very tinny little thing. Yes, we didn’t get a proper radio until much later. We didn’t have a telephone until, about 1940, and I think we had a radio during the late Thirties, but it was, as I said, a one-person instrument.

And where was the, where was the telephone placed?

Our telephone was on a hook, on a wall, down near the front of the house, as opposed to, the kitchen and the breakfast room were up at the back of the house. The back of the house was the top end of the house where the, sort of closest to the ground, was only six feet off the ground. The front of the house was twelve feet off the ground, but that was the front of the house, which had a very very long staircase going down to the garden, but nobody ever used it. But that’s where the cloakroom was, that’s where they had the hat rack and everything else, so, the telephone was down there for some reason.

Did your parents entertain?

Oh a lot. Well, people would come in the evenings for dinner, or they would come out, definitely weekends. People would come out from, for weekends, and we’d see them.

Who, what sort of people?

Grandparents would come, and occasionally they’d come and stay with us.

And would...

Not so much my mother’s family, because, my grandfather had to look after his shop, but my father’s parents, they came to stay.

What about other farmers, farming families? Percy Savage Page 17 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2

Occasionally the odd other farming family would come, yes, not many. There were one or two I think my father used to see and like, and they would come, but, they were... They didn’t like the... The closest neighbour was a family called Perot[ph], and, then there was a, the next one, about, another mile further on was one called, Braun I think it was called, or Brun. And they didn’t like them at all, because they were Jehovah Witnesses, and my father didn’t approve of that. So we didn’t see them.

What about your room, can you remember what your room was like, and what, what it had in it?

As a child? No, I didn’t really have a room. I used to sleep on a bed on the veranda. And my clothes were kept inside in a cupboard, alongside my sisters’ clothes. They had a room, they shared, they shared a big double bed, and they had a room. My mother and father had a room, again it was part of the veranda, but a sort of, closed off. And then, next to their place was the bathroom, and that was next to the kitchen, and then that was next to the breakfast room, and then that was next to the dining room, which was a very big, long room, and that was next to the, the drawing room, and then that gave on to the cloakroom down at the front of the house, at the top of the steep stairs. And the veranda went around the house.

So, is it ever cold in, in Queensland? What happened when it was cold?

Oh it can be, yes, I mean, now that their winter coming there, I mean it can be below zero, it can be, Celsius.

So where would you sleep when...?

I would sleep outside, certainly.

Even in the cold?

Percy Savage Page 18 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2

Yes, they’d put on an extra, extra bedspread on, an extra duvet. We didn’t have duvets but we had eiderdowns. No no, it was...

And what was the reasoning behind...? I can’t quite understand the reasoning behind you sleeping on the veranda.

Well that’s where I was put. I mean, there were two different beds on the veranda, and there were...there was another big double bed which was considered to be a guest bedroom, where the parents and grandparents would stay when they came. But, I was never... I was in there I think when I...if and when I was ever ill, I was sort of put into there. You know, I mean, I might have been ill for something, had my tonsils out or something or other, when I’d come home from hospital I’d be put into the big double bed in the guest room.

And how did you feel when that happened?

Well I didn’t particularly like that big double bed, because it was too high, I couldn’t climb up into it. (laughs) I was very happy on the veranda. And very private, you know, I mean I, nobody else would be... Because my two little sisters were tucked away in another room, my mother and father were tucked away, so I was nice and private there.

Did you have any particular sort of possessions, or toys that you were sort of fond of?

Not really, not toys, no. I never had a bicycle, although I had a horse, which was wonderful. Eventually I had a horse, because as I said, when I first went to school my, each of my sisters had horses, but I didn’t. And eventually I had a horse, so I mean I was very happy with my horse. Then I did leave home you see, I left home, I left home when I was, seventeen, went to live in Brisbane for a while, and then, worked in Brisbane as a waiter or doing various things, delivering the mail, I was a postman for a while, and then I left and went to Sydney. So if I’d...you know, my... And my sisters stayed on, and eventually, went to secondary school, and eventually got degrees and became very professionals, and, and married and went on to make families. I went on to Paris and, worked in the couture, and... Percy Savage Page 19 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2

So was there any, anybody in your family who, who was interested in art?

Not... Yes, I mean, the various aunts and uncles were all very encouraging about the fact that I wanted to paint. They were all very encouraging. My mother was quite encouraging, she was quite happy with, you know, when I... I mean the family still have some of the early work I did when I was, you know, sixteen, seventeen.

And these aunts and uncles were from both sides of the family, or...?

No, there was never any great, either, on either side really, not...there were no painters or musicians or, not really.

No, sorry, I meant, were these aunts and uncles on both your...

Oh yes.

...sides, your...

Yes. Mainly my mother’s side, yes.

So she...

My father only had one brother, and, he had two sons, one of whom was a pilot during the war and was, although born in Ipswich in Australia, he was shot down over England on the way back from Germany and he was buried in Ipswich in England, which is rather a coincidence. And then he had a, a brother, who became a priest – or, not a priest, became a minister, and carried on the Protestant family tradition. But my mother had four brothers and two sisters, and they all became, you know, doctors, dentists, and, lawyers and so on.

And so, you had encouragement from them.

Percy Savage Page 20 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2

I had encouragement from them, yes. Yes, we used to see them and they were quite, quite encouraging.

When did you discover you had an ability for art?

Well I began to draw very young, I began to draw, as a youngster. And, did drawing at school, and, began to paint, you know, bought various paints, and met other young people who painted, and... Then as I said, I left at seventeen, went to live in Brisbane, and met lots of young painters, and from there, after, you know, quickly after a year, went to Sydney.

But when you were living on the farm...

I used to paint when I was living on the farm. Oh yes, I used to go out and paint the trees, and paint the, the animals, and I used to, also I used to paint from books. I remember I’d go through books and pick, you know, get a, the head of a, an Irish setter or, head of a man, and paint from photography.

What sort of books were around when you were growing up, on the farm?

Oh we had, my mother had a very good, big library, lots, lots and lots of books.

And how did she acquire those?

Well she was, she had been working as a teacher, so I think, you know, she just, she was a... I think she just liked books, naturally liked them. Not, not just books for reading, but I mean, all sorts of books, about history and... No, she was... I used to read a lot of her books. My father was never particularly bookish, and his family didn’t have many, many books, no.

But did your father have any hobbies?

[pause] I know he used to like shooting, he used to go out on rifle ranges with people, and go, and go shooting. He was a very good shot. Percy Savage Page 21 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2

And would you ever go with him?

He nearly, he nearly... I... Well, no, I, I went with him on one or two occasions, yes, I mean... But, we used to have quite a few deer on our property, that had been introduced and had gone wild, so he used to go and shoot the odd deer, and eventually bring something home, it was...we’d have venison occasionally on the menu. (laughs)

So, I hadn’t realised your mother had trained as a teacher. Had she taught after the...?

Well that was probably during the First War, before she got married, she was a teacher, yes. She didn’t teach afterwards, no.

Where did she teach?

She taught at the Ipswich Girls’ Grammar School. (laughs) Good old Ipswich. And I haven’t been back there since I left Australia, I haven’t been back to Ipswich.

Do you....

I’ve been back to Brisbane quite frequently, but not to Ipswich.

And why not?

Well, there’s nothing...I don’t know anybody living there, you know, and the idea of going back and looking at a little provincial town, no, it’s not... No, I’ve been to many other places in Australia but not Ipswich, no. But Brookfield, where I was born, and, or rather where, where I was brought up, and Brisbane, they’re both very lovely towns now, very lovely. Brisbane’s a lovely town. Although I prefer Sydney, Sydney’s much more beautiful. Sydney’s quite spectacular, it’s wonderful.

Did you ever sort of, as a family go, go to Sydney? Would that be the sort of thing you would have done? Percy Savage Page 22 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2

No, never, no. My father used to go, but... And he... I remember he and my mother went once, and I remember, when they came home they brought some little presents for all the children.

Can you remember what they bought you?

Oh they bought me a model aeroplane that I had to sort of, you know, cut up and stick together, which was wonderful. But then I must have been, I suppose I must have been about twelve or thirteen at the time. And I suppose whilst they were away in Sydney, one of my mother’s sisters or something might have been staying with us at, or the grandparents might have been staying with us, and, looking after the children whilst the parents went away.

So, would you ever have gone as a family on a holiday?

Oh yes, every year we went on local holidays, we might have gone 100 miles or so to the seaside. A place that is now called the Gold Coast in northern...well, southern...below Brisbane, south, south Queensland. Which in the days when I was there was called Surfers’ Paradise, but, Surfers’ Paradise is now sort of, a very downmarket sort of word, because it’s become the Gold Coast, and Surfers’ Paradise is a little sort of suburban part of it, which is... But that was wonderful, we used to have a, rent a house on the seafront. And there might have been about fifty houses, one alongside each other along the waterfront, and, there was just the main road, and I remember opposite there was a garage, and after that were just, you know, fifty miles of beach, and ocean. That was wonderful, used to go swimming there, and stay there for a, you know, a couple of weeks.

So is that where you would have learnt to swim?

Yes, essentially I learnt to swim in the, in the ocean there, in the sea, mm. And occasionally I swam in fresh water, but essentially in, in the ocean, mm.

And who taught you to swim? Percy Savage Page 23 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2

Oh, both my mother and father, I think they just, threw them in, you’d paddle. (laughs) And my father used to go out fishing occasionally, we’d hire a boat and go out fishing, and fish at night-time, catch fish and bring them back, catch crabs and bring them back.

It all sounds very idyllic.

Oh it was great. It was, it was wonderful, yes.

Had you any sense when, when you were growing up of, of, of what an artist was?

[pause] Yes, but I think I had access to quite a lot of art books, books about... Well there were books about American art and artists; there were books about, Europeans, I mean I’d already seen, you know, the Sistine Chapel paintings of, Leonardo and Michelangelo and things like that, Italian art, you know, there was Botticelli, I’d seen The Birth of Venus in reproduction books. I mean I’d seen lots of very good books. And contemporary, you know, painters like Gauguin or Van Gogh or Matisse, you know, I mean I knew... And then later on, even more contemporary painters like Ben Nicholson and Barbara Hepworth and people like that, and Henry Moore. I mean I had read books on Henry Moore before I left Australia.

Would you, would you have...I mean is, is there a museum in Brisbane, would you have gone...?

In New Zealand?

In Brisbane. Would there...were there museums that your parents [inaudible]?

Very poor, yes, they had museums but they were very very poor, mm. Not good museums, not, not then, no. They do now have, yes, but not, not... And for that matter, even Sydney didn’t have very good museums. I mean they were still very under... Canberra had some good museums, or a good museum, and Melbourne had a Percy Savage Page 24 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2 good museum, but Sydney was not, at that stage, very culture-conscious; Brisbane certainly not, no. (laughs) Ipswich never.

So it was mostly through, through these books that you...

Mm. Oh yes, and I used to buy books too, you know, when I was already fifteen or sixteen, I used to go and spend money buying books that I wanted. I’d have my pocket money and go and spend it on buying a book.

So when, when, looking back, when do you think you formulated the, the desire that you did want to, to become an artist?

Oh already at the age of sixteen, I remember, you know, having, getting very strong encouragement from people when I said I wanted to be a painter and my father would say, ‘He’s going to be a farmer,’ they would say, in front of my father, ‘No, if you want to be a painter, you be a painter,’ you know.

And what would your father say then?

Oh he wasn’t at all happy about that. But I remember that was, that was the point of view of a very lovely lady called Mrs Cameron, who was the wife of the doctor who was there when I was born, and Mrs Cameron was a lovely, lovely old lady, lived in a very beautiful stone house in Ipswich. And, I remember she encouraged me to paint, and I remember painting roses and flowers and carnations in vases and so on, silly little still life things. And she said, ‘If you want to be a painter, you be a painter.’ And she was very, very firm about it. (laughs) No, there was...

Did your father try to stop you at all?

No, he didn’t...no, he didn’t offer any inducements or, as to why I should be a... I mean he never sort of said one day, ‘Young man, all this will be yours,’ you know. It was obvious, and the idea was terrifying, I mean, who the hell wants to look after, you know, 100 acres of bananas? (laughs) One acre of bananas was enough, not 100. No, I just wanted to... I think I was a bit bored with living in the country. A bit bored Percy Savage Page 25 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2 not having many friends, and wanting, much preferring to live in the city. I mean Brisbane was the big bright lights in those days. And, meeting friends in Brisbane who painted and did things, like actors and, going to the theatre and going to musical comedies, and seeing the, The Merry Widow and various... (laughs) All the things that came from abroad that, you know, it was wonderful. And then later in Sydney I was actually working on stage, I got a job as an extra in a visiting opera company, and I was in Carmen and I was in Aida and I was in Tosca and... And then later, the theatre people, when the opera moved on from Sydney to Melbourne, the people that owned the theatre said, ‘We’ve got, our next show coming up is Annie Get Your Gun and we could use you as a young dancer,’ you know, in the chorus. So, I was taken on for Annie Get Your Gun. And then after that was Oklahoma!. The shows didn’t last very long, they might have lasted a week or two weeks at the most. I think when they had the opera there, it was there for about six weeks, so I had six weeks with the opera. And a couple of weeks with Annie Get Your Gun, and then a couple of weeks with Oklahoma!. And with Oklahoma! they then took me from Sydney to Melbourne, and after that they took me to New Zealand, to Wellington, in Auckland, you know. And then back to Sydney. And then after I was back from Sydney from, from the New Zealand trip with Oklahoma! that’s when I got the, the trip, the chance of... I already had the, the, the scholarship offered to me, but I didn’t have the chance of getting any transport. So when I got back from there, there was a chance of transport to England. So it was... No, I was always very intent on one day getting to, getting to Europe, getting to England, very much. I didn’t think so much of France or Italy, but, England was the, the goal.

So did your parents talk about their experiences in Europe at all?

Well my mother and father never came to Europe together. I mean my mother never came to Europe. But my father, yes, he, he used to like, he used to like England. He came there for business occasionally.

Sorry, I thought they’d met on a boat coming back from Europe.

No no no, my mother’s father was coming back, my mother’s father was in the Army. And he was in the Medical Corps. And my, my father was in the Army, and they Percy Savage Page 26 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2 went back to Australia on the same troopship, that’s how they met. And as they came from the same town, they went back to the same town of Ipswich, and that’s how they continued to meet each other. I think, you know, it was obvious that my father, my mother’s father was, he had four sons and two daughters, and I think he might have thought, well you know, nice young man, he can meet the two daughters, and it worked. (laughs) Took about four years for it to work, you know, because they went back in 1919, and they didn’t get married until 1924.

But they were happily married, would you say?

I think so, yes, yes. And because when I was living in Paris, I offered my mother a return ticket to come and stay with me in Paris, and she said she didn’t want to leave her, you know, her husband alone, didn’t want to leave my father on his own. So she didn’t want to come. She did actually go away with him on one occasion, she went with him to America, she went to California. Because they had, they had cousins or something living in California, and, they went to stay with them. But she never went to New York, she went to America but never...just to the West Coast. And also I think they went occasionally, they went to their local sort of, you know, they went to Japan and they went to Hong Kong. They went, like, travelled locally but not, not to Europe.

So did they have any sort of view about sort of...

Any what?

Any view about Britain and the Empire, you know, did they have any...?

Oh yes, they were very very very very very much British Empire type of people, yes, oh very, very much indeed. Oh yes. I remember in, whenever it was in the Thirties when King George V died, I remember there were general, you know, tears everywhere, the fact the King had died, you know, it was a great, great tragedy.

But were you...did you have any sort of view or sense that...?

Percy Savage Page 27 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2

Oh yes, very much, yes, very. Oh yes, it was a very strong, the British Empire, a very, very strong thing. Oh yes.

The...

And I still have for that matter, you know, I still think, I still think much along those same lines, you know, was...still think of Canada and Australia and India and all those. I go to India a lot now, since I’ve been living in Europe.

And why, what do you do in India?

Well I used to go to travel and work there with the textile industry, with fashion. But now, the chap who was here this morning, he’s a painter, and that’s one of his paintings over here, from about five, six years ago, and that is one he did last year in India. But we went there again this year, and he’s got his show on tonight down in Tunbridge Wells that I was...

Would you just say for the tape what his name is?

Oh the painter, the painter, yes, his name is Marcus Grey. And, he is originally from Canada. Born in England, but he and his mother went back to Canada. His mother and father divorced, and the father lives in Paris, and the mother remarried and she lives in Vancouver.

So how did you meet?

We met through my landlady, Hélène Chetwynd, because years ago he used to live, actually live in this flat. That’s how we met.

So just to briefly go back to, to your education. Was art part of the curriculum when you were taught at home?

Oh no. No no no. I think it was just the three Rs. No no, nothing about art or history of art, no no no no no. Percy Savage Page 28 C1046/09 Tape 1 Side B (part 2

And what about the school over the hill?

I don’t think so, no, don’t remember art in any way whatsoever with that, no. And then when I went to secondary school, grammar school in Ipswich, I think there was a great shortage of teachers because of the war, and I don’t remember any art classes at that school either. But I just picked it up along, along the way, it was something that always interested me, and especially with the, as I said, with the good library that my grandparents, my mother’s parents had, and the good library my mother had, just picking a lot of it up through books.

[End of Tape 1 Side B] Percy Savage Page 29 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3)

Tape 2 Side A [part 3]

So what was your impression of the grammar school?

Oh very grand. Architecturally Gothic, a very good, very good-looking school, architectural point of view, and in a... I had to sleep in a dormitory with about a dozen other boys I suppose. And that’s where I learnt to play football, which I quite enjoyed. And I remember buying football boots, which I only wore for a couple of years, and, no idea whatever happened to them, but... (laughs) And, also I played tennis there. I don’t think I played cricket, although, I think they did have a cricket team, but I didn’t play cricket with them. And, I enjoyed, enjoyed the classes very much. And we had a, a teacher called McMurtrie, who was a wonderful man who used to teach us Latin and French, but after the first three months he was called up to do his military service. He was too old in the beginning of the war, but at the end of the war they were scraping the bottom of the barrel and taking anything. So he went off to do his military service, and we didn’t have any more Latin courses or any more French courses, so, I had a very small smattering of French at school. And then after two years there, I left the school, and then went back to live with the family and work on the farm a bit, and then left basically to go and live in Brisbane. And work in, as I said, get my first jobs, which was, I went along to the job centre and got a job as a postman delivering the mail, and then I got a job working as a waiter in restaurants, very grand restaurants, where I had to buy myself a dinner jacket, which I... (laughs)

They didn’t provide you with one?

No, I had to provide my own dinner jacket. (laughs) But that was fun, you know, I was working... And then, then I used, as I said, I used to start going to the theatre, and, I’d been to the cinema a few times before, but, suddenly the theatre was available and I went along to see, whatever stage productions they had.

So, so where had you been to the cinema?

Oh there were local cinemas in Brisbane. You know, I used to go in on a, perhaps on a Friday night or a Saturday night, get...I used to ride my horse from home, down to Percy Savage Page 30 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3)

Brookfield, where the bus terminus was, and then I would let my horse free in the, in the cemetery, the horse would just eat the grass in the cemetery, and when I came home at night I would saddle up, ride off home again. So I used to go in on a bus and go to the cinema, meet a friend or two and go to the cinema, and then come back home again.

And can you remember any sort of, particular film that sticks out in your, in your mind?

Oh I suppose I must have seen Gone With The Wind, definitely that must have been one of them. But, not really, no, not, not any great films. I think...no, I think most of the films that I saw that impressed me were films that I saw later on in Sydney.

Like, like what for instance?

Well I remember seeing Les Enfants Du Paradis, the French one, which I loved, and seeing some of the old Alec Guinness, Lavender Hill Mob films, and, Arsenic And Old Lace, I think they were the... And the odd American film, you know, the...I can’t really remember many of them. But I do remember Les Enfants Du Paradis, which was a fabulous film.

So do you think there was more, more links, or more sense of, of Europe than America in Australia?

[pause] I think there were stronger links with Europe really. America became an influence during the, the Forties, because of the war with Japan, and the front line so far as Australia was concerned was the border between New South Wales and Queensland, so Brisbane was right in the official war zone, and we had thousands of American troops stationed in, in and around Brisbane, thousands and thousands.

And how did people...

But I don’t think that affected the, the pro-American culture much, other than a few Australian girls married Americans, and, you know, it was... It was as I said, the Percy Savage Page 31 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3) reason why my parents went to California, because one of their family had married an American and lived in California.

So what was it do you think about Les Enfants Du Paradis that, that you liked so much?

It was, it was just such a beautiful, poetic film, about a lovely world, a world of theatre and a world of... No, it was lovely. And eventually later on I met Jean-Louis Barrault, I knew him very well, and his wife Madeleine Renaud, and Garance, the girl who was playing...the wonderful voice she had. Marvellous girl, I knew her quite well.

Arletty.

Mm, Arletty, yes. Yes I knew her very well.

Oh.

Yes, she played Garance, mm.

So...

And then of course in France I saw many many many many wonderful French films, wonderful. And knew, working in the couture I met many many of the actors and actresses.

So... But when you were, when you were in, in Australia, when do you think you felt an affinity for France?

Not, not greatly, no. I was always very accented on coming to England. That’s what I really was looking forward to. And France, yes, well you know, France was a... But I had never thought of actually going to live or work in France, never, or Rome, well you know, was...or any, anywhere else in Europe for that matter. Or America, I didn’t particularly want to live in America. I went eventually, living in France, I went to Percy Savage Page 32 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3)

America, very frequently, saw a great deal of America, but...and I was even, eventually even offered jobs in America, but I didn’t want to...no way, I didn’t want to leave France. That became too important. And when I was living in France I was even offered jobs back in London, but I didn’t want to come back to London either. (laughs) France was much, too much fun. It was wonderful.

So just to, to, to go back a bit more to, to your sort of, teenage years I suppose in Australia. Where were you, where were you living, or...?

In Sydney, I was... Well the first year I was staying at Knox College, which was on what they call the North Shore, and later I moved into a boarding house in what is called Woolloomooloo, which was within a couple of hundred yards of Kings Cross, which was a very exciting part of Sydney, and very close to Darlinghurst, which was the school that I went to, the East Sydney Technical College. And the college was housed in what had been one of the very big prisons in Australia for the first convicts that went there, so they had walls that were about twenty feet thick. You went through huge arches to get into the central courtyard, which was round. And all what had been the old cells and so on were classrooms, up above on the first floor. And I was living in this boarding house in what was called Woolloomooloo, in Dowling Street I think was the name of the road, and that led down from, down to the docks where the ships used to come in and anchor. That was a very poor area, but now a very rich, very upmarket area, very highly desirable suburban area.

And how did you find the boarding house?

Through other students, another student was living there. And that was, reasonable, and within walking distance of the school, so it was very, very good. And with walking distance of Kings Cross, which was the sort of naughty part of Sydney, which was great fun. (laughs) Stayed open very late at night.

And did your parents know that, that was the sort of character of the area?

I don’t think I ever told them that, no. (laughs)

Percy Savage Page 33 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3)

And would you have to... Well, did your landlady provide you with meals and things?

No.

How did that work?

No no, I used to start... No, I used to just have a little gas ring in the room and cook in the room.

And what sort of things?

Or eat out, you know, I mean...

Yes.

Be invited out, go to little restaurants and eat out. They didn’t actually have pubs in Australia. They did have pubs but they were never for eating, you just went there to drink. And they had quite strict drinking laws. I think people had to stop drinking at six o’clock at night. And they would, consequently you’d find they’d go into the bar and buy six pints of beer and come out, put it on the pavement and just stand there and drink. (laughs) No I didn’t like going to the pubs.

So what sort of things would you cook for yourself?

Oh just, veal escallops or steaks or... I don’t think I ever did fish because I mean I’d heard, or it was told, you know, fish, you can never rid of the smell of fish. I don’t think I ever cooked fish much; even later on, fish is never one of the things I like... I adore fish, but I mean not, not, not to cook much at home.

So what do you think you, you actually learnt at the technical college?

Well I did a lot of painting, did a lot of oil painting, and drawing and life classes. And, also I did sculpture, and I did three...I had three different commissions in what’s called the ABC, that’s the Australian Broadcasting Commission, and I did a bust in Percy Savage Page 34 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3) bronze of Namatjira, who was an Australian Aboriginal painter who used to make beautiful landscapes in a traditional European manner. And then I did somebody called Lilly Kraus, who was a, an Austrian[sic] pianist. And then I did...oh I can’t remember his name. Marcel Cerdan, who was a French boxer, and came to Australia. And he was the lover of Edith Piaf, the French singer, so when I went, eventually arrived in France, I looked him up, and, he introduced me to Piaf very quickly, so I knew Piaf for many years, and used to go and, very very frequently to listen to her singing.

And how did these commissions come about?

Well I think it came about through the school, you know, they would approach the school, saying ‘We’d like, you know, somebody to do this and do that.’ The same as when I was in France, at the school in France, at the École des Beaux-Arts, I got commissions to do, not sculpture but paintings and posters. I did a lot of poster work and things like that through the school. They would put up notices in the school, you know, ‘Applications are invited for...’ So I did posters for Mother’s Day, and I did posters for the French racecourse, you know, at Vincennes for the trotting, and at Saint Cloud for the racing, I did posters for that.

But in Australia, would the school take any sort of commission?

I don’t remember them ever getting any commission from them, no.

So that...so...

I was sort of paid personally, yes. Not, not a great deal, but I was... Yes. It was very nice to do it.

And were you able to live off your commissions?

No, because I used to have to work in Australia when I was going to school. The first serious sort of job I got was as a, as a telephone operator. Down in the centre of Sydney there was a great big building where I went along at, I think eleven o’clock at Percy Savage Page 35 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3) night, and worked until six o’clock next morning. And, we used to sit there, put the headphones on, and, lights would flash so I’d put a plug in and say ‘Hello,’ and they’d say, ‘Can you put me through to,’ whatever number, either in Australia or overseas. And when it got a bit boring late at night when there wasn’t much work in Australia, because everybody was in bed, we used to just ring up the exchange in London and chat to the exchange in London, or chat to them in America, and, just talk to the other telephone operators.

What did you talk about?

Oh, well... (laughs) How boring life was. And then I had a, I was sitting alongside a girl who was studying singing, and one day she told me she’d just been auditioned for a job in a chorus for this visiting opera company, and they were looking for extras also and I should go along. So I went along, and got the job. And we used to check in and start work at about half-past six at night, and I think the curtain went up about half-past seven. It would finish about half-past ten, and then we would both of us rush down the road to the telephone exchange and put our headphones on and start working as a telephone operator.

So was that the first production that you were in, the first theatrical production?

Yes, the first proper one was, as I said, I think it was Aida, and, where I had to dance and be an archer and... Then, after Aida I think it was Carmen and then after that we did Bohème, we did, Tosca was wonderful, that’s, I was a member of the firing squad in Tosca. And in Carmen I had, again had to dance and... And I couldn’t really dance very well, but I had a good figure and, I learnt it very quickly, it wasn’t very difficult. And then, then the opera company moved on to Melbourne, and that’s when, after that they suggested I come along for Annie Get Your Gun.

So, did you have to sort of abandon, abandon your studies to...?

No, because I studied during the day.

But even when you moved to Melbourne? Percy Savage Page 36 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3)

Oh no no, I went to, when I went to Melbourne that was just for a month in Melbourne. And I already, by that time I already had my scholarship to study in England. And all I was waiting for was trying to get a passage to, to get a job on a ship to come to England. Which I eventually, you know, it came through eventually, what...and they said, ‘Your ship’s ready.’ But by the time I got this, I then found out that in order to leave Australia, in those days, you needed income tax clearance to make sure you had paid all your income tax, and that took about a week. So by the time that tax clearance came through, the boat had left Sydney and had made its way to Melbourne. And I rang through and I found it had already left Melbourne to make its way to Perth. So I then had to fly from Sydney to Perth in order to catch the ship to come to London. But I managed all that.

So was that your first introduction to opera?

To opera, yes, I’d never seen opera up in Brisbane. Never. I’d heard opera on the gramophone, but not... I’d heard Caruso on the gramophone, which was, explained to me, he was a great singer, you know; I didn’t think much of Caruso but still... (laughs) And then the girl... I meant to tell you, the girl who was sitting next to me, the one who was, the telephone operator, was Joan Sutherland. So that was another very good introduction to opera. And since then I’ve seen her occasionally in France and in England. She lives in Switzerland now. I think I saw her last a couple of years ago, she was over here.

What was she like then?

She was always a very big girl, and she had a very large, squareish sort of face. She’s not a, by any means an attractive, beautiful woman, no way. But, a fabulous voice. I mean the Italians used to call her ‘La Stupenda’. She really was quite sensational.

And was she, was she already sort of, do you think making a name for herself then?

In Australia? Not at all, no no no. No she was still... Well she was then the same age, you know, she was then about nineteen, eighteen or nineteen, she was still a very Percy Savage Page 37 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3) young student of music. No she didn’t make it until much later. By about, you know, by the late Fifties, yes, she was already singing in New York. And then she came to Paris, and I saw her in Paris, and... And then later I saw her, she sang in Paris, and I saw her later at the Scala, and saw her at this thing[???]. And... But, she, she lives in Switzerland now, so I don’t see very much of her.

And did she, does she reminisce about, with you about her days..?

Her days, oh we laugh, we laughed a bit about it, yes. Yes.

So what sort of clothes were you wearing as a student?

Well, basically T-shirts and, and, not jeans, I didn’t have any jeans until I was in France actually. I don’t know, just sort of, corduroy velvet trousers, and T-shirts I suppose. Occasional printed shirts, short sleeves. I didn’t wear a suit much in Sydney. I know I had a suit in case, but I didn’t wear a suit much.

Because where, where would you shop for clothes then?

In Australia? Oh in the sales and in the department stores. I wasn’t very clothes conscious, no, not really. I mean I had been in Brisbane, I had had clothes made to measure, but, that was basically for going to weddings and things like that.

And who...how did you find the sort of tailor that you chose? Was that a family...?

In Brisbane?

Mm.

Oh just somebody on the street, I mean, just walking along looking, you know, might... I never had a sort of family tailor from my parents or anything like that, no.

What...

Percy Savage Page 38 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3)

And then of course when I landed in Paris and went to work at Lanvin, Lanvin had a fabulous tailoring building, you know, an entire, they were one of the very grand, grand tailors of Paris, and one of the very grand couture houses, so, I immediately had a wardrobe offered to me by Lanvin, because they said, you know, ‘If you’re working here, you have to look...’ [clicks fingers] So I had suits and coats and shirts galore made up. I was very well dressed for a few years. (laughs)

Well perhaps, perhaps we should talk about your sort of, arriving in Europe. What...what do you think your impressions were of Europe before you actually arrived?

Well I was looking... I mean, the Slade had a very good reputation in Australia, and I was very happy to be going to the Slade. So I was looking forward to that. And then I got on the ship, and when I got on the ship with my one suitcase, because I’d packed the night before with a couple of friends, and packed, and I think I had three suitcases, and, a parrot in a cage, and a small portable easel.

A live parrot?

A live parrot, yes. Called Zoë. Which I inherited from my paternal grandfather, my father’s father had brought the parrot from a trip back from Brazil years ago. So the parrot was already, you know, quite an aged bird. And, I went along the next morning to check in at the departure lounge in Sydney to fly to Perth, and they looked at me and, you know, they weighed my luggage, and I was, goodness knows, I had the right to take one suitcase, otherwise, I didn’t have enough money to pay for all the excess luggage. So I had to... Fortunately I was with somebody who came to say goodbye, and I just left the other two cases and said, ‘You can take them and do whatever you like with them.’ But I had no idea what I’d packed in any of the suitcases, so, I chose the most beautiful looking suitcase, which was one that had belonged to my father, in heavy leather, and I had no idea what was in it. But, we checked in, went, flew to Perth, I moved in to the YMCA, where I think I paid a shilling a night for lodging. And then went out every day and bought a cooked chicken or a cooked rabbit or something like that and ate that. And checked in at the shipping office to find out where the, where the boat was. And the day the boat arrived I went down, got on Percy Savage Page 39 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3) board, set sail, and eventually arrived in London. And when I, we arrived at Tilbury Docks, and they wouldn’t let my bird in, they wouldn’t let the parrot in. And so I was very annoyed, so I left the parrot on board ship, came to London, went to visit a few friends whose addresses I had. Went to the Slade, didn’t particularly like the Slade. And, was horrified by the war damage in the East End, I had to come in by train every day from Tilbury through the East End. Very depressed by the restaurants and the lack, the food rationing and everything else. And after a week of seeing this, and seeing the people I knew here, all of whom were Australians from Sydney, and they were all, you know, I thought, my God! I didn’t leave Sydney to come and see all this bunch here. And I just thought, well, I think I’ll go to France, see what Paris is like.

And were these friends, these people you knew, were they, had they also come from, from the sort of, art and theatre world?

Yes, they were essentially theatre or painters, mm.

And who had seen you off at, at...

Perth?

...at Perth?

Nobody.

Nobody saw you at Perth?

Nobody knew, nobody knew me in Perth. (laughs)

Sorry, I meant Sydney.

Oh Sydney, lots of people came to see me off, yes, lots. Lots and lots. But, Perth, no, I was all alone.

Percy Savage Page 40 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3)

And what about, can you remember telling your parents about the scholarship and coming over to London?

Oh yes, I rang them up and told them I had the scholarship, and they were very, you know, very happy about that. And I said, ‘Well I’ll be back in about a year,’ as it was a year’s scholarship. And, then I rang, I think the day before or the night before I was leaving to say goodbye. And they were, disappointed, but I mean, you know, polite, and...

Did they cry?

I don’t think so, no, no no no no no no, I don’t think so. They might have cried after they’d hung up, but they didn’t cry on the phone. And, then, so when I, once, once I was in London, as I said, I was very disappointed by the whole scene. Went to Paris, and everything changed completely. There was no visible rationing in France, and Paris looked absolutely fantastic. And I went, eventually made my way, just a couple of days, made my way to the École des Beaux-Arts, told them I had a scholarship to study abroad, and they said, ‘Right, well we’ve got, the examinations are starting in a couple of days, come along.’ And I sat for the exams, which were basically drawing skills. And then they told me out of the 600 applicants they’d chosen sixty, and I was one of the sixty, and to bring my papers along. So I went along to see them. And, well before going to see them I went to the Australian Embassy to check with them and said, ‘You know, can you...?’ And the man said, ‘Well, this scholarship is only available in a sterling area, like England or Canada, or Ceylon or New Zealand or South Africa.’ Sadly France is not part of the sterling area. So I had to go back to the school and explain that although, yes, they’d chosen me as one of sixty, I’d got the...the scholarship wasn’t valid. So they just said, ‘Too bad, you know, you can stay here; we can’t go and pick one more out of the hat, and, you’re going to stay here and, not have to pay for the first year.’

How wonderful.

So then, very quickly I got jobs in Paris, and one of the first jobs I got was as a proof- reader for UNESCO, who had just opened up an office in Paris, they’d taken over a Percy Savage Page 41 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3) hotel up near the Etoile, it was called the Hotel Raphael in the avenue Kléber. And, so I was working there as a proof-reader, and through other proof-readers working there I was introduced to what was called the Continental Daily Mail, which was a Continental edition of the Daily Mail in London. And I got a job there as a proof- reader, doing replacement work, because they had six proof-readers in every year, one of the...they had to have a month’s holiday. And there was another newspaper called the Herald Tribune, and the Herald Tribune had the same problem, where they had six proof-readers and a rotating thing of... So I did replacement work at either newspaper, and it was very well paid. So I was able to work at night there as a proof- reader, and eventually pay my fees at the school for the following year. Which made the school happy, and was very good, and was a wonderful school.

So how did you hear about the proof-reading work?

Oh again just through meeting people. I don’t know, can’t remember.

Can I just ask you, what you didn’t like about the Slade?

I just thought the Slade was dull, there was no atmosphere there, just didn’t... I was just very disappointed, you know, it was...

Did you meet anybody there?

Not really, no. I didn’t... I never actually studied[???] there; I was only in London for a week, and I went there on just one visit to see the Slade. And, I just thought it was a very dull building, and very dull atmosphere. This was in October, and the weather was dreadful also. October ’47 was a pretty awful year apparently. So... (laughs) I wasn’t in luck. If I’d have arrived in May or June of any other year I think I would have had a different impression.

And did anybody welcome you at the Slade?

Not at all, no. I just went in, saw somebody, OK, right, you know, fine. ‘Come back next week’ or something like that. Percy Savage Page 42 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side A (part 3)

And had you taken your work along to show them?

No, I didn’t, I didn’t have, didn’t bring any work.

Because I was going to ask you, what was in your suitcases?

Oh, well I remember I had a, a dinner jacket... Not a dinner jacket, but a white tie and tails. I had the jacket and the trousers, but no shirt, or bow tie. And I think I had a few other clothes. And I remember I had forty records, you know, 78 disc things that... (laughs) So they weren’t much use to me.

And what sort of music that you, that...?

Oh I think a lot of jazz, I loved jazz in those days. American jazz, and... No. And a few, a few bits, a few operas, one or two operas.

And where had you been introduced to jazz?

Oh essentially in, in both Brisbane and, and Sydney, very much. They used to play jazz in Brisbane, I used to go to jazz concerts in the evening. And Sydney very frequently.

So jazz...

And where I, where I lived in the boarding house in Woolloomooloo there was a, a jazz pianist, and I used to work with him a bit and play the drums a little bit. They had what they called the Port Jackson Jazz Band.

[End of F15199 Side A] Percy Savage Page 43 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4)

Tape 2 Side B [part 4]

No the black, the suit was, was useful, except that as I said, I didn’t have the shirt or tie to go with it. And besides which at that stage in Paris I didn’t have a lifestyle to necessarily wear a dinner jacket or tails. Later I did, but I had... I used to go out a lot later on in, four or five times a week I’d be in black tie and tails. Or white tie and tails.

So, was there anything that you, you’d left behind in the other two suitcases that you, that you missed?

Oh, I remember I had a bedspread in printed leopard skin design. (laughs) No, there were...I’d packed everything, you know, clothes. And I had some fun clothes in Sydney. And, I was carrying the little paint box, I was carrying my little folding easel, and carrying my Zoë, bird, parrot. So the rest, no, I just, forget it, you know, I mean it was too bad.

So, was Zoë in a way the, a sort of souvenir of, of Australia?

Oh yes, and, not only that but no way was I going to let her stay in quarantine. I mean that was one of the reasons I thought, well, you know, I didn’t... Can’t get my bird in with me, I don’t want to stay here. I... No, I was very dis...very very, you know, it was a big deception actually, arriving in London, for lots of reasons.

So...

But then, in Paris there was no problem whatsoever. I went back by, the same boat took me across to Dunkirk, that was the next stop in France, Dunkirk, and I got off there and got a train to Paris, third class ticket to Paris.

So, sorry, what were the other reasons do you think that, that England was such a disappointment?

Percy Savage Page 44 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4)

Well the, the restaurants were so...food was so scarce, food rationing was so scarce, and everybody said so. And I went to one or two restaurants which I thought were very gloomy, you know, Lyons Tea House or something. And, I just didn’t like, I didn’t like the... I mean there were pea-soupers in London when I was... I remember I was actually on Piccadilly, outside the Royal Academy, and I could not see across the road and see Fortnum & Mason’s, the fog so bad. And all the cars were driving around with their headlights on, and the buses with their headlights on, and it was just awful. And it smelt bad, there was this sort of, dreadful sort of yellow smog. Oh it was horrible.

And what...

Day after day, you know, it was like it every week, every day of the week.

And had you any sense when you were in Australia that that’s what London was like, and that...because...and also all the war damage?

I think I’d probably heard the, you know, the song of ‘foggy London Town’. (laughs) But I never took it seriously, it was...no, no. And I think anything in the way of fog in London was a rather romantic sort of thing, as you saw in some films, it was rather lovely, rather beautiful. But this was dense, dense, dense, dense fog, and awful.

And what about the war damage, had there been any, any news about that in Australia?

In the East End? Well, yes, we’d heard about the war damage, but I’d never, don’t think I’d ever seen much in the way of photography about it.

And how did people respond to you as an Australian?

I didn’t meet many, I don’t think I met many English people, but most of those I met were the people whose addresses I had and I looked them up. Again I was rather disappointed, because they were all so eager to see me and they seemed to be starved of, you know, they were, ‘Ah, wonderful you’re here’ sort of, you know. But... I Percy Savage Page 45 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4) think I saw about four or five people. And one was Peter Finch, you know the actor, and his wife, who was a dancer, her name was Tamara Tchinarova, and they lived down in Chelsea then, and I went to see them, and they were very happy to see me, and, so on. But I...it didn’t...I don’t know, I just didn’t seem to...

And did you know Peter Finch in Australia?

Mm?

Did you know Peter Finch before?

In Australia? Yes, I, I met him in Sydney, and his wife was a dancer. He was quite a nice, quite a nice chap, yes. I think he was having an affair with, what was her name?

Vivien Leigh?

Vivien Leigh, yes, Laurence Olivier’s wife, yes.

Did he talk to you about, about, about that?

Not really, because, most of the time I saw him he was with his wife, so, I don’t think it would have been... (laughs)

So what happened to Zoë?

Well, I kept her for quite a few years in Paris, in the various flats I lived in, I lived first of all in one little flat in a place called Place de la Contrescarpe, and she was very happy there. Then I moved to a three-roomed flat which I shared with a young man, who was a journalist for the Journal de Genève in Switzerland. And, I used to illustrate his articles, he would write about the theatre or write about art galleries, and I would write about the personalities, the actors or speakers or dancers or painters and do portraits, little pen portraits of them. And, this parrot, he had one room, the first room, and then there was a centre room which was a sort of little dining room, where the parrot had a cage on a table, and I had the end room. And there was a corridor Percy Savage Page 46 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4) that went down between the rooms at the back, and there was a balcony along the front. And then a little kitchen/bathroom. And every morning when I went out I used to put the table with the cage out on the balcony. And, also in the...at night time I used to put a blanket over the cage, and during the day...in the cage there was a bell, I’d hung a little cowbell, and out on the balcony he used to squawk and screech and, ring the bell, and had great fun. And nobody seemed to mind. Until they had a new préfet de police in Paris, who decided he was going to clean up the city and they would ban all noise. They wouldn’t allow taxis to blow their horn... Do you remember there was a wonderful song, ‘Last time I saw Paris, her heart was young and gay, and the chorus of its squeaky horn.’ Well he banned all noise. And that started problems, because, the police in the street, they had complaints, and they came up, and said, you know... So I then kept the cage inside in the room. But eventually they still came. And so I was then taken to court, so I had to go to court with the parrot. And the judge said it had to be expelled from the region of Paris. So I then gave it away to a friend who lived out in Neuilly. And I used to see it for a few years after that, but I haven’t seen it for ages now. But at least she was happy, mm.

And what sort of, was the flat furnished, or did you have to furnish it yourselves?

I think it was... I think there were two beds and a table and two chairs, yes. And there might have... I don’t remember if there was bedding, sheets and blankets, I honestly don’t remember. All I know is that I put up curtains and bought... I repapered the walls, a sort of...and bought, you know, paintings, I put my paintings up and various other things. Put... No, no, I think it was furnished, because I don’t remember buying beds, I think the beds must have been there. It must have been furnished, yes.

And, did you have any sense of, I suppose I’m asking about, was it home, did it mean home, or was it just a place that you...?

Oh yes, I was very happy there, yes, very very happy, yes, yes, and I got on very well with the young man. He was, he was a...he had... I mean his French was impeccable, and, helped me with my French, which wasn’t bad, you know, I’d learnt French fairly quickly. And by that time also I had already got a job working at Lanvin, so I was Percy Savage Page 47 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4) earning reasonably good money, and, so it was, no, no, it was very very much a... And a lovely little flat, and I used to give parties there, receptions there for up to 100 people, you know. I gave parties there for visiting theatre companies, and, gave a party there for the visiting company of Glyndebourne, and when Margot Fonteyn was over once, and, dancing, I gave a party there for her, and... I had the British ambassador and his wife coming along to the party, and I know, there’s a law in, not a law but there’s a custom in France that when you have visiting ambassadors, you always have the French police with their special red braid on their shoulders, and you have to pay for them, so I hired them. I had two outside the front door, and I had on each landing going up. (laughs)

And how long had you been working at Lanvin by then?

I started at Lanvin at the beginning of 1951. I was hired in 1950 and started in the beginning of ’51.

So how long were you at the École?

Two years at the École des Beaux-Arts. I was, basically ’48 and ’49. Because I started in ’47, but I didn’t start work until the end of the year, so, it was all in 1948, all of ’49. And then I did what they call the École du Louvre, which was over in the rue de Rivoli in the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, which was another school who were teaching about the history of fabrics and tapestries and, so on. And then I began selling designs to various fashion houses for their silk squares, and that’s how I started at Lanvin, because, I’d sold, the first client was Balenciaga, and I took along a selection of about twenty, and he chose five. And then a friend who was a journalist said to me that I should try Lanvin, so I went to Lanvin, and they bought a few. Then I went to Jacques Fath, and he bought a few. And then I went to Balmain and he bought a few. And then I went to Hermès, right opposite Lanvin, you know, in the Faubourg St Honoré, and they didn’t buy any, but they commissioned me to do some to their taste. And then Lanvin called me and asked, they said, ‘We want to see your selection again, because we chose a few but we’d like a few more.’ So I went back with my selection, and the ones that they wanted weren’t there and they said, ‘Well where are they?’ So I said, ‘I sold them to Balmain.’ And they said, ‘Oh well you Percy Savage Page 48 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4) can’t do that, because we want, you know, we don’t, can’t have you working for everybody.’ And they offered me a contract for three years exclusive to work for them. So, after about six months they said, ‘No no no, no no, you’ve done enough for ten years, and we’d like you to work in, in looking after the press. We’ve never...’ They said, ‘We’ve never had a press office, but we’d like to start one.’ So, they gave me a room about as big as this, with a secretary.

This was about, fifteen...

Oh yes.

...sixteen feet square?

Oh yes. At least as big as this, yes. And that was on the third floor. Because at Lanvin the ground floor was the boutique where you went in, and then you went up to the first floor for the collection, which was shown on mannequins. And then the second floor where they had the cabine d’essayage, where clients would go and do their fittings and so on. And then above that was the office of the owner, who was the Comtesse de Polignac, who was the daughter of Madame Lanvin. And my office was next to hers. And, it was, you know, very...and that went on for ten years. And then after that I went to work for Nina Ricci. And after a few years, it was six years with Ricci, I then went, started doing freelance work, and the, one of the clients I had was the Rive Gauche from Yves St Laurent, who started in 1967. And then, I arranged for the UK licence with somebody called Lady Rendlesham, Clare Rendlesham. And, she got the St Laurent Rive Gauche exclusive for the UK, and opened up a shop in Bond Street in 1969, the end of ’69, and then another one in ’70, and ’71, et cetera, and then eventually in ’74 I came back to work here. And started London Fashion Week. So there’s a lot more to be said about that.

I know.

(laughter)

Percy Savage Page 49 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4)

So, can we just go back to the École for a moment. What was it like being a student in Paris?

Oh it was wonderful. I mean I was... There I thought, well I’ve studied painting and sculpture, I’d like to do something else. And I decided to do lithography. And they had an atelier of lithography, and there was a, I suppose we were about a dozen students in that class. And...

Were the others all French, other students?

No, curiously, I’ve just come back from India, and in India, a coach load of French tourists arrived at this hotel where I was staying, and I simply said, ‘Bonsoir’, I didn’t know who I was talking to, but I mean, I knew they were French. And the people I was talking to turned out to be a couple from Java, and they were living in Paris. And we talked a lot. And it turned out that he had also studied lithography at the École des Beaux-Arts at the same time as I had. So we’d been in the same class. (laughs) And he and his wife, who was Javanese, went on to live in Paris, and he works for the Javanese press association, and, we had a nice long talk in India.

What did you reminisce about?

Oh, just, we... I remembered we had the same professor that was called Professor Joli, and... I didn’t remember him actually, but I mean I remember, we just know that we were there together.

And what was, what was the professor like?

He was nice. Well, I mean I was just twenty-one or something or other, and, the professor must have been about fifty or so. He was...I didn’t have much respect for middle-aged men. (laughs)

Who did you have respect for, when you were there?

Percy Savage Page 50 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4)

[pause] I think I basically mixed with youngsters, you know, there were a few students, there was a, a young American girl I went off with for a skiing holiday, and, and we did a lot of art work together. I turned out a couple of lithographs on, on the skiing holiday which were nice.

And had you...

No, I... Basically I led a good student’s life. And then of course I was also working at night time, which, as a proof-reader, which, you know, cut private, you know, private life a lot.

And how did the teaching compare to the teaching you’d had in Australia?

Well they were totally different subjects, but I think, I think the school we had and the teaching I had in Australia was very, very satisfactory. I was quite happy with it all. And it was, it was very satisfying.

So what...why did you choose lithography, do you think?

Well it was, it was a medium that I liked, I’d seen other people’s work and I just thought it was... And because, in order to do lithography you need a huge big stone that’s bigger than this, twice as big as this table, and a big press, and you, you work on the stone, with grease and acids, to take the grease away. Then you put the paper down, and then there’s a huge press that has to roll over it, and you couldn’t possibly do that at home. So I thought this was a possibility of being able to use somebody else’s material without having to do it at home. Whereas, I continued at home, I continued to paint in oils, and did quite a lot. And in addition to going to the, to the École des Beaux-Arts, I used to go to another place called the Académie Julien, where I again did painting classes, and I used to go to another place called the Grand Chaumiere, which was a, an art class simply where they hired a model, and everybody would pay a couple of francs just to come along and sit down and sketch all afternoon, or all morning, they’d have a morning class and they’d have an afternoon class and an evening class. So for just a couple of francs you could go along and sketch, and I used to take along a whole roll of paper. And I’d sketch and sketch and Percy Savage Page 51 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4) sketch and do one and drop it on the floor and do one, and then I’d roll them all up and take them all home, and find out the good ones and keep some and throw the rest away.

So of those three, which, which activities did you enjoy most do you think?

I adored sketching, I adored the life classes, and, quick work, and doing... And also they were quite productive, because I used to be able to sell a lot of those, I sold quite a few.

And how would you sell them?

A friend introduced me to, an American friend working at the embassy in Paris introduced me to an Italian architect called Leonardo Fodera, and he had just built, or was in the process of building, a maternity hospital in Palermo for his brother. And, he wanted to decorate the wards, and he bought 150 of my drawings from me. He haggled about the price, and then got them, a very good price. But he bought 150. And then he said I order to help me and to help, you know, launch the hospital, he wanted to organise an exhibition for me in Palermo to coincide with the opening of the hospital. So that was in 1950. And, he invited me to go down and stay with him, so I, I spent about a month down in Palermo, had the exhibition, sold out totally. And then found out that, because of currency restrictions, the same as I wasn’t able to take too much money into Italy, apart from travellers’ cheques and things, I couldn’t take any money out of Italy, couldn’t take out any more than I had actually physically brought in. So I had to spend a lot of money down there, and I bought clothes, I went to a tailor and bought clothes, and I took a, a trip, I took a return trip from Palermo to Malta, and spent a week in a luxury hotel in Malta. (laughs) Then went back to Palermo and then set back off to Paris, and went back to work at Lanvin. With these two suits I had made in Palermo, which looked hideous, you know.

Why were they hideous?

Great huge... Great huge padded shoulders, you know, I looked like the Mafia. So I don’t think I ever wore them. (laughs) Percy Savage Page 52 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4)

So, apart from your skiing sort of, subject matter, what...and your figurative work, what was your, you know, your, what were your paintings like?

The paintings I’d painted, mostly painted ladies on the beach. I was very much in...I loved the work of Picasso, his rose period when he had rather large ladies on the beach and so on, so I would paint, very much doing things like that. And they sold. They didn’t sell very well, I mean I didn’t sell... I mean I had some of those in the exhibition in Italy, they sold. And then I had exhibitions, other than that I had exhibitions in London, at the Redfern Gallery. And another gallery which was in Conduit Street. And then another gallery which was called the Ojana Gallery in Carlos Place, which is still there now, it’s called the Hamilton Galleries now, near Grosvenor Square, near the Connaught Hotel.

And who had introduced you to the London galleries?

Well that basically came through the, through the Australian Cultural Attaché in Paris, because they had enquiries from Australia House in London, they wanted to have an exhibition at Australia House, organised by Australia House, and they asked the Australian Cultural Attaché in Paris to sort of give them names. So, I was about the only Australian painter in Paris. I never met any other Australian who was a resident in Paris. I mean they came and went, like Freddie came and went, and, lots and lots of people came and went, and, from Australia. Margaret Cilento, a great painter, came and stayed for a short time in Paris and then went. But very very very very few Australians actually lived in Paris, and I never knew another Australian painter.

So did you come over to London when you had your shows?

Oh yes, yes, mm.

And, and had London changed at all, or your...?

Not much, not in the Fifties. No, no no no no no. Still very, very unacceptable. (laughs) Percy Savage Page 53 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4)

And what about your...

No London, I didn’t really like London until the late Fifties, early Sixties, then it began to, you know, get a lot better. Food became a lot better, restaurants became a lot better. And, oh it was... And the fashions became a lot more acceptable too.

You mentioned that you’d seen sort of, lithographic work that you really liked.

Mm.

And I just wondered what, what sort of lithographs or, or whose work that you, you had seen that you admired.

Well I think Raoul Dufy, Matisse, you know, Picasso. I bought a Picasso litho when I was in Paris. I knew Matisse a little bit, and I saw him a few times. And he did a lot of lithos.

Where had you, how did you meet him?

I went along to, he had a studio on the boulevard Montparnasse, and I went along with a friend to visit him there.

And what was he like?

Well he was over ninety then, and he was a sort of rather frail old man, but he was still painting. He used to have a long stick and he would sit down and paint on a wall like that. He was doing a lot of collages and things then.

And can you remember anything else, sort of, about, about him or the studio or...?

I remember it was a very big studio, I mean, a sky-lit roof and so on. A very, wonderfully lit studio, and he sitting in a big comfortable armchair and painting and talking and... Percy Savage Page 54 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4)

What did he talk about, can you remember?

Well we were talking about other painters, and, you know, his, his exhib... I went along there with a man called Ascher.

Oh, the...

Zika Ascher.

Yes.

The textile man. Who had commissioned him to do some of his scarves. And that was how we met.

So is this in the sort of mid-Fifties?

That was the mid-Fifties, yes. Mm, early Fifties. Yes, Ascher was one of the great fabric people in London, and who worked a lot with the top, top, top houses in Paris, a lot.

So when you met, when you met somebody like Matisse, what, what did you feel?

Well it was rather a great honour to be, you know, for a man who is so internationally famous, was rather a great thing to be able to meet him alive. Although I did meet Picasso, and Picasso, I knew, I knew, saw Picasso quite a lot. And I knew Jean Cocteau very well. I knew a lot of French painters. Othon Friesz was another painter I knew, and his wife. No, I knew quite a lot in the art world, I knew quite a few.

So how did you meet Picasso?

Well I actually went along, and, I got his address and I went along and rang the doorbell. (laughs) Somebody told me I should do it, that he’s quite open to receiving people. And then went along there, and he himself answered the door, and I said, you Percy Savage Page 55 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4) know, I was a friend of so-and-so, could I come and meet him? And so he asked me in, I think he gave me a glass of wine, and we talked, and...

Can you remember what you talked...

I mean I had a very good recommendation to him, I had a recommendation from Balenciaga, you know, the couturier, who, he and Picasso both used to collect pearls, and, black pearls, and, because they’re, he said they were like his eyes, and so he showed me his black pearl collection. And we... Because I said I was a friend of Balenciaga, Cristóbal Balenciaga had sent me. He said, ‘Come on in,’ you know. And then I knew his, one of his wives, Françoise Gilot, I knew her quite well. And I met Dora Maar, his ex-wife, you know, his... And the lithograph of his that I bought was a portrait of Dora Maar.

So what was your impression of Picasso?

Oh he was wonderful, wonderful man, and very very, very on-the-ball, very alive, and very, very vibrant, very...

And where was he living at the time?

In the rue des Grands Augustins, between the rue St-André-des-Arts and the Seine, the Quai, Quai Voltaire I think. No not Quai Voltaire. Quai des Grands Augustins.

And did you...

Just opposite the Ile de la Cité.

And, could you describe what, what the interior was like?

Well he had a courtyard, and you went in through great big doors, and, into the courtyard, and then the house itself was, was on the right-hand side, with pillars, on the right-hand side and opposite, but I mean the entrance was on the right-hand side. Percy Savage Page 56 C1046/09 Tape 2 Side B (part 4)

Through pillars and going in, and I think the opposite end was a great big drawing room.

And he showed you his pearl collection on that first visit, did he?

He showed me his pearls, yes. Mm. Oh yes, well that was the sort of introduction. I told him Balenciaga had, you know, mentioned that he collected pearls, and, I should come along and meet him. [laughs]

So how many pearls did he have?

He had them all in a, in a tray, he had about, he had about twenty. And all black, all nice big ones, you know, really nice.

And did you visit him subsequently, or, did he come to you, or, you know, could you describe...

In what?

Your sort of subsequent meetings with him.

Later? Oh he’d ask me to come around, and you know, just come around and... He said, ‘Drop in whenever you like.’ And then, I think he’d had another exhibition. Oh I’d already bought one of his things before I met him. And then he’d have an exhibition, meet at the exhibition and so on with... And I think I did a little, a little portrait of him for one of the articles I did in Geneva. I mean I sketched Picasso, he didn’t sketch me. (laughs)

[end of session]

[End of F15199 Side B] Percy Savage Page 57 C1046/09 Tape 3 Side A (Part 5)

Tape 3 Side A [part 5]

Right, well my name is Percy Savage, and I was born in Australia in 1926.

You didn’t actually tell me the day you were born, the actual...

12th of October. So I’m a Libra.

And do you follow astrology?

With a few friends occasionally, yes, I mean I, somebody reads my astrology to me from time to time.

Have you ever had your chart done...?

Oh in Paris I had it done, yes, long, long, long sort of thing that was done for... That was, that was years ago, and I never...I never kept it, but I mean it was... No it was interesting.

Well did it tell you anything you didn’t already know?

No, but I... I think it’s a very good and very happy sign, Libra, I mean it’s supposedly one that’s reasonably well balanced and, supposedly it is a good sign for the art world, or the arts in general. As the following sign, Scorpio, is supposed to be a, a more difficult sign and so on, and, but I have quite a good number of friends who are Scorpios, so I mean it’s, I’m quite happy with Scorpio people. But both, my sister and my father were also both Libras. I mean it’s, it’s a good, nice, happy sign.

An what was your mother?

She was a Leo. She was in August.

And was that a good sign?

Percy Savage Page 58 C1046/09 Tape 3 Side A (Part 5)

Oh I think so, yes, I think, no no, I think it’s a good strong sign.

Actually, before...I’d like to go back to, to your visit to Picasso. But I just wondered, something you mentioned on the last tape about, you know, having to sleep in a dormitory when you went to the grammar school.

Grammar school, yes.

I just wondered how you felt about that, after you had, you know, had your nice veranda all to yourself.

Oh it was... It was... No, it wasn’t very...I don’t think it was too much of a problem. I mean we used to have a few pillow fights and so on I think. (laughs) But I don’t think that was a...no, that, there was never any problem with that. Not really.

Was it, was the... Obviously the school seems to have been built on a sort of British model.

Oh yes, very much a sort of...it looked like a, you know, a Gothic church building. Very nice big stone building. And, big classrooms. It was a very nice... And big gardens around the school. It was a very nice, very nice school.

And was there any kind of hint of any sort of, repressive regime, like one hears about boys’ public schools here?

I don’t think so, no. No. Not really, no. The dean of the school was called, he was Scottish, and I remember his name was, he was a canon, Kerr, John Kerr. And a very nice pleasant... And I believe in some way he was a relation, I’m not quite sure, I know he was also a, he was a Presbyterian like my father, my father was, and, a very nice man. He wore a dog collar and he was the head of the school. And we never saw him very much, he didn’t actually take classes, but I mean he was just a nice, a nice sort of man to see occasionally. But I never had much problem with teachers, I mean I got on very well with them.

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So to go back to Picasso. I wondered, how, how did he...what do you think his interest was in the fashion world that, you know, that you were from?

I don’t think he had a great interest in the fashion world. I think he was, essentially he was a friend of, quite a close friend of Balenciaga, because they were both Spanish. And there was quite a large Spanish colony of expatriates living in, in Paris, and many very wealthy Spanish people, and Balenciaga had lots of wealthy Spanish clients who used to buy clothes from him, and Picasso was just a friend of his, and I think, they used to meet at dinner parties, and had many mutual friends. But I think they were just part of the Spanish colony, the Spanish and also South American, because there were a lot of South Americans in Paris also who were quite wealthy clients of Balenciaga and the other fashion houses.

And how do you think Picasso, did he see you as a sort of fellow artist, or somebody from the fashion world?

I think when I went to meet him it was essentially that I was a painter. I wasn’t really doing much in the fashion world then. A little, I was working a little bit in the fashion world, as a textile designer, and he didn’t think much of textile designing. (laughs)

How do you know that?

Well he, he... I don’t think he thought it was...I don’t think he, you know, didn’t seem much of any of the... Well we didn’t talk much about painters really, I mean, talked a little bit about his work, and his... His wife was also, he[???] used to dress in the fashion world, I mean he had various wives and they all, he was a very wealthy man, so he...his various wives used to dress in different fashion houses, one of them being Balenciaga, and, the others where I worked at Lanvin, there was another Spanish designer working at Lanvin, whose name was Antonio Canovas del Castillo, and, who had worked as a designer in Paris for Piguet, had then gone to America to work for Elizabeth Arden, and was then hired to come back to work at Lanvin, because Madame Lanvin had died, and her daughter, the Comtesse de Polignac, was, you know, she wanted to carry on the house, and, they hired Castillo as the house designer. And it was the first time ever existed and has never happened since, that a Percy Savage Page 60 C1046/09 Tape 3 Side A (Part 5) co-designer in a house had his name actually on the label. When different designers followed on, in a house like Christian Dior, they did not put his name in the label, they just put the name Christian Dior. When St Laurent was there, he never had his name in the label, and the other subsequent designers, including today John Galliano, he doesn’t have his name in the Dior label. He has his own collection called Galliano, which is made concurrently along, at the same time as the Dior one, but, the Dior label has always remained the Dior label. And since Castillo left, Lanvin went back to just calling itself Lanvin, or rather they used to call it Jeanne Lanvin, and I think now they just call it Lanvin.

So how, how do you think Castillo managed to persuade Lanvin to have his name...?

Well I think he was, first of all he was a very persuasive person, and I think he probably had a very good lawyer. And he wanted to promote himself. I think he, good old Spanish ego. And it did help, I mean the name Lanvin Castillo because an established name for, I was there for over ten years, and he stayed on a couple of years after I left. And then he left and started his own house under the name of Castillo. So Lanvin went back to being Lanvin. I think they went back to being Jeanne Lanvin again. And, then later on when the Comtesse de Polignac died and the various Lanvin family inherited, then they, eventually they sold it to somebody else, I think that was only about ten years ago, they sold it to a lady from Taiwan, and she changed the name to just Lanvin.

Because what sort of person was the Comtesse de Polignac?

She was a very beautiful woman, and she was a very cultured lady, very, very musical. And, when she was born, she was born back, I think about 1900, and her mother, Jeanne Lanvin, had been the daughter of the concierge of Victor Hugo, who lived in the Place des Vosges. And when Victor Hugo had to get out of France for political reasons, and went to live in Guernsey, he escaped using the passport of Monsieur Lanvin, the concierge. And Monsieur Lanvin had, I think he, supposed to have had about fifteen children, and Jeanne was apprenticed to a milliner in Spain. And she went to live and work in Spain, working for the milliner, and eventually she came back to Paris pregnant, and unmarried, and then she had her little baby, and Percy Savage Page 61 C1046/09 Tape 3 Side A (Part 5) brought it up, and she took an attic in the Faubourg St Honoré where she made hats. And she, from selling hats to the clients, she eventually, dressing her own child, she began to make little dresses for her clients’ children. And from there made dresses for, for the women. So, from somewhere in the first ten years up until about 1910, ’14, she was established then as a, as a fashion house making clothes for women. And then during the Twenties and Thirties it was a very grand fashion house in Paris, Lanvin.

But, do you think the Comtesse then ever had any sort of, stigma attached to her as, as, you know, being illegitimate?

I think there might have been in the very early years, but I mean that was quickly, I mean, Madame Lanvin became a very wealthy lady, and she married her daughter off to a, Monsieur le Comte de Polignac, who was a count in a princely family, there were princes, the Polignacs, and Count de Polignac, so she married a Count de Polignac. They never had any children. And, during the war when the Germans were occupying France, the Polignac family that she married into owned a champagne called Pommery, it was called Pommery and Greno. And, Madame Lanvin had bought shares in the company, and in exchange she got a count for her daughter, a title for her daughter, so they... And, during the war Madame Lanvin was selling the champagne to the Germans at a certain price, and then she found out that her son-in- law, the Comte de Polignac, was under-cutting her price and selling the same champagne to the Germans, so she had that, and, rounded up very neatly by denouncing him to the French Resistance and he was taken out to the Bois de Boulogne and shot.

And how did her daughter feel about that?

I think the daughter was somewhat relieved, because she was well-known as being one of the very gay ladies in Paris, and, didn’t particularly relish her husband.

And how did she treat you?

Percy Savage Page 62 C1046/09 Tape 3 Side A (Part 5)

The Comtesse de Polignac, Marie-Blanche? Well she was a very gracious lady, and I met her quite early in my life in Paris, because I was a student at the art school and I was take... She was one of three very famous Maries in Paris. There was Marie- Blanche de Polignac, there was Marie-Laure de Noailles, the Vicomtesse de Noailles, and there was Marie-Louise Bousquet. And Marie-Laure de Noailles was a millionaire who lived in the Place des Etats-Unis in a very grand modern palace. And, Marie-Louise Bousquet was the French editor of American Harper’s Bazaar, and she was also the mistress of, oh dear dear dear, Jean Giraudoux, a French académicien. And the académiciens all met on Thursdays in Paris at the Institut, to decide on the dictionary et cetera, and whatever they had to do, and, Jean Giroudoux, being a famous playwright, and an académicien, he used to come along to his mistress’s salon on the Thursday when he met, and he’d come along with a couple of literary giants. So Marie-Louise Bousquet had her salon on the Thursday; Marie- Louise Bousquet...Marie-Laure de Noailles had hers on the Wednesday; and Marie- Blanche de Polignac had hers on the Monday. So it was Monday, Tuesday...Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, that’s right, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday were the three days they had their salons. And I was taken first to Marie-Blanche de Polignac’s salon by a friend, and, I remember the first couple of years she was a little bit jealous of people, she didn’t want them to be going to all the different salons, and she told me I shouldn’t be going to that woman in, Marie-Louise Bousquet. And then later on when I was working at the house of Lanvin she said, in view of the fact that Marie- Louise Bousquet was the editor of American Harper’s Bazaar, perhaps I should go along to her salon. (laughs) But, the three salons were frequented, was... They don’t sort of exist any more today, I mean, people have soirées and so on, but, the salons were very much a part of the after-war years in Paris for social life, cultured life, and visitors to Paris were always very eager to be invited to one or two of those salons.

And who, so who introduced you to the Comtesse de Polignac?

It was Jean Cocteau who took me along. And then, later when I went to the, Marie- Louise Bousquet, that’s where I first met Christian Dior, and he was one of her great friends.

How did you meet Cocteau? Percy Savage Page 63 C1046/09 Tape 3 Side A (Part 5)

I met Cocteau through the school, I mean, at the, in St-Germain-des-Prés. Because I was living at that, at that stage I was living in the Place de la Contrescarpe, which was behind the Panthéon, about a mile away from the school, from the École des Beaux- Arts, and, in the evenings I was occasionally working in, in, as I told you, I think I, I got a job working as a proof-reader, but I would often go round the cafés and restaurants in the, either before going to work or after going to work, at midnight or two o’clock in the morning, and, and I just met Cocteau through other friends.

And what, what was he like, you know, how, how did he treat young students?

He was an extremely, very amusing, very amusing, very witty, spoke quite good English, and was, he had been already in 1949 when, in 1947 rather, when Christian Dior started his fashion house, Cocteau was with Christian Dior at the Edinburgh Festival. And many years, fifty years later in 1997 when Edinburgh were having a retrospective exhibition of, of the history of the Festival, they found they didn’t have very many documents about the Festival, and they asked me, could I arrange for stuff from the, various documents and dresses and things from Dior of the period when he started. So I worked on that exhibition in 1997, which was up at the Edinburgh University, well the University of Edinburgh rather.

Well how do you think the Scots reacted to the New Look?

The Scots? I think there were a few good, Scottish, very wealthy ladies in Scotland, they loved it. And Dior was invited to show his collection at Gleneagles, and that went down very well, it was, you know... No, he was very popular. The French were always very very popular I Scotland. And the Edinburgh Festival was a great, had taken off wonderfully and was a, year... And Cocteau also did the, the poster for the Edinburgh Festival for a couple of years running. And I went to Edinburgh with them, I think it was in, already in 1949 I think I went to Edinburgh for the first time. And then again in 1950. And then, subsequent years after that also I went up there for, without even coming to London, we just flew directly from Paris to Scotland. Because a lot of, a lot of the French people went there.

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And what did you think of Scotland?

Well I didn’t see very much of it, apart from Edinburgh, and then, took quite a few years before I actually got out into, into Scotland to see more of it. But I, I adore Scotland now, it’s wonderful. And still like the Festival, you know, it’s a, still a wonderful thing.

And so when you went there, did you...was there a sort of, given what you said about your impressions of London, what would you say your impressions of Edinburgh were?

Oh, much, much, much superior, much, much, much more satisfying[???]. And also I think, my first impressions of London were in October during very bad weather, as I told you there was horrible smog, and, the weather conditions. Whereas Edinburgh is in August, and at a time of the year when the weather is perfect, so, no, Edinburgh was always a lovely, and still is, a lovely city. I’m very, very happy there.

Was Cocteau the first gay man you had ever met?

The first gay man?

Mm.

Oh no, I think, I’d met gay men in Australia. (laughs) No no, there were lots of gay men in Australia. (laughs)

And did you have...

There was a very famous Australian called Bobby Helpmann, I don’t know whether you’ve ever heard of him, but he was an Australian ballet dancer, and, I knew in Australia, then he came to London, and, he was a choreographer and dancer and he, one of his very famous roles in London was when he played the, one of the ugly sisters in Cinderella. And he was one of the first gays that I met in Australia. Oh no, Australia was, you know, very...lots of gays in the... (laughs) And still are, mm. Percy Savage Page 65 C1046/09 Tape 3 Side A (Part 5)

But was there a sort of, a particular area or, or...you know, I mean, would this be in the city more than in...?

In Australia?

Yes.

Well, I think that the only gays I ever knew in Australia were all, they were all, mainly in Sydney. I think there might... I don’t remember in Brisbane. I think I was too young to know much about the gay life. But in Sydney, yes, there were lots of gays in Sydney.

Because I wondered, you know, how, how, how you found out about sex, you know, who, who, who would have explained it all to you? Would it have been your mother, or the school or...?

Oh I... No, it was the schools I think, yes.

And how, how would they have gone about it? Were there actual, was there sort of books, or sex education?

No, I don’t think there was ever any sort of sexual education, none whatsoever. But when you live on, when you live in the country, when you live on a farm, you learn about sex very quickly. (laughs) So it was... But I don’t think I’d heard much about gay sex in Australia until I went to Sydney. I don’t think I’d come across much of it in literature at all, I can’t remember any, any literature that I had when I was a child that mentioned that. And, it was just basically when I went to Sydney and was going to school in Sydney, and knew people there.

And, did you ever feel lonely in Paris?

I don’t think so, no, no, I was... No, I, I fitted in to French life very well, both as a student and also as a, as a worker. And... I didn’t, no. And I shared the, as I said, I Percy Savage Page 66 C1046/09 Tape 3 Side A (Part 5) shared the flat with the Swiss journalist, writer, a boy called Dominique Fabre, and he wrote for the Journal de Genève, a Swiss newspaper, and he and I shared the flat in, in the rue Vaneau, and, he did his work during the day, I was working at Lanvin during the day, and occasionally working at night, and so on. We saw each other occasionally, and went to galleries, went to the theatre, and he would write about the theatre, first nights, and he would write about artistic events, theatre, opera, ballet, conferences, and I would illustrate his articles with little pen portraits of the various people.

And is that how the one for Picasso came about?

No, because I’d met Picasso before that. I met Picasso when I was, before I was working at Lanvin. I think, I met Picasso, I think it must have been, 1950 I think I met Picasso, it was the year before I went to work at Lanvin. And that was the year when I started doing the textile designs, and started selling... Balenciaga was the first person to buy my designs, and that happened because I had an exhibition arranged in Palermo by an Italian architect for a maternity museum – a maternity hospital. And I had an exhibition in London at the Ojana Galleries, which today are called the Hamilton Galleries in Carlos Place, near the Connaught Hotel, and, I happened to know, in Paris I happened to know a man called Mauricio Ojana, who was the Spanish cultural attaché. And he was very proud that I was showing in his family’s gallery in London, and he was very proud that I was doing this and that. And he had a dinner party, and at the dinner party he was telling all his friends what a brilliant young man I was, and how wonderful, and he said people should see my work. And then, opposite, sitting, almost sitting next to him and opposite me was a young, was this man who said, ‘Well, you must come and see me, I would like to see some work, I need some designs for scarves.’ And he gave me his card, and it was, as I say, Cristóbal Balenciaga, and that’s how Balenciaga and I met. And then he bought some designs from me for scarves, and then eventually Lanvin bought some, and eventually Lanvin hired me full time, but that wasn’t until 1950...a year later.

So, what sort of designs, well, could you describe one of your designs?

Percy Savage Page 67 C1046/09 Tape 3 Side A (Part 5)

The... Well, the ones I did for Balenciaga were, at the time I was very influenced by a Russian painter called Poliakoff, and, who was abstract, and I did abstract designs for Balenciaga, and, and basically they were heart shapes, I think there were about five different coloured hearts on a dark background. And then once I’d done the original, Balenciaga wanted dif...what they called different colour ways, so I had to do different coloured backgrounds and different coloured hearts. So, that was a lot more work to be done, but it was, that was the way they did it in those days, all done by hand, of painting on paper and so on. I don’t think they do that today, I think they use computers today.

And were you involved at all in the process, did you go...?

No, I just had to do the original art work on paper. And then Balenciaga passed that on to the French printers who were in Lyon, it’s where the centre of the French silk industry was. And they all had representatives in Paris, the fabric houses would have their mills down in Lyon making the fabrics, and the fabric would be sent up to Paris. And then the representatives from the fabric houses would visit the fashion houses and the fashion designers would choose, and they’d go through length after length after length of fabric, and put one aside here and one aside there, and then they’d say seventy-five yards of that and five yards of that. And then eventually they’d make up their collection from that. So I didn’t... Later I had a little bit to do with that, because I had to work, when I was at Lanvin I had to work on the production of the scarves, not just the designing of them, but the following through and, with the... And so I had to go to Lyon occasionally and see the, see the mills down there.

And would, would Balenciaga have any input into, into your designs?

With the scarves? No, no, he just chose from what I had submitted. And I showed him about thirty different designs, and he chose five. And then the others I then showed to somebody, I showed to Lanvin, and they chose four or five, and then having sold to those two I then sold I think to, Jacques Fath I think was the next one, and Balmain. And then I saw Christian Dior who said, ‘I hear you’ve been selling scarf designs, and you’ve never shown them to me.’ So, I then showed them to Dior, Percy Savage Page 68 C1046/09 Tape 3 Side A (Part 5) and he bought a few. And then of course Lanvin hired me and I couldn’t design for them, anybody else any more.

And how did you know how much to charge?

Well, amongst the students they would, that was the sort of, you know, you’d say... There were other students who were doing similar sort of work who told me, that was the sort of going rate.

And, would you make an appointment to go and see people?

Well the first one I made was thanks to Balenciaga asking me to, and then a friend who was a fashion journalist who was so excited that I’d done this, and she was the one who told me to go to Lanvin, so she rang up and I got an appointment through her. And then after that I just rang up and spoke to the people I knew working in various fashion houses and said, you know, ‘Can I come along and show my collection? I’ve sold to that and that,’ and so on, and, they said, ‘Yes.’ So I went along and... That lasted for about a year I was doing that, before Lanvin hired me full time.

And what would you wear when you went to show them your work?

Oh, just student clothes. I mean, you know, shirts and pullovers and... I don’t think I had any jeans, I didn’t get any jeans until about 1950. After that I wore jeans a bit, but not very often. Because once I started working at Lanvin I had to be very very well dressed, and jeans were not the sort of thing you wore when you were working at Lanvin. (laughs) You could wear those when you were on holidays in St Tropez, but not in Paris at Lanvin.

So could I just ask you what, what Picasso was like as a sitter?

Oh he didn’t actually sit for me, I mean he was just sitting working, walking around, and I was just sitting and sketching in a notepad. No he didn’t actually sit for me, but I mean he was... No, he, he was a very lively, very talkative... He liked to drink, I Percy Savage Page 69 C1046/09 Tape 3 Side A (Part 5) mean he would have a glass of wine early in the morning, at eleven o’clock in the morning we’d be having a glass of wine when I went to visit him. And then we’d occasionally see each other in the evening. No, he didn’t actually sort of sit for me, the idea. (laughs) Just sketch, do sketches of him.

And where would you meet in the evenings?

At either his home or friends’ homes. In cafés, round the... There were quite expensive cafés we’d go to.

And would you, would it be quite formal, or would it be sort of...?

No, no way, not really, no. Dinner parties at home, they’d be fairly formal, yes, but out in restaurants, no. We used to go to quite expensive restaurants. I remember one evening I was there, and we were sitting next to, this was when I was working at Lanvin, and we were sitting next to Greta Garbo. And we were speaking. And the next day I went back to Lanvin, I was up in my office upstairs, and the directrice of the boutique who was called Jacqueline Citroën, she belonged to the car manufacturing family, the Citroëns, and she called up on the phone from the boutique and said, ‘Mr Savage, there’s a lady here to see you.’ And I said, ‘Well send her up.’ And she said, ‘No I think you’d better come down.’ So I came down, and it was Greta Garbo who had come in and asked for me. So my stocks in Lanvin went up high, the fact that Greta Garbo came in asking for me, and actually bought a raincoat from the boutique. So, and I’d met her through Picasso, in a little restaurant around the corner from Picasso, and was a little restaurant called the, or was Ile Porquerolles. Les Iles Porquerolles in the Mediterranean, just opposite St Tropez. And, this was a little restaurant there run by some lady, and quite an expensive restaurant, one of the best in Paris at the time.

[End of F15388 Side A] Percy Savage Page 70 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B

Tape 3 Side B [part 6]

.....sort of food would you have there?

Well, Les Iles Porquerolles was essentially a fish restaurant. And I remember the night that we were having dinner there at that restaurant with Picasso, there was another...this painting I have on the wall up here, the basket with a couple of pears in, and a knife, that was one that I had bought from a friend, who was a Mexican, obviously Mexicans speak Spanish, and he was also a friend of Picasso, and he was with us for dinner that night. And I’ve kept that painting all, it’s over, sixty years old now I’ve had that.

And what was his name?

His name was Alfonso Michel.

What did...

And he was a great friend. Another Mexican painter I knew in Paris was Rufino Tamayo, who was a very famous, you may have heard, I mean he’s a, he and his wife, they were both Indian Mexicans, and they lived in Paris, they had a big palatial home in Paris they lived in, they were very much a part of Paris society, and, again, they were friends of Picasso’s.

And what was your impression of Tamayo?

Oh a lovely man, wonderful, lovely, they were a lovely, lovely couple. And Tamayo was a very successful painter, totally different from Picasso, but very well known and successful painter in Paris in the Fifties.

So, what do you mean by totally different? In character or in work?

Well in character, yes, and, and age. I mean they were both about, Tamayo was slightly younger. But, no they were... They, they each respected each other’s work, Percy Savage Page 71 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B but they were totally different as, as... Picasso was quite unique as a painter, quite, quite unique, and changing all the time, all the time, all the time, all the time. I mean, he did years before in the early 1900s, he had his Rose period and his Blue period, and, but then he changed totally and was, always innovating, every, every exhibition was totally different.

And would, would an artist like Tamayo ask you about Picasso and, would he, you know...?

Oh they knew each other in...

But would...would... Yes.

Well we would occasionally talk about them, yes, yes. Occasionally. I think Tamayo would, he and his wife would invite me to come along for drinks or dinner or, cocktail parties, or we’d meet in other people’s places, and... They were very, they were very lovely people, you know, they were very, very... And, they also had quite a, a big connection with the Americans living in, in Paris. Picasso didn’t have many American friends, he didn’t...a few, he knew Gertrude Stein, which was before I met him, and Gertrude Stein had a companion called, oh what was her name?

Alice Toklas.

Alice B. Toklas, that’s correct. And I knew her fairly well for about ten years or so during, all through the Fifties. But Gertrude Stein had died before I met Alice Toklas.

Gosh, so what was Alice Toklas like?

She was a small lady, she was...and, a writer, she was a, very sociable little lady, she used to be invited to the theatre a lot, I would see her in the theatre first nights, and, so on, and she would occasionally, occasionally we met at other people’s parties. She lived around the corner from Picasso, in the same area near this... He lived in the rue des Grands Augustins, on the Left Bank down near St Michel, just opposite the Ile de la Cité, and she lived in a little street just round the corner from him. Percy Savage Page 72 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B

And did you...

Off the rue Dauphine I think she lived, she and Gertrude Stein had a house, or rather a big flat.

And, do you have any memories of that flat?

Yes, it had a lot of paintings in it. (laughs) And Gertrude Stein had been in 1946 when I was, that was before, a year before I was there, in Paris, I was there in late ’47, Gertrude Stein was one of the ones who financed Pierre Balmain when he started his fashion house. And Balmain started his fashion house in the end of 1946, six months before Christian Dior started in February 1947. And Gertrude Stein was one of his patrons, she put the money up for him.

What, for Dior as well?

No no no no no, for...

No, for Balmain.

...Pierre Balmain. No, Dior was financed exclusively by a man called, oh dear what was his name? The big cotton... How silly. Anyway he, he was known as the cotton king of France. [pause] Boussac, Marcel Boussac was his name. And, he had owned a lot of racehorses, and he owned cotton mills up in Strasbourg and Nancy, and it was he who financed Dior totally.

So, I didn’t realise that, that Gertrude Stein was at all kind of interested in the fashion world, or...

Well I’m not sure that she was interested in the fashion world, but I mean she did dress, and Gertrude Stein was a very wealthy woman, and she used to dress very well, and so she needed somebody to make her clothes. (laughs) I don’t think she was a Percy Savage Page 73 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B very fashionable woman, I think she just wore heavy tweedy suits, but, with Balmain who used to make them for her.

Because, have you ever read The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas?

I don’t think so, no. No.

Because there’s quite a, it’s quite an amusing book.

Mm.

And...

I know she was supposed to have written cookery books, and supposed to have made hash brown cakes with hash in them. (laughs)

And did you ever have one of those?

No, I don’t think so, no. (laughs)

And did, did Alice shop at Lanvin?

I don’t think so. She used to come to the Lanvin collection. But Alice Toklas was a very small lady, and she was...and I just seem to remember her being, wearing sort of, over-long overcoats, and longish skirts, and, she was by no means a chic woman in any way whatsoever, she was just a tiny little, little old lady that had no pretensions to fashion or elegance whatsoever. But she was a well known, you know, person, everybody loved her as a personality.

And what language would you all talk with each other?

Oh, with Picasso I spoke English and French. I never learnt much Spanish, but I mean, he spoke very good English.

Percy Savage Page 74 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B

What did he think of your drawing of him, your portrait?

Oh I think he was just polite. I mean... (laughs) It was, it was a good likeness of him, that’s all.

And have you still got that?

No, no, I gave it to him. No no, I gave that to him.

Do you know what he did with it?

Well I mean it was such a huge studio, and, so many thousands of pieces of paper everywhere, I’m sure it just ended up on another pile of...

So, do you think he was encouraging to you, as a sort of young artist?

Well I think he was, he was very welcoming, I mean he was... Yes, he was...I mean it was, it was...it was quite a feather in one’s cap to be known to be a friend or an acquaintance of Picasso, and say hello to him in public, and, so on, it was, ah, you know Picasso, it was... But it was...it was... In that particular world of fashion and art, I mean they were very very closely allied, and met each other and, for various, in various places. I mean they were always at the theatre or always at the ballet or the opera or the races or, various places to meet.

And do you think that sort of meshing was a unique thing in Paris? Do you think that there would have been a similar...

I think the same, similar sort of thing must have existed in every capital city. I think you would find the same thing in Rome, you’d find the same thing in, definitely in Rome, you’d find the same thing amongst the fashion houses and the various artists and musicians. You would find the same thing in New York, amongst the various fashion designers and... The people in the...the main people in the fashion world or the beauty world, like Elizabeth Arden, in those days, and Helena Rubinstein, Helena Rubinstein was a, a big client of Balenciaga, and she used to come to London after Percy Savage Page 75 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B she had bought from Balenciaga, and she used to go to a little Australian couturier in Beauchamp Place, who would copy stitch for stitch and bead for bead the jackets and suits and dresses that Balenciaga had made for her. And she, you know, she told everybody that she did it, everyone knew that she had copies of them. She would... She had a house in London, in Rutland Gate, near...she lived just opposite where was once the French Consul, at the top end of Rutland Gate, up on, just opposite Hyde Park. And she had, the clothes that she had bought in Paris from Balenciaga, she would bring to London, have them copied, and she’d leave the copies in London, so, when she travelled she didn’t sort of travel much with clothes. Wherever she went, when she went back to New York, she had copies of clothes in New York too.

Mm, what a good system. (laughs)

Oh lots of them did that.

Did they?

Well we had one client at Lanvin, very well known, was Barbara Hutton, and when she bought from Lanvin, she would buy the same dress four or five times. And one would be sent to Mexico, one would be sent to Tangier, one would be sent to London, one would be sent to New York, and the other would be sent...oh, Switzerland, and another one would stay in Paris. So when she, again when she travelled, she just didn’t take any luggage with her, she just travelled, she had a wardrobe everywhere.

And did heiresses like Barbara Hutton ever alter clothes?

Alter them?

Mm.

I... They might have perhaps sometimes taken them back to the couturier to have them altered, I don’t think they would do it themselves.

No no, I meant, sort of... Percy Savage Page 76 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B

Oh you mean, would they say, ‘Yes I like that but I’d like the skirt shorter or longer’? Oh yes, very definitely.

And that, and that wasn’t frowned upon?

Well, I think that the couturiers were too happy to have their clothes, you know, to have a good client, and it wasn’t... The couturier wouldn’t necessarily know, because the couturier very rarely had anything to do with the client. The client would come along and she would just deal with the saleslady. And the client would come along, and sit and watch the collection, and the saleslady would perhaps sit next to her, or sit aside, and then come and see her after the show and say, ‘Which numbers would you like to see?’ And then she would bring...the collection on the first floor, they would be taken up to the second floor where they had the cabine d’essayage and where they would have their fittings and take their measurements. And it would be basically the, the saleslady who would chat to her about, you know, perhaps we make the sleeves a little bit deeper, or a little bit bigger, or, the sleeves a little bit longer or a little bit shorter, because they might be, they might like to have their sleeves shorter than usual so they could wear their bracelets and bangles and watches and things would be seen. Oh no lots of little changes were made by, by clients to clothes. I think that’s perfectly normal. But the couturier would not, he wouldn’t know much about that.

And, because I am sort of quite intrigued by Balenciaga, because, the sort of, reputation one reads about is that he was quite stern and [inaudible].

He was, he was not very jovial, I mean he was a very, very quiet... Yes, he was rather stern, and rather monkish. And he always at the fashion house, he always wore a white smock. And he would hardly ever see any of the private clients, they would just deal with the, with the salesladies. He would see the private clients at dinner parties that he might give, or he might be invited to, as I said, the Spanish cultural attaché invited Balenciaga to that supper, where there were half a dozen different Spanish ladies or half a dozen different South American ladies and their husbands or boyfriends, but he would meet them there, but he wouldn’t necessarily ever have anything to do with trying to sell them a dress. That wasn’t his job. He just designed Percy Savage Page 77 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B and made the clothes. And he himself was a master tailor, he could cut and sew impeccably.

Did you ever watch him work?

Oh, very little. I went, often went to see him in the couture house, but, he wouldn’t be working very much there, I mean, walk in and perhaps he might be sitting down doing a fitting on a model girl. But, I didn’t...I don’t think I ever actually saw him cutting. I know he did it but, I don’t think I ever remembered him doing that, no.

And...

But not many of the couturiers actually cut and sewed themselves. Christian Dior couldn’t sew; Christian Dior could draw beautifully. And, Yves St Laurent could, could sew and cut, he was a good tailor. Castillo, the designer, did not cut and sew, he used to sketch. Many of them just used to do sketches, and then they would ask what they would call the premier d’atelier, that would be the person in charge of a workroom, either a man or a woman, in most cases men did tailoring like jackets and coats, and women did what they call the flue, which was the, the fluid clothes, dresses and skirts and blouses and shirts. And you would call them in, show them the sketches, and they would go away and interpret that by making up a garment from looking at a sketch. And then they would bring the garment in to the designer and the designer would sit down, and the model girl would wear the clothes, and the designer would say, ‘Yes, well take it in a bit here,’ or shorten it here or make it longer there, or, a bit fuller at the back, and some... But, very few of them could actually themselves cut and sew.

And were you ever tempted to, to design clothes?

No, I never had the slightest desire to do clothes whatsoever. (laughs) Far too happy and interested in doing what I was doing. I just, I didn’t really have, you know, I didn’t particularly want to draw fashion, I didn’t... As an, as somebody who was trying to study fine art and painting, fashion artists and fashion art, the drawings of clothes, was about the lowest of the low so far as I was concerned, I just didn’t like it, Percy Savage Page 78 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B you know. Even in Australia, I never liked the... Mind you, in Australia, you didn’t see very good fashion art in Australia. You’d get advertisements in the papers for department stores and their fashion art was pretty abysmal. I mean the same thing in Paris, fashion art, and, advertising was one thing, but fashion art in the newspapers was another thing. You get some fashion artists who became, eventually became quite highly respected and well paid, but, no, that never appealed to me in the least.

And so who, when, when did fashion artists become sort of, better paid and...?

Well, I think fashion artists were always, in the 1800s and the early 1900s, fashion artists were the, they were the, the only way of illustrating fashion. It wasn’t until photography was invented and some photographers began to do photographs of fashion, that photography took over. So fashion artists were always in Vogue, right up until I would say about the mid-Fifties or, late Fifties, and then after that it became a...I would say photography had taken over, and fashion artists became a rare species. And they still are today, I mean you look at the majority of the newspapers today and you find very few fashion artists, very few. Whereas photography is, everybody uses photography. And you go to a fashion show now and you find thousands of photographers there, and you might get one or two people sitting in the audience who are actually doing some sketches, but, they’re very rare today.

And did...

And I love fashion artists now, you know, I mean, I think they’re... I think a page with fashion drawing in is far more exciting to look at than a page with just photography.

So when did your opinion change, do you think?

Oh I think that changed during the Fifties and Sixties when I began to get to know some of the fashion artists as being rather wonderful people, and, knew some of them well.

Who stands out for you? Percy Savage Page 79 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B

One of the greatest was a man called René Gruau, you may have heard of him, he was born Italian...his father was an Italian, and his mother was French, and he was a great, close friend of Christian Dior. When Dior came out with the first New Look in 1947, he introduced a Miss Dior perfume and it was René Gruau who did the, the illustration, the art work for that perfume. And so it went on and on and on, every time Dior had a new collection, it was Gruau who did all the art work for all the, all the perfume ads, all the, all the Dior advertising. You would find just perhaps a Louis XVI chair with a glove draped over it, and a little bunch of muguet, a little lily-of-the- valley, and that was to advertise the Dior perfume. And he was one of the great great great ones. And he died just about, oh only a couple of months ago. And he did, in 1957, when Dior was planning to introduce a menswear range, and they were planning to introduce a men’s fragrance, and they didn’t quite know what to, what to call it. They had the, the packaging was there, they had the perfume, they had, the bottle was designed, they had the packaging and, the cardboard package that the bottle went into, but they didn’t know what to call it. And they didn’t want to call it Eau de Monsieur Dior, and they didn’t want to call it eau de cologne, because it was too soon after the war with Germany and Cologne had a, a German connotation. And they didn’t want to call it eau de toilette because in America toilet means pee-pee rooms. So they decided to have a dinner party in Paris during the collections, and they invited the store presidents from Sachs Fifth Avenue and Bergdorf Goodman, people who would eventually be stocking the, the fragrance, and they invited the people from American Harper’s and American Vogue and American New York Times, and the same from London, from Harrods and Fortnum & Mason’s, and Vogue and Harper’s here, and the invited them to a dinner party, along with various friends like René Gruau, and Jean Cocteau, and myself and various other friends of Dior, to come to, first of all a drinks party, and then a dinner party for the...to explain all this and so on. And I was working at Lanvin, and, late...until quite late at night, so I thought I’d skip the drinks party and just go along for the dinner. And when I arrived everybody was seated at table and the butler sort of, took me through and knocked on the door, opened up, and said, ‘Monsieur Sauvage.’ And somebody clapped their hands and said, ‘Oh Sauvage, how dare you arrive so late.’ And then Dior clapped his hands and said, ‘That’s the name, we’ll call it Eau Sauvage.’ And that was the origin of that particular fragrance, which has gone on and on and on, and it was a great, great, great Percy Savage Page 80 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B success. And René Gruau did the art work for that which I have here, I have the, the card... Well no, it’s in a, in a box, as a card, and that card is actually sold at the V&A with a man promoting, a naked man with a towel over his shoulder, just with Eau Sauvage. And that’s actually sold at the, at the V&A now. It’s published by a friend of mine who’s a publisher of greeting cards and... So I can go to the V&A and I buy a lot of cards of Eau Sauvage. (laughs)

Who is the publisher?

It’s a lady called Allison Demuth, originally born in New Zealand, married, and her husband did work in McCann Erickson which was a very well-known American advertising agency in Sydney. And then they moved from Sydney to Singapore. And she was in, she was an importer of French lingerie, knickers and slips and bras, selling in Singapore. And then she left and she came to England, and her two daughters still live in Singapore and her husband now lives in Bangkok with McCann Erickson, but she lives in London, and works from here.

So did you use Eau Sauvage, did you [inaudible]?

Oh yes, I, yes, I do love...I’ve got some up on the shelf up there.

Is it your favourite?

Yes. Oh yes, I have it. (laughs) But I like other Dior fragrances also. They brought one out that I liked very much for men called Fahrenheit, which is one that I also buy and use. But I like the Eau Sauvage, and still occasionally buy it.

And, at that sort of evening, would you have been the only sort of press person there?

No, because they had, first of all they had the, their press director from Christian Dior, who was Monsieur de Monsabré, the Marquis de Monsabré, he was the head of the press at Dior. And I, I think I was the only one from another fashion house, shall we say, yes. But... And then the other press people were, as I said, they were, they had Percy Savage Page 81 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B the people from, I think there was somebody from the New York Times newspaper, and somebody from American Vogue, the editors and writers and so on.

And had you met sort of, journalists through, you know, your, your proof-reading and through Dominique, was that [inaudible]?

I met very few journalists through that. I met a few, notably the woman who was the fashion editor for the Daily Mail in Paris, the one that introduced me to Lanvin, and her name was Joy Smail, and she worked there as a fashion writer, and, her husband also worked in the Daily Mail in the advertising department, his job was to sell advertising. And then other than that, I knew, at the Herald Tribune, I knew the fashion editor of the Herald Tribune, who was called Eugenia Sheppard, and she was an American and she came over to Paris twice a year for the collections. And, in the meantime when she was not in Paris there was a little old lady called Lucy Noelle who had, she was born Russian and she was the fashion editor in Paris all year round, but when collections were on, Eugenia Sheppard came over and took over. So I knew a few of them through the papers that I worked for, but not, not...not many, no. Most of them, most of the journalists I knew, I knew simply because I was working as a press officer at Lanvin, and they would come to see me or I would ring up and try and get them to come and see me. If I wanted, you know, a story or thought there was a story good enough for them for some reason, it was my job was to try and get the stories placed with the right sort of paper and the right sort of person.

Because did they have...I mean were they powerful in a sense, these journalists?

Oh very, very very very very powerful, yes indeed. I mean they had, they had the choice of whatever they would want to write about; it wasn’t necessarily the editor of the newspaper who said, ‘You’re going out to do a story on Dior.’ They would say, ‘You’ve got a fashion page to fill, and, it’s up to you to put in whatever you want.’ So they would choose whether they want to write about Dior, whether they want to write about Balenciaga, or they’d want to write about Prisunic or Galérie Lafayette. And the same in every country. So we had to, you know, try and keep up with and keep in with all the top journalists from all over the world.

Percy Savage Page 82 C1046/09/ Tape 3 Side B

And... Actually I’m.....

[End of Tape 3 Side B] Percy Savage Page 83 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7)

Tape 4 Side A [part 7]

So how would you, how would you go about persuading them to do, you know, a story on Lanvin?

Well the local press in Paris would always be, they would have a weekly article, they would have a page a week in their, Figaro or, France Soir or, [inaudible] newspapers, whichever papers they had, and then the magazines like Paris-Match or Jours De France would also, there were weeklies or monthlies. And then you would get the big glossy magazines like, the biggest glossy magazine which was called l’Officiel de la Couture, which was a couple of inches thick, glossy paper. Then there was another one called l’Art et la Mode, and there was another one called Femme Chic. And there was another one called Vogue, which had been around for quite a few years. So, they were all, eventually they would be doing their articles well in advance, because it took about, in those days it took about three months from the time you took a photograph to the time you could actually publish it, because of the printing delays. And they would be, they’d be running after us to get stories from us, or, not exactly stories, but they would want a photograph, they were doing a story on perhaps blue, and they would have a blue dress and a blue jacket and a blue suit, and... Or they would be doing a story on coats and they would have a coat from this, one page would be a Dior and opposite would be a Balenciaga, and opposite, the next page, would be perhaps two suits from Jean Desses, and opposite would one from Balmain; some would be in black and white and some would be in colour. So, it wasn’t, it wasn’t a very difficult job to get them to do it, because they were living on advertising from all the textile companies, and the textile companies would always get credits in the editorial. So if there was a coat that was in a blue silk by Staron, Staron would in addition to that probably have taken what they call a cahier of about sixteen pages of advertising, to advertise whatever they had in the fashion houses. So sometimes you would get, the same dress would appear in a fashion page as editorial, and the same dress would appear in an advertisement, paid for by the textile house. Or, if it wasn’t the textile house, it might be the silk federation they would pay to make sure that they got silk advertised, or it might be the wool secretariat who would pay advertisers, or it might be the, the cotton people who would do it, or the nylon people, or, DuPont De Nemours, the American company, who were trying to sell their nylon, and they Percy Savage Page 84 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7) subsidised advertising also, make sure that they got their, they were able to sell their fibres and make artificial fibres. So it was, you know, there was a big, big big industry, the fashion industry in textiles.

But, was there any sort of, particular publication that, you know, that was very important to appear in?

In those days it was very important to appear in, it was very important to have a cover. The cover of a magazine, the cover of l’Officiel, or the cover of Vogue, or the, the cover of l’Art et la Mode, that was a very important thing. But they were all, all four of them, Vogue and l’Officiel were the two most important, French Vogue and l’Officiel, and then, in America, again it was either Vogue or Harper’s. And in England it was either Vogue or Harper’s. And little bit by little bit in France you would get the weekly, like Elle magazine began to get more important and more important, and now it’s one of the, the most important. And then Marie Claire was another one in France, another...Marie France was another one in France, but, in Paris. But, they weren’t as important as the big glossies. Elle was not a glossy magazine, it was, it was, you know, a soft paper, but it was a, it was a very important big circulation. Whereas Christian Dior might advertise Dior perfumes in Elle, because of the huge circulation, they wouldn’t advertise their fashion in any way, but they would let editorial be published.

So, when Lanvin offered you the post of press officer, what did you think that meant? Did they explain what the job was?

A little bit. Well I was, it meant an upgrading in office space for a start, because when I started at Lanvin they gave me a table about three feet wide, under a staircase, that’s to say it was the staircase between the fifth floor and the sixth floor, which is where the workrooms were. So I used to arrive in the morning on the ground floor, and go through the service entrance and then walk up the stairs, and up the stairs, and up the stairs, and eventually open up a little door under the staircase, and there was a small table under the staircase, and this little desk, and chair, and I used to sit and draw there. And as I said, after about six months they told me I’d done enough work for ten years, and they said that they’d like me to start working in the press office. So Percy Savage Page 85 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7)

I moved from the fifth floor down to the third floor, and had a great big room, and a secretary. (laughs)

And why do you think they, they offered you that job?

Well they knew that I... First of all I spoke English and French, and, whilst French was very important in Paris during twelve months of the year, during the collection time when they had visitors from all over the world, from America, from Australia, from England, they needed people who could speak English. And there weren’t many, there were not many people in the fashion houses who could speak English, who could do that sort of work. I mean there were a few, not many of the salesladies spoke English. A few of them spoke English, but not many. At Lanvin we had a, a saleslady who spoke a little bit of English, and she was called Madame Cezile, and she was the lady who was the saleslady, from about 1920s I think she had been there, and she was the saleslady for Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, when she came to Paris and used to buy in Paris. She first bought at Lanvin in 1926 when she was the Duchess of York, before she became the Queen. And then when she came back to Paris, she used to come and see the collections. She didn’t buy much in Paris after that, but occasionally she would, you know, have something made. And then Princess Margaret came along with her one day to buy from Lanvin, just before she was being married. And Princess Margaret also bought from Christian Dior in Paris, but I think they were about the only two houses that they went to. And that was basically because of the... We had very good relations at Lanvin with the success of British ambassadors, so I had Ambassador Jebb, Gladwyn Jebb, who became Lord Gladwyn, his daughter Stella was my secretary assistant at Lanvin for a while, and then after that, when Christopher Soames was the Ambassador, and his wife Mary Soames who was Churchill’s daughter, and their daughter Emma was my secretary at Lanvin also. Emma then left and came back to London, worked at the Telegraph as a journalist for many years, and she now works for a magazine called Saga which is for the elderly, she’s the editor of Saga magazine. So we always had, through the embassies and so on we had contacts with various people who would for some reason or other try and get clients in to us and, we used to dress the ambassadors’ wives and, at a cut rate, because, they needed a vast wardrobe to go out a lot and so on, so we were always running after the, the chic, elegant ambassadors. We didn’t particularly want all of Percy Savage Page 86 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7) them, because some of them weren’t the right shape. (laughs) And for a few years I was also the official Anglo-American press attaché for the wife of the President of France, who was President Coty, René Coty, and his wife was a large lady, and I was her official press, American, Anglo-American press attaché.

So what would you do for her?

Introduce her to editors from America, from Ladies Home Companion, or, Look magazine, and they would go along and do an article on her drawing room at the Palace, Élysée Palace. And, same with, you know, various newspaper editors or, to get stories written about her if possible.

And was this when you were freelance?

No, this was when I was still working at Lanvin. I was working... And I had been to, invited as a VIP for the inaugural flight of Sabena, the Belgian airline, from Brussels to Moscow, in 1958. And, when I came back Le Figaro did a big story on me as being the only member of the French couture that had gone on this particular flight, and as a result of that, Christian Dior rang me up, said, ‘We’re going to Russia and Moscow and showing our collection on Red Square next year, we’d like you to help us with it.’ So I helped them with that. So I went again in 1959. And on the first trip in 1958 I was with a couple of French deputies, one was a Canon Kir, le chanoine Kir, who was a deputy from Dijon; another one was Monsieur Medecin who was from Nice, the Alpes Maritimes deputy. And when we were in Moscow we were taken along to meet Khrushchev, so I’d met Khrushchev in ’58; I went back with Dior, and again arranged to meet Khrushchev and his wife. And then in 1960 Khrushchev made a state visit to Paris with his wife, and that’s when I was with Madame Coty as press attaché, so I had dinner at the Élysée Palace with the President and his wife, and Khrushchev and his wife, and fifty other notable people. So it was... And then that same year was my first visit to America in 1960, and it coincided with Khrushchev’s visit to the United Nations in America, and I was invited to lunch by the head of PR, the public relations officer for DuPont De Nemours. And, she invited me to lunch with the editor of American Vogue and the fashion editor from the New York Times, and when I arrived at the restaurant I could see the three ladies sitting in one corner, Percy Savage Page 87 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7) and the other side there was a great bellow, and it was Khrushchev. So I went over and said, bent over and kissed him on the top of his head, because he was a short, tubby little man, and then went and sat with these ladies. It was quite, at the time when communism was the worst element in America, so... (laughs) To be kissed by Khrushchev in New York was, quite a, quite a coup. But the, the Élysée Palace was a, a very useful contact also for many reasons.

And Lanvin were quite happy for you to help Dior...?

Oh yes, yes.

So was there a sense of competition between the couture houses?

Well you see at the same time I was on the board of the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture, and the Chambre Syndicale was the grouping of all the fashion houses. And some of the fashion houses had members on the, on the board, so I used to do, certain things were done in the name of the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture, as a couture, as a group effort. And they were quite, you know, well they were, they were...it was either that or, as eventually happened, I left Lanvin and went to work for Nina Ricci. Nina Ricci gave me double the salary, and, allowed me to continue to work for Lanvin’s menswear, because, Lanvin used to give me a very generous wardrobe, and, which didn’t cost me anything. And when I went to work for Nina Ricci, there was no menswear department there, so, they allowed me to continue to work and do the promotion for Lanvin menswear, whilst I was still doing Nina Ricci womenswear.

And was it sort of, to the advantage of Lanvin in a way to have you be part of the Chambre Syndicale?

Mm. Oh yes, I mean it was, we were the ones deciding the policy of... Not only that but I mean when, if and when the Chambre Syndicale decided to do anything, obviously we at the Chambre Syndicale would be...not necessarily every house would be included, and there were certain houses whom we didn’t consider to be good enough on a, they weren’t on a par, because obviously you had very good important houses like Balenciaga and Dior and Lanvin, or Jean Patou was also another Percy Savage Page 88 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7) important house, but then there were many other houses, like Jean Desses, who were not as important, Jacques Heim were not as important, Guy Laroche, Carven. Big, big, big successful perfume, Carven, but an insignificant little fashion house, they did not make very grand dresses and they did not dress a very grand clientele. They had a big clientele, of lots and lots and lots of rich little nobodies. (laughs) We would not necessarily include people like those in the grand events that we organised. Whereas Lanvin was always being pushed by me, because I was there.

And did those smaller houses try to get in?

Oh they were on their knees to be included in things, but we would not necessarily include them in everything. They just weren’t considered good enough. I mean it was a very elite little club, very exclusive.

Because, were you involved in actually sort of, setting it up, or had it been going...?

No, the Chambre Syndicale was started about 1860 by Charles Frederick Worth, the Englishman who started couture. And he started the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture, and then, every... They had to have certain standards before a fashion house would be accepted as a member of the Chambre Syndicale. They had to have their own house; they had to have a minimum number of employees; they had to make a collection twice a year of a minimum number of garments. There had to be about 100 garments, they had to employ about 200 people, and they couldn’t... For instance you would find certain fashion houses who were not allowed, not admitted; they had...perhaps they had outworkers, their work would be done, it might be cut in a workroom, in a small boutique or, one or two storey house, and then somebody would come in the evening, pick up the cloth and take it home and sew it at home and then bring it back. And they were not considered eligible to be members of the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture. And then later on they had the Chambre Syndicale du Prêt- à-Porter, Federaciòn du Prêt-à-Porter, who were the houses that made the ready-to- wear.

And what sort of, what sort of...you mentioned...

Percy Savage Page 89 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7)

The same thing, the same thing happens today, you get Christian Dior with Galliano as a designer there, I mean, that’s one of the leading, leading houses. The same with Givenchy, is a leading, leading house. Ungaro is a leading house. And there are a few other houses that, you know... Only recently has Jean-Paul Gaultier been admitted as a, as a couture member, because he was too snobbish, he didn’t want to be. (laughs)

And, is that, is that because he’s joined Hermès, or...or before?

He’s only just started with Hermès. No he had, he had his own business for, oh I would say at least twenty years, and although he was a good designer, and although the magazines used to like him, and publish his work, the Chambre Syndicale did not want to admit him. Because he didn’t sort of fit the, he didn’t have the couture house that they wanted him to have. And now, now he has, and...

So what has changed, why, why...

Oh I think they’re getting a bit desperate, I think they need more. (laughs) They’re getting fewer and fewer in number, they’re getting a rare species. (laughs) And they’re selling fewer clothes, they’re not selling as many clothes as they used to sell, either in the couture, now, as their ready-to-wear collections that they design, which are sold in vast quantities. You get all the Chanel boutiques in London, it’s all ready- to-wear. And the Chanel house in the rue Cambon in Paris has a few clients who still come along and order made-to-measure, but very few. You get a few from the Middle East who come along and might order fifty dresses, and that keeps them busy, they might...and now they would be down to only about, two or three hundred workers, whereas before they would have over 1,000 workers at Chanel. When I was at Lanvin, Lanvin had 600 employees; I doubt if Lanvin has 200 today. Might only have about 150 today.

What sort of things did you sort of, when you were, when you had your meetings at the Chambre Syndicale, what sort of things would you discuss?

Percy Savage Page 90 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7)

Events to be organised in Paris. We had a, at the Chambre Syndicale we had what we called a sub-committee called the Comité des Fêtes de Paris, and that was to help organise events in Paris which would bring people to Paris and make Paris the centre of world culture and art and, and luxury. One of the things we organised was, I think it was about 1954, when the Queen in London decided not to continue with the tradition of having debutantes at the Buckingham Palace, and all the little debutantes had to wear tiaras and long elbow-length gloves, and be presented at court. So the French decided they would have a debutante ball at Versailles, and I was on the committee to organise that. And we, consequently the American or South American or English or French young girls of seventeen, eighteen years of age would come along and they would buy clothes from Lanvin, so would their mothers, and we continued...all that helped continue the couture business. So we would organise lots of different events, cultural and spectacles and, social events, balls. There was one called the Bal des Petits Lits Blancs, held every year, and then the Red Cross Balls, they were held, and we would show a fashion show at Monte Carlo, and, the profits would all go to different charities. But we tried to organise things in Paris rather than do them at Monte...if there was something happening in Monte Carlo, of course we’d do it, but I mean... Or try and get as many things happening in Paris as possible, with the patronage of the President of the Republic if possible, if he was the right sort of president.

And who, who was the right sort of president?

Well Pompidou was very good, and, Giscard d’Estaing was very good. Monsieur Coty wasn’t bad, but, de Gaulle was not very good and cooperative, no. (laughs) And neither was Madame de Gaulle. (laughs) I don’t know where, if ever, Madame de Gaulle dressed in a fashion house I’m not sure, I never saw her very well dressed at all. She was a nice little old lady. They used to call her Tante Yvonne.

Now when did you discover that you had this sort of flair for organising things?

I think it’s just, I think I always did have that sort of, inquiring sort of, you know, inventive sort of mind. Always I think it was... When I was, when I was a student at the École des Beaux-Arts, I remember I was living, as I said, in the Place de la Percy Savage Page 91 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7)

Contrescarpe, and I was...there I was....I had a friend who was, a Dutch boy who was making marionettes, and we worked together and produced a marionette show, which we put on in the Place de la Contrescarpe, and hired chairs and had chairs around, you know what they call a pissoire, you know, a urinal in the centre of the square, there were four trees, this little urinal, and we were inside with puppets hanging over the outside, doing our puppet show, and the people sitting around. (laughs) No, we always had lots of fun things happening.

And what was, which was the apartment that you wanted to tell me about when, before we started the tape? You said there was a particular apartment that you wanted...

Oh that was, that was the one in the Place de la Contrescarpe, yes. And I started there, I think about 1948 I think I moved into that. Because I had been living outside of Paris, outside of the Porte d’Italie, the Porte d’Italie was the terminus of the tube station, the underground, the Metro. And once I left the Porte d’Italie I had to walk about a mile to get to the little flat that I was renting. And, I was working at the time as a proof-reader on the Daily Mail, and that particular night there was a tube strike, so I couldn’t go home. And, one of the other proof-readers working there was an Englishman, a young English man, and he was staying in this little hotel in the Place de la Contrescarpe, so he asked me to come back and sleep on his floor. And the next morning I met the landlady of the hotel. It was only small, it only had about ten rooms, on three, three or four floors. And she gave me a room from then. So I moved out of the Porte d’Italie and moved into Paris, and that’s where, I stayed there for a couple of years before going to the rue Vaneau, where I shared with the Swiss boy, Dominique Fabre. And then it was after that that I started working at Lanvin, and, so I went from the Rive Gauche, rue Vaneau apartment, used to walk across down to the river, across the Concorde and arrive at Lanvin, where I checked in every morning somewhere about half-past eight, quarter to nine.

And then, when would your day finish?

Oh, normally around, around, half-past five, six o’clock. Normally, except during the collection period, when they were showing the collections and when we used to work Percy Savage Page 92 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7) quite late at night, because photographers would come to pick dresses up to take away to studios and photograph and then bring them back. And sometimes they would bring them back about midnight or sometimes they’d bring them back the next morning at half-past eight. Which was why when I went to the Christian Dior supper party for the Eau Sauvage, that’s why I was working at Lanvin with...packing clothes and getting them out to Vogue or Harper’s or, whichever photographers wanted, or...advertising shots and so on. It was quite, it was a long...it was a... And that work went on for about, two weeks. And then it was all over for the season, all the buyers had left and all the press had left and, then we settled down to only showing once a day instead of twice a day, and we would show just to the clients in the afternoon about three or half-past three, after they’d had lunch. And then we would only show to about 100 or 150 people at a time, whereas before that, we would be packed out with about 300-odd people per day, twice a day.

And was the show for clients sort of, by invitation?

Yes, each of the salesladies would have their little black book full of addresses and they would send out their invitations, and, reserve seats, you know, for the Duchess of Windsor or, this or that, or whichever one was coming, or Maria Callas or, whoever, or, Alice Toklas we had. (laughs) Whoever, they would get... I mean lots of people, personalities, many of whom were not clients but they would want to come and see, they would want to be seen there, and, so on.

And what sort of, apart from the Queen Mother and Princess Margaret, and the Duchess of Windsor, who I suppose you could describe as an English client, who were the sort of...

Clients?

What type of English or British clients came to Lanvin, or Dior?

Well not, not a great many, because they had problems during the Fifties, and even into the Sixties, they had problem with the fact that they couldn’t get their money out of the country. So unless they had a friend in Paris who could give them £500, in Percy Savage Page 93 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7) exchange for £500 over here, in England, then, they would...they might come to Paris but they wouldn’t necessarily be able to buy there. But lots of them did, you know, you get... Well, the industrial people, and business people, various aristocracy. There were a few, a few royals, the Duchess of Kent was a very favourite...Princess Marina, who was Greek, was married to the Duke of Kent, and she was a very very popular visitor and occasionally bought something there. And then Princess Alexandra, her daughter, at Lanvin we did the clothes for her twenty-first birthday, did a wardrobe, I think we did about ten clothes for her. Until then she had dressed in London in ready- to-wear, from a place called Horrocks, which was very...Horrocks was a good ready- to-wear. Or they went to Jaeger or something like that. But...

So there was...

But, it was the same all over the world, just people with money, you know, and those who, film stars or, Hollywood stars, and New York stars.

And I suppose I was interested in, in sort of, finding out whether there was a sort of, a section of, of British upper class society that was interested in fashion and couture.

Oh yes.

And you know, to...

Yes. I mean, many of them did come, you know, they came to Paris and, they couldn’t necessarily afford, as I said, they couldn’t necessarily afford to buy much there, but they loved to see it.

And what did you look for? You mentioned your, your secretaries. What did you actually look for in a good secretary?

Well social contacts, and, a minimum ability to type. (laughs) I did a little bit of typing myself, and my secretaries had to do a little bit of typing, but not a great deal. We did a lot of work basically by telephone, you didn’t, didn’t send out many letters, we just saw people and ring them up and speak to them. But, no, I would say that Percy Savage Page 94 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side A (part 7) social connections was a very important thing. Again, because they were the young girls, and they were, they would know people with, perhaps debutante balls coming up, or whatever, or getting married, and, they were all potential clients.

And did the secretaries have a wardrobe sort of, allowance from Lanvin as well?

Not really, no.

[End of Tape 4 Side A] Percy Savage Page 95 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8)

Tape 4 Side B [part 8]

Could I just go back for a moment, because I feel I haven’t got a good picture of, of what you did at the École du Louvre.

Oh well the École du Louvre was a separate school from the École des Beaux-Arts. The École des Beaux-Arts was on the Left Bank, had its own particular academy buildings, and the École du Louvre took place in the rue de Rivoli on the Right Bank, opposite....it was in the section known as the, Les Arts Decoratifs. And that basically was, Les Arts Decoratifs was furniture and tapestries and wall hangings and silks and, I just studied there and learnt the history of the Gobelin tapestries and other tapestries and how they were... That was, the person in charge of that was a wonderful lady called Madame Hour, h-o-u-r, Madame Hour was the person who was in charge of that. And I did that for, and got a, after a year got a diploma from it that was supposedly quite an achievement. I got my Master of Arts diploma from the École des Beaux-Arts, which was given by the Sorbonne, because, the École des Beaux-Arts is part of the Sorbonne University. And, various people going there. Givenchy was, the designer, he was also at the École des Beaux-Arts when I was there, but he was not in the art department, he was in the architectural department, he learnt architecture before he became a fashion designer.

So did you meet him when you were a student?

Not at the, not at the school, no. I met him shortly after when he started working with Schiaparelli. And, he was with Schiaparelli for a start, and then he opened his own house. And he’s still alive and well. He sold his business to that consortium known as LVHM, Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy etc, who own Givenchy, they own Christian Lacroix, they own lots and lots of different fashion houses. Will you excuse me just a minute please because I just want to go to the loo.

[break in recording]

Why did you decide to go to the École du Louvre in the first place?

Percy Savage Page 96 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8)

Well I knew one or two other people who were going there, and they said it was an interesting class, the main reason. And I’d met Madame Hour, she was a very exciting lady.

In what way?

Well she was also a restorer of fashion, and she worked a lot with the...there was a, on the Left Bank there was a...always call her La Dame à La Licorne, was a tapestry, you may have heard of. It’s over on the boulevard St Michel.

Oh the Musée de Cluny?

The Musée de Cluny, that’s right. And she used to work there restoring, restoring fashions and, and it was she who persuaded me to go there. She thought I should do it. (laughs)

Had you any, any conception then of working in the fashion world?

Then? No, not at all. That was still in 1948, ’49 and ’50. It was only in 1950 that I began to start doing textile designs, and it was only having sold the first few that I was then hired by Lanvin, that was how it all started. I mean once it started, I sort of took it on very enthusiastically, just a very exciting world.

And, what...do you think there was any benefit of having done that course to, to how you...?

Oh I’m sure it was, yes. Just in general knowledge, I mean it was, especially in the fashion business afterwards, to have known the various things I’d learnt from there. No, it was very, very much indeed, oh yes.

And how, how, how was the, how were you taught, what was the teaching method?

Basically lectures, and, lectures and books. And looking at, looking at articles, looking at tapestries, and, looking at machinery that they had there that made the... Percy Savage Page 97 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8)

They had the looms that made tapestry, they were on, as permanent exhibitions in the museum there. It was, it was a definite museum part of the Louvre. Not the paintings. It was on the rue de Rivoli side, whereas most of the paintings are over on the other side, the side that gives on to the Seine, onto the river. [pause] And then there was a, a school called the École de la Chambre Syndicale, where they would train youngsters such as Yves St Laurent, and Karl Lagerfeld, and, I was one of the teachers, I had to go there. Every house was supposed to basically send somebody along as a teacher and lecturer and teach the students something or other. And the main purpose of the École de la Chambre Syndicale was basically to train youngsters how to cut and sew. So that it provided the workforce for the fashion houses, so that when they wanted midinettes as they called them, the little, little seamstresses, they would get girls who had this particular, or boys, who had had this particular course. And I started teaching them the history of art...the history of fashion, through art, and I began to get, I got some slides, photography, and photographed Peter Pan collars, or Van Dyck collars, or, Grecian pleats and some Delphi and, explained the history, how these particular things had come to be introduced into fashion through, through the art world. And it was quite an interesting sort of course. And one of the students I had there came to see me one day and she said, ‘I’d like to hire you for private lessons.’ I was very wary of any students wanting special attention, I said, ‘No no no no,’ I said, ‘you couldn’t possibly afford me.’ And she said, ‘Well, excuse me, but let’s go and have a cup of tea, and I’ll explain the problem.’ So we went to the Hotel Meurice, which was very close to the school, the school was in the rue St Roch near the avenue de l’Opéra. And we went to the Hotel Meurice, and we had a cup of tea, and she explained that she was to be married in about a year’s time, she was to marry the Shah of Persia. He was married to somebody called Princess Soraya, and she wasn’t able to have children, so Mr Mossadeq, who was the Prime Minister of Persia, had arranged for him to marry somebody else, who was this young girl who was one of my students in school. So I spent a lot of time with her, taking her around to the various fashion houses, she wanted to be introduced to the fashion world of Paris, so I took her to Lanvin, and she bought some clothes at Lanvin, and took her to Dior, took her to Revillon and she bought some fur coats. And eventually she chose her wedding dress from Marc Bohan at Dior, he was the designer who replaced Yves St Laurent. And, eventually I went to their wedding in Teheran, and, they stayed friends for quite a few years. Percy Savage Page 98 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8)

And so why did she want private lessons?

Well, she wanted, as I said, she wanted to be, to do things that had nothing whatsoever to do with the school. She didn’t want private lessons in Peter Pan collars, she wanted just to be introduced to the French couture world, and French society, and, and people, you know, and how to... She was, she was quite a young, she was a very young and very attractive young lady, very lovely, very, very desirable.

So why, why were you wary of students asking you for private lessons?

Oh, because there were too many possibilities of getting, having amorous affairs with them. I mean I think they were only too happy to offer their services one way or another. (laughs) I don’t know, I was often, often picked up by people for, you know, [inaudible]. I was a, you know, good-looking young man, I was...(laughs)...I knew that.

And how would you untangle yourself?

Well I was just very careful not to get into any compromising situations with them. No no, I, you know, students, no. (laughs)

Did you enjoy teaching?

[hesitation] Yes, a little; not, not a great deal, not really, not... I, I don’t think that they were very receptive to tell you the truth. I mean there were, too many of the midinettes were literally little seamstresses who had very little education. And, I think the best thing was that they were taught to cut and sew, and they got a job, and you never saw them again. And they were working upstairs at Dior, working upstairs at Balenciaga or somewhere, and they, they had... Some of the, some of the girls working there, I remember, it was curious because some of the girls working there were daughters of the silk producers in Lyon, and in Lyon they actually used to, not only have the silk factories where they produced fabric, they had the farms where they Percy Savage Page 99 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8) had the silkworms, and produced the silk. And every year the, the silk producers used to send envelopes, you know, sort of, full of eggs, silkworm eggs, and the girls would wear them under their black pullovers, and pinned them, you know, to keep the eggs warm until the eggs hatched, and then they would be sent back to Lyon and be fed on mulberry leaves and produced the silk. And those young girls were sent to Paris to learn about couture so that they could eventually get a job in the fashion world in Paris, which was considered more upmarket than working in a silk mill in Lyon. So it was... It was, it was literally a workforce, it was a... Whereas today, you get schools in, there is a school in France where they teach fashion more or less along the lines that they do in England, because the, the schools like St Martin’s College in London, or the Oxford Street one, the London College of Fashion, or Brighton has a very good one, or the best of all, which is the Royal College of Art, they have a far, far greater knowledge of fashion and fashion design. Whereas in Paris they did not teach fashion design. Fashion designers were not...they didn’t come from schools, they were basically young artists, as I said, who did sketches and, and gave that to the seamstress to interpret into a garment. And the schools today in London, schools are still the best in the world I think.

So what... You mentioned getting this wardrobe from Lanvin when you started to work for them.

Yes.

Can you describe or remember any things that they [inaudible]?

Well I had, first of all I got a dozen shirts, I was able to go and choose the shirt fabric, and then have shirts made. And I remember I was rather revolutionary at the time, because, I asked the people who were cutting and making the shirts, one particular shirt was of woven cotton, and there were tiny little sort of square polka dots on it. And if you turned the fabric over, the other side of it had little square polka dots with all the short little hairs the other side. So I asked them to make the shirts using the fabric inside-out. Which shocked them, but afterwards they found that they were selling, actually selling them, other people wanted them. So I had a dozen shirts made, and, a couple of suits made, day suits, and, a white tie and tails, I had six white Percy Savage Page 100 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8) waistcoats and six white shirts, because I had to go out night after night, and sometimes, you know, you have to have them cleaned, and that would take about a week to have any dry-cleaning done. So I had six white waistcoats and six white ties and six white shirts. And, one black coat tails and two pairs of trousers. And that was part of the wardrobe. And then I had a camel-hair coat made, and, various other things. Over the period of about ten years I had a very nice wardrobe that was added to, every year there was another suit or another this or...

And what, what fabric were the two day suits [inaudible]?

Oh they would be mostly in English tweeds, English silks, or, Italian silks and English tweeds. Fine wools, you know, I mean... The English had a very big sale in France of their men’s fabrics.

And what, and what...how, how did you decide you wanted the jacket styled?

Well basically I listened to what the, my tailor would tell me. And as I think I mentioned to you once before, when I had the exhibition in Palermo, I had some suits made in Palermo with padded shoulders, and I came back to Paris and I couldn’t wear them ever. (laughs) They just looked too much like the Mafia. Went back to my Lanvin wardrobe.

And did you have a sense of yourself having a particular style?

No, I looked upon myself as being a very well dressed Frenchman, basically, I mean I did not have clothes made in England, and, I didn’t... We did have an arrangement at Lanvin menswear where we had an arrangement with Savile Row, and they would send some of their young apprentices to Lanvin to learn what we did in France, and we sent some of our young apprentices to London to a place called Poole which was a very big house in Savile Row. Occasionally when I came to London I’d come and see Poole and see what they were doing. And then also we had another arrangement at Lanvin, there was a very nice man called Freddy Cripps, who was the brother of Sir Stafford Cripps, and Sir Stafford Cripps was the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the early Fifties. And his brother Freddy, the Honourable Frederick Cripps, was a very Percy Savage Page 101 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8) gay, when I say gay, I don’t mean, mean he was, gay lover, liver, and was the lover of many, many, many, many of London’s lovely ladies, and he didn’t have very much money. I think they all got a bit tired of keeping him. So they, who were clients at Lanvin, they said to Marie-Blanche de Polignac, who owned Lanvin, they said, ‘Freddy is a very good friend and we think he might be useful for you, perhaps to sell your menswear.’ So, they paid for his expenses when he stayed at the Travellers’ Club in Paris, and the Travellers’ Club was on the Champs-Elysée, and a very grand club for men. And, they made up a couple of suits for him, and he was a very grand looking man, very distinguished, and he was I suppose then about, fifty-five or, maybe sixty, but a very distinguished gentleman. And a member of White’s Club in London, and the Travellers’ Club in Paris. And, when I came to London he invited me to White’s Club for breakfast or dinner or, invited me to other places. And I also, I found out that he, in addition to being a client at Lanvin, he was also working for an English tailoring company called Burton’s, which is still very well known and is part of what they call the Arcadia group, and on the level of Dorothy Perkins and Top Shop and so on. And he had some clothes from Burton’s. And, one of his friends told me that the clothes he had from Lanvin, he’d had the labels taken out and the Burton’s labels put in. (laughing)

Shouldn’t he have done it the other way round.

So the, the arrangement didn’t last very long with Lanvin. (laughs) But he was great fun. But there were quite a, it was quite a considerable clientele from England that went to shop in Paris, not just at Lanvin but at all the other houses, quite a considerable one.

And what was your impressions of Henry Poole when you came over?

Oh, no, Savile Row was very distinguished, very good. Very... Lanvin was much more, much more impressive in Paris, because, it was on six floors in a relatively modern building, I think built about 1930, a beautiful building, beautiful wood, all the, all the furnishings and fittings in Lanvin were very beautiful. And it was a very grand, very luxurious establishment. Whereas Savile Row houses were smaller, and Percy Savage Page 102 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8) they had beautiful fabrics and they made beautiful clothes. Menswear in London or Savile Row was tops, I mean it really was, top of the market everywhere.

And, did you meet any of the, either...I can’t remember...Sam Cundey or, or Angus Cundey at Henry Poole?

I had some... Sorry. I don’t think I ever met [inaudible], no. I didn’t know them at all. I just came over to see what they were doing, and see the people I knew working there, and... And I never had any clothes made in Savile Row. After that when I came to London I was dressing, essentially in, because I was working for Yves St Laurent, I was essentially wearing the Yves St Laurent, Rive Gauche menswear. And I wore that for years and years and years here. And also occasionally I bought, I think I bought some Christian Dior menswear which was made in London by Chester Barrie, who, a good men’s tailoring business, and that used to sell at Harrods or places like that, and I used to get it from the trade, direct from Chester Barrie, I used to buy Christian Dior clothes occasionally. But essentially I wore the Yves St Laurent clothes. Because working for them, and also knowing the, the owner, Lady Rendlesham, who ran the shops here, and either helped to persuade her to take St Laurent on as a, as a client, and get the UK licence, she was very persuasive about, you know, my dressing at St Laurent. (laughs) She didn’t even like me going to Paris, where I went, when I went to Paris, and St Laurent would practically give me the clothes in Paris. And I’d come back and she’d... I’ll do that... [noise in background] You’d better turn that... That’ll go on for a couple.....

[break in recording]

.....very well, and you...not Yves so much, I mean it wasn’t Yves who gave it to me, it was the people who were manufacturing the, the ready-to-wear, who were called Mendez, m-e-n-d-e-z. And, there was a man called Mendès France, who was the Prime Minister of France at one stage, and this was the family, and, the man who was running this particular organisation, Mendez, he was the one who I had...he was, you know, very thankful that I got him this contract for London. And when I went back to Paris I used to go and see him, and, they had their collection there, and I, you know, they practically, as I said, practically gave it to me. What I would be paying £500 for Percy Savage Page 103 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8) in London I could buy for £50 in Paris. So, and was... I’d buy something there and come back and Clare Rendlesham would see it and be furious that I’d spent money elsewhere, you know.

But would she give you the sort of same, same kind of discount?

Oh no way, no way, no way, no way, no way, no way. No, she would give me a little bit of a discount, you know, maybe ten per cent or something off, but I mean, after she had paid her price in Paris, brought it to London, and paid duty on it, put her profit on it, it came from, you know, as I said, £50 or £100 up to, up to £500. But they were beautiful clothes, I mean the clothes they made for both men and women were very beautiful clothes, it was a very nice sort of, arrangement to have that sort of wardrobe here in England.

And how...as a sort of, as a consumer, as a wearer of the clothes, how did, how did the, the suits you had made at Lanvin compare with, with the St Laurent?

Oh the Lanvin were far superior. I mean the Lanvin was made-to-measure in the best possible fabrics, and it was beautifully, beautifully made. Beautifully made. And very beautiful fabrics. So, that was far superior. No, they were best clothes I ever had.

And have you still got any of them?

None whatsoever, none. I have a, a couple of drawings of them next door, by one of the fashion artists that, when we’re finished I can show you if you like, but the...there’s one of my camel-hair coat with a little fur hat that I had, which is one that actually appeared in French Vogue, it was done for, and then once it was...I framed it. And then I’ve got another one that was, again one of the shirts that I had from Lanvin. And... But they’re the only two traces I have of what the wardrobe looked like. I do have one or two photographs, they’ll be somewhere around the house, wearing the clothes, but, I don’t know where they are now.

Percy Savage Page 104 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8)

And, what do you do with your old clothes? I mean are you somebody who sort of, keeps them and, you know, what...what...?

There is an Oxfam shop in Camden High Street that I give clothes to occasionally. But... Or just throw them away, I mean I...now.

But you haven’t collected them as it were, you know, collect them as...?

I haven’t got, I haven’t got the space. Oh I’ve got some that I’ve had for twenty years, I’ve got some very, very beautiful clothes. But the, the last lot of clothes I’ve had made I had, this year, when I came, when I went to India I had a jacket made in India, in a bright orange, I think it’s one of the ones over there, I’m not sure, in beautiful Assam silk, and they cost a fraction in India of what they cost here. I mean I had three shirts made there for £2.50 each, whereas here they... And I gave them a shirt from Oswald Boeteng, who is in Savile Row, and that cost £120 in London, where I had the same thing made in, £2.50 made in India, in just as beautiful fabrics.

And copied exactly?

Copied beautifully, yes. Very beautifully.

Without taking it apart?

Don’t think they took it apart, no. No no.

We’ve probably got sort of five minutes left.

Mm.

And one of the things I, I was wondering about was what the salons were actually like, you know, what happened.

The salon?

Percy Savage Page 105 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8)

Yes, the Comtesse de Polignac...

You mean the, literary salon?

...and literary salons.

They would have musical soirées, and somebody would perhaps play the piano and somebody might sing. They would just drink champagne, and, depending... Marie- Laure de Noailles, who was the Vicomtesse de Noailles, she would sometimes have jazz musicians in, or, she would have people like Christian Dior coming, and she’d have jazz musicians, or she’d have American composers, or singers. I mean they were always on a, a high cultural, literary standard, and, often followed by banquets, and, so on. Marie-Louise Bousquet was the meanest of them all, she never had any, she gave sort of, tinned orange juice and Cinzano. (laughs) Whereas the others were all on champagne or, brandy. They didn’t drink whiskey much in those days, in the early Fifties, they didn’t have whiskey in Paris, they had what they called fine al’eau, a fine was brandy, and brandy and soda. Which I had occasionally. And then eventually they started introducing the American whiskey, the bourbon, was introduced by the bourbon family, they were persuaded to sort of become agents for American whiskey, so we began to drink American whiskey in Paris. And then eventually, I would say about the mid, late Fifties, scotch was introduced, and that took over.

And what time would the evenings begin and when would they end?

Around six... Well depends on what time of day, but around 6.30, 6.30 or seven. And they’d go on until about nine o’clock, and then people would go off and have supper or go to the theatre. You know, the theatre would start around half-past eight or nine o’clock, I think about nine o’clock they started. So people would come and have drinks and then go on to the theatre or they’d come and go on to dinner, or...

And typically how many people would there be?

Percy Savage Page 106 C1046/09 Tape 4 Side B (part 8)

Around, well, I would say, sort of, at Marie-Blanche de Polignac, there would always be at least fifty or sixty people. Marie-Louise Bousquet, there might be anything from ten to twenty, thirty people. Her apartment wasn’t as big, and it wasn’t as luxurious. And there was much more, much more intellectual with the académiciens there. And then Marie-Laure de Noailles, her...it was a palatial place, it was, she would have anything from fifty up to a couple of hundred people. And then sometimes she would serve suppers there, and, you know, served up...they’d bring in large plates of something or other, and we’d all...lobsters and champagne.

And, and people would just know it was on, or would you, would you actually be invited?

More or less, well, I mean I was sort of, just accepted, because they knew me very well, I could go when... I knew it was every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and if I wanted to, I would go along, and I might take somebody along with me. And introduce somebody, you know, or... Or I’d ring up and say, ‘So-and-so’s coming, may I bring them?’ you know. And that would depend, you know, would... But in principle, I was able to take along anyone, anybody I wished.

And is there anybody that you wouldn’t have taken along?

Oh masses of people I wouldn’t take. (laughs) Oh yes. But I was...at one stage I had my sister living in Paris, she had trained to be a doctor in Australia and for some strange reason she had, I think had an unfortunate love affair, and she had lost her voice, and she was no longer able to practise medicine. And the family decided it would be a good idea if she came to Europe, and studied over, studied...she was going to study physiotherapy in London, but come to Paris first. So, we arranged that she would come and stay in Paris. I was going to meet her in Marseille, but I decided to jump the gun, and, I went to Naples where the ship was docking before. And I booked myself a passage from Naples to Marseille, and met her on the boat. I arrived in the morning when the ship had docked.

[End of Tape 4 Side B] Percy Savage Page 107 C1046/09 Tape 5 Side A (part 9)

Tape 5 Side A [part 9]

Yes, so, in order to meet up with my sister I decided I would book a passage on the same ship, and I went to, flew from Paris to Marseille – rather, Paris to Naples, and found that, when I went there in the morning found that she and all the rest of the passengers had gone off by coach to visit Rome, and she would be back that evening. So, I waited all day long, and eventually we met up on board ship, and, great, her great surprise, she... And then we sailed to Marseille, where she unloaded her, her cabin trunks. And we stayed in Marseille for a few days, met some friends whom I, from Paris who were down there, a girlfriend who had a car, and she drove us back to Paris, and my sister was staying at some university girls’ place n Paris. And, and I decided she was totally totally totally unpresentable in the way she was, and I gave her an appointment the next morning at a hairdresser, opposite Lanvin, and, had her hair done. Then took her next door to the hairdresser and bought her a pair of shoes, instead of her flip-flops that she had on board ship. And then whipped her across the road with her hair all done and her nice new shoes, upstairs into the second floor fitting rooms, where they had, in cupboards they had a lot of dresses on sale from previous collections. And we went through the sales, and she was trying on the frocks and looking at them, and deciding this and that. And suddenly, the designer, Castillo, walked through, and saw her twirling in her skirt, and, and said, ‘Right, she’ll do.’ And, I hadn’t realised it, but he had called model girls in that day to work as replacements after the August holidays, every girl had a month’s holiday, and he thought that my sister was being, presenting herself as a potential model. So she got herself hired on the spot as a model. And she was quite shocked, because to her the idea of being a model in Paris meant more or less disrobing and posing naked in art school. So she didn’t want any... So I explained it wasn’t that at all, but she was very lucky because she not only had a place to stay in Paris, she had a job, where she was going to earn money. So she was a model there for a year, she stayed with me in Paris, she stayed in Paris for a year, she got her voice back. And she was very beautiful, and I had some lovely lovely lovely photographs done of her. And she got a nice wardrobe out of it. And then she came, eventually came to London and she got, studied here, and then she went back to Australia and got married and had children.

Percy Savage Page 108 C1046/09 Tape 5 Side A (part 9)

So, models were well paid then?

No, they weren’t well paid, not by any... They were...they were paid, well, sort of, reasonable sort of salaries, but they worked all day long basically, they came along at around ten o’clock in the morning and they work until six o’clock at night. They had probably one show to do per day, most of the time, sometimes during the collections they did two shows a day. But... No, they weren’t terribly well paid. I mean model girls today, who do run catwalk shows are paid a fortune compared to what they were paid in the Fifties. No no no, their salaries have gone up all over the world. But...

And... Sorry.

...then model girls today also earn a great deal of money by doing photography. Whereas in Paris in those days they didn’t have the same model agencies and girls, they just, they had nice girls who were reasonably photogenic, but I mean it wasn’t the same as today.

And this was Bettina?

That’s my sister Bettina, yes, mm.

And how long was it since you had seen her?

Oh, it was a good...that was in about 1955, that was about, I hadn’t seen her for about ten years. But she was always a very pretty little girl, she was a very sweet and pretty little girl, and very slim and very elegant and, had a good figure and a good voice, and, very nice. She was my great favourite little sister, mm.

And, how did you sort of, keep in touch with your family?

Oh I wrote regularly. And, my mother used to write fairly regularly. Occasionally I got a, a card or something from my father. And once when I was in Paris he came over, I think it was about 1952, he came over for a conference in London, Empire paid preferences for the farming industry, and I came over from Paris to London and Percy Savage Page 109 C1046/09 Tape 5 Side A (part 9) stayed. He was staying at the, what is called the In and Out Club on Piccadilly, which was an Army and Navy officers’ club. So I came over and I stayed in a little hotel nearby, and saw him for about a week in London. And then he went back to Australia and I went back to Paris, and, he didn’t come to Paris. And then I wanted my mother to come and stay with me in Paris, but she didn’t want to leave him in Australia. So she never came. But my sister came, regularly, she still comes regularly, she comes every couple of years now.

So what about your other sister?

Oh well the other one married, and had six children, she married a cattle rancher, living in the centre of Queensland. And she had six children, and has just celebrated their golden wedding, so they’re...

But did she come over and visit you?

No, no. They, they used to go, occasionally they used to go to America, to California, they had a sort of cousin who was living in California, but my other sister, Mary, never came here. Sadly, I mean... But Bettina has always been, you know, every time she comes, she stays with me and then, we usually go to Scotland, and sometimes go to France. She comes and stays for, you know, one or two months.

And, would you like your father to have come to Paris, to sort of see your world?

Oh absolutely, but he, he was...I mean he had been here, he’d been in Europe during the 1914-18/19 war, he went back in 1919, and, but he never, he never came to see me, no. No I would have liked him to have seen Paris, because I loved Paris, I was very proud of Paris. And very, you know, wanted the world to see it. Especially as it was so much better than London in those days, there was...London was very poor by comparison, very miserable.

Do you think he would have liked Paris?

Percy Savage Page 110 C1046/09 Tape 5 Side A (part 9)

I’m sure he would have enjoyed... I’m sure he would have enjoyed Paris. I think if he had been in France, I think he would probably have preferred to have gone to the country and see how the farmers were. He was very very interested in land and farming and farmers, and, all, all aspects of farming, whether it was cattle farming or fruit farming, and... Mind you, it’s vastly different in Europe from Australia where it’s all tropical farming and, tropical fruits, whereas over here it’s apples and pears and, and small crops and so on. But I’m sure he would have loved to have seen the country in France. And the grapes too, also, I mean a wonderful industry of grapes in France.

And do you think he would have understood your world?

I doubt it. (laughs) I think he might have understood the Lanvin menswear department, because we dressed, made uniforms for many of the generals and colonels, and I think that he as a, as a military man, might have appreciated perhaps the fine, beautiful uniforms they made. But, I doubt whether he would have understood the fashion world. I don’t think he ever saw anybody wearing clothes like that in Australia, it was very exceptionally rare for people in Australia to wear, constantly wear couture clothes. I mean they...we did have a few, I can, I think I can remember when I was at Lanvin we had about twenty women from Australia who would come over regularly and buy, you know, one or two suits and... There was one woman especially used to come, she had a shop in, in Sydney, and she used to come and she used to buy ready-to-wear in France, or ready-to-wear in England, and take it back to Australia, and she had a very expensive boutique in Australia. But, she didn’t buy couture, she would be buying ready-to-wear.

From Lanvin?

She bought from Lanvin. She bought from various other people. And she would also buy, she would go to the couture houses and she would very often buy the end-of-line, end-of-season clothes, and she would buy the couture clothes, made on the model girls, all size tens or smaller, and she would buy those, and take those back to Australia, and have them dry-cleaned, and, she could then, if necessary, alter them a little bit to fit some of her clients. So she did sell second-hand couture clothes if you Percy Savage Page 111 C1046/09 Tape 5 Side A (part 9) like. I mean, not exactly second-hand, but I mean they had been the original clothes, and, the fashion houses were only too happy to get rid of them, you know, they had no room to keep all these extra clothes every year, so they had to keep rid of them. And if they couldn’t sell it to their own private clients, they had to get rid of them to somebody. So she used to buy a few things like that.

And, where was her shop?

Her shop was in Sydney. Double Bay I think it was. Do you know, do you know Australia at all? Double Bay is one of the, very upmarket areas in Sydney.

And, were you ever homesick?

[pause] Not...not really, not homesick for Australia, no, not until I went back, went back in 1974 for my parents’ golden wedding. And I was a little bit homesick, a little bit. But, I much preferred Sydney to Brisbane, and that’s where I went back to my parents, they were in Brisbane. And it was still, in 1974, it was still rather a backward country. It’s not any longer, it’s now a much, much, much more developed and very wealthy city, Brisbane. But Sydney is still far superior and far, far more exciting in every way.

But what was it do you think that you did miss about Australia, was it anything specific, or...or, what?

No, I was never, never a great sportsman. I mean Australia has the finest beaches in the world, and, I suppose you could miss those, but I, I didn’t really miss going swimming in the ocean. When I go back I do it a little bit, you know, it’s nice to go there and just spend the day at the seaside, or, on the ocean beaches is rather fun. And then, I had never been when I was in Australia, I had never been up to, which I think is one of the finest things, is the Great Barrier Reef, I have never been there, never seen that, but that is something I would actually like to see as a tourist. So if I ever have the time and the money, I might go back and spend a couple of weeks up there.

So when did you start smoking? Percy Savage Page 112 C1046/09 Tape 5 Side A (part 9)

Oh I was smoking when I was a child. I say when I was a child, I was smoking I suppose when I was fifteen or something. My father and...both my mother and father used to smoke. And, I used to, I started smoking, buying my own cigarettes and, rather buying my own tobacco; I did buy what they call tailor-made cigarettes occasionally, but it was much more fun to roll my own cigarettes, I used to do that. And then, eventually, when I arrived in France I started smoking the French Gaulloises, and I smoked Gaulloises and Gitanes for years and years and years and years. But in Australia I used to smoke quite expensive cigarettes, one of them was called Sobranie, the Balkan Sobranies, which were black paper with gold tips and very chic and very flash and very, very expensive. (laughs) And then when I came to Europe I found them over here, they were manufactured in England. And I used to smoke those also. But the French black tobacco was very very...I got used to that very quickly, and smoked that for years, and it’s only... I still do smoke it occasionally, but it’s, they’re just so expensive to buy now that I, most of the cigarettes that I smoke are all duty-free cigarettes from, either when I travel or somebody travels and brings them to me. I have a whole list of runners who buy cigarettes for me on planes or at foreign airports. When I was in India just a couple of months ago I came back with 600 cigarettes that cost me only 60p a packet, whereas here in London they cost about £5 a packet. So, that’s what I’m smoking now, my last lot from India.

So, these Dunhill ones you mean?

Mm. I bought 600 Dunhills, six cartons.

And, sorry...

No, twelve, twelve...six cartons, that’s 1200. Not 600, 1200, yes, yes.

I don’t think I understand what the difference is between black tobacco and, and these?

Percy Savage Page 113 C1046/09 Tape 5 Side A (part 9)

Well the gold... This is called gold flake or Virginia tobacco, which is a blond tobacco. And the French cigarettes are cured, the tobacco is cured differently and the tobacco is black, dark. Not golden. The French are now making their blond Gitanes and blond Gaulloises, but they always used to be what they call black tobacco.

When you were working in the, doing the designs in the cupboard under the, in the room under the stairs...

Yes.

Was that quite lonely?

No, because the doorway was open, I was sitting, as I said, there was a little, a little triangular door that opened up, and I was sitting here, and the door would be there, and, there would be people constantly passing in the corridors you know, there was a great deal of activity, people running up and down the stairs taking clothes up and taking clothes down, taking clothes down to the... If a client came in, they would call, the saleslady would call up and ask the premier d’atelier to come down and bring down the coat or the dress or, blouse, and she would...there might be three or four pieces being made in one or two different studios, so the chef d’atelier, or the head seamstress, would come down with them and do the fittings, and get the hemlines right, and make sure that the waistline was not too big and so on. So there was constant...no, there were constant, people constantly walking by. And then at lunchtime I would go out with them and go round the corner to a little café and have a, an omelette or a sandwich or something for lunch. And then later on when I got my own office downstairs I would again go around and have lunch with the workers if necessary, or I would go to Maxim’s and take a journalist to lunch, and... I had a big expense account, quite a big, generous expense account, so, there wasn’t one restaurant that was, you know, didn’t know me in Paris. And we would also organise, through the Chambre Sydicale we would organise, in order to promote fashion we would organise luncheons where it was obligatory for the women to wear hats, so, there would be half a dozen restaurants where we would go just to encourage the ladies who came along, and, and go along to the top restaurants, all the ladies wearing hats. That helped the industry. Percy Savage Page 114 C1046/09 Tape 5 Side A (part 9)

Yes, because, can you remember meeting Freddy Fox?

I remember Freddy came to see me when I was at Lanvin, when I had the press office, and he came in to see me, and, just, you know, said he was on his way to London. He had a job offered to him by some, I think he was a German hat designer here in London, and he had been selling hats in Sydney where Freddy had been working, and Freddy decided he wanted to come and work over here, and he decided that he would, you know, like to work in Paris on the way. But I persuaded him it’s not the easiest thing in the world to do, that. (laughs) But, I think I took him to lunch, and, saw him a couple of times in Paris, and eventually continued to see him over here. But he’s a lovely person, I’m very fond of him. And I have I think still got half a dozen of his hats in the back there.

What hats, men’s hats?

Most of the hats I have now, the ones over there, they’re all from a man called Philip Treacy, you’ve heard of him? He’s the hat man in London today for women. And he’s now making men’s hats.

Yes, because I didn’t realise he was making men’s hats.

Mm. Mind you, they do cost, each...I have three of them over there, and they each cost £250.

Would you...

Two straws and one felt. They are very beautiful quality.

And what is it about his hats do you think that, that...?

Well his women’s hats are quite extraordinary, I mean they’ll be lots of them at Ascot next week, and, Royal Ascot always, you see lots of his hats there. And he’s just...they’re more daring, they’re more outrageous. And he does have a, a friend who Percy Savage Page 115 C1046/09 Tape 5 Side A (part 9) wears his hats constantly called Isabella Blow, you may have heard of her. She writes for fashion for the Sunday Times, and she writes for fashion for Vogue, and she owns the house that Philip Treacy works from, and she owns a couple of other properties in Elizabeth Street, and, she’s a very wealthy lady and dresses outrageously in clothes from John Galliano, or Alexander McQueen and so on. And she wears Philip Treacy hats. But Freddy has also had a very very very very good clientele. The other day at the D-Day celebrations, I don’t know whether you listened to it or not, but they were talking about the Queen being there, and she was wearing pale lavender, and a hat by Philip Somerville, who is another very good hatter in London. He’s in Chiltern Street. And again is another Australian.

Oh I didn’t know that.

A very nice chap. Mm.

So why do you think there is...well, I don’t know whether it’s a lot of, Australians, two is...(laughs)...is more than a coincidence.

No there’s a lot... There’s a great deal of talent has come out of Australia in the fashion, in the fashion world, young fashion designers, women, men, that have travelled all over the world and are working. A few of them are working in London. But, there’s a great deal of talent that’s come out of Australia, since I left, you know. Not much came out of Australia before I left, but I mean, I started a trend, I was one of the first few to get away from there, and, I was about the only one in France, there were very very very very few Australians in France of any sort whatsoever, apart from one or two business people, I mean the embassy crowd and the, a few business people, but there were no other painters there, there were no other couturiers in any way there, not from Australia. It was extremely difficult to get working permits in France, and I had... Fortunately the, the job that I got as a proof-reader made it possible for me to get, first of all a work permit, and then secondly from getting a work permit I got the carte de séjour, which was first of all the carte de séjour ordinaire, and then the carte de séjour privilégié. Ordinaire meant I could only live in Paris, but the privilégié, the carte privilégié meant that I could live anywhere in France. Percy Savage Page 116 C1046/09 Tape 5 Side A (part 9)

And how long did that take to get?

Oh that took about three years I think. The first year was a card for one year, and the second one was a card for, I think for another one year, and, so it sort of went, the work permit was one thing and the residential permit was another thing. But it was, it was not easy to get that for a, for any foreigner. I mean the English had a great deal of trouble doing it also. Americans had trouble. You know, it was just not easy for any foreigner.

So was that why you said it would be difficult for Freddy?

For Freddy? Exactly, yes it would be very difficult for him to get a job in, and justifying, you know, his, his work there. And it was not...in those days it was not at all difficult for Australians to come and work in London. Whereas today, it is very difficult for Australians to come and work in London. They have to either have one English parent, to justify it.

[end of session]

[End of Tape 5 Side A] [Side B is blank] Percy Savage Page 117 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10)

Tape 6 Side A [part 10]

.....your...

Name.

Your name and where we are.

Yes. Yes, right.

OK.

Are you all right?

Mhm.

Right. My name is Percy Savage, and we’re in my flat in Camden Town in London.

Why did you leave Lanvin for Nina Ricci?

Well I’d been working for nearly ten years at Lanvin, very successful in my work, and had a reasonable salary, but, basically the Countess of Polignac, who had owned Lanvin, had died, and the house was taken over by her, the wife of Yves Lanvin, who was her cousin, and Madame Lanvin was not nearly as nice a person as the Comtesse de Polignac, and I didn’t particularly like her. And then, the house of Nina Ricci had, whom I’d known for almost ten years, offered me the same sort of work at Ricci, and doubled the salary. So it was just a very sensible move.

And how did they approach you?

Well I was on the committee of the Chambre Syndicale, as a director of the house of Lanvin, and the president of the Chambre Syndicale was Robert Ricci, the son of Nina Ricci, and we knew each other very well, and saw each other constantly at different meetings and different parties and fashion shows, and, we’d known each other for Percy Savage Page 118 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10) quite some time and worked together on many projects for the couture in general. And he just asked me to come and, come along and meet his mother one day. So, and then, offered me the job.

And what was she like?

Oh well his mother had retired. She was a nice little lady of Italian origin, and had been quite a successful couturier in Paris from the mid-Thirties, and then retired, and they had taken on a designer called Francois Crahay, who was the house designer. And then when I did eventually move and work at Ricci, after another year he left and he went to work as the designer at Lanvin, where I had been working. Because the designer there had been a Spaniard called Antonio Canovas del Castillo, and he left to start his own house, so Lanvin were looking for a designer.

And what was Robert Ricci like?

He was a very elegant, slim, dark man, dark-haired, very attractive, married with three children, and very much a lady’s man, and, knew how to charm clients, and, various friends. No he was a lovely man.

And, why was he able to offer you double the salary?

Well he was the president of the house of Ricci, I mean he was the one who used the purse strings. And, I was effectively, not very well paid, according to standards of my age group in Paris, but in the fashion world, not many people did get good salaries. The salesladies were the ones who earned the most money, because they were working on a commission with their clients, so if they had a good client who bought a lot of clothes, they were the ones who basically did very well. But the various administrative people, no, they didn’t get a great deal. But as I said, I didn’t have a very big salary, but I had a very big expense account, which was very helpful. And also at the same time I had a, I had a wardrobe allowance from Lanvin, because Lanvin had one house one side of the road which was for women and another house the other side of the road for men, and I got lots of my clothes from Lanvin. And that continued when I left; Nina Ricci wanted me exclusively for womenswear, but they Percy Savage Page 119 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10) didn’t have a men’s department, and Lanvin did say they’d like to continue, me to work for the Lanvin menswear, but only on a, a swap basis, that’s to say, they didn’t pay me any money but they continued to supply me with any clothes I needed, suits and overcoats and shirts and so on. Which was still a considerable economy for me.

And what other benefits did Ricci offer you?

Well I still had a very good expense account, and, there was no such thing as a company car, at least, I didn’t have a... I did have my own, I had a car for quite a few years in Paris, and I had a scooter also, so I didn’t... But they did not give company cars so far as I know. But there weren’t many other benefits in the fashion business.

And, how did you feel working for Ricci in comparison to how you had felt, you know, about your job at...?

Ricci was a, Ricci was a nice, a good house with a good name. At the time they were in the rue des Capucines, which was over near the rue de la Paix, just behind the Ritz, not very far from Chanel. But the street they were in, the rue des Capucines, was not as grand a street as was the Faubourg St Honoré where Lanvin was. It was not the most chic part of Paris. They did not have a ground floor entrance, they were up on the third, fourth and fifth floors, the third floor was the showroom and the other floors above were the workrooms. So it was not as grand a fashion house in appearance as other houses were, such as Christian Dior or Balenciaga or Givenchy or Lanvin or Cardin. And eventually they did move from the rue des Capucines, and they moved to the avenue Montaigne which was just opposite Christian Dior, so they then became a much grander house. And eventually the house of Nina Ricci was sold and bought by a Swiss...not a Swiss, I’m sorry, Spanish company, called Putsch. And then they closed the house down, and, after a few years they reopened it but did not do couture any more, they just did ready-to-wear. But they bought it principally because it was a highly successful perfume company. All the Nina Ricci perfumes were very very very very good, popular sellers.

And were you with them when they moved to the rue Montaigne?

Percy Savage Page 120 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10)

No, I’d, I’d left before. They didn’t move there until the mid-Seventies, when I was already, I’d left Paris and was coming, and living in London.

Why do you think Robert understood the value of, of PR?

Well I think he was, he was able to see... Everybody in fashion, in the fashion houses had a press secretary as it were. In most houses it was a woman, a girl, who did it. In a few houses, such as Lanvin, it was...I was working there as a man, in Christian Dior they had a big department with, the public relations man as I said was Monsieur Monsabré. And, there was a man called Jean Claude Donatie who was a Corsican, he was the press officer. But Nina Ricci only had a press, a little press lady, a little old lady called Jane, Jeanne Chadell. And, she became, basically she became my assistant, I did all the PR and she, she continued to handle most of the press, the French press, and I handled the foreign press.

And, sorry, I’m just sort of thinking about, if Dior had, you know, seemed to have such a sort of solid press department or promote...would it be called, would it be called a department?

Oh the... No...

Or office?

No, a sort of press office, yes.

Yes. Was he quite unusual in having such a...?

Dior, Dior was the big, yes, they had the biggest. Well then Dior had many many more, was a much bigger house internationally, they had their own house in London, in, Conduit Street I think they opened up in, about 1955 they opened up a house in London. Then they had their American operation, and with their own brand label in America. And they had, they started their menswear in 1957, when they started the Eau Sauvage fragrance. And it was a much bigger house internationally, much much much bigger. Percy Savage Page 121 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10)

And do you think the other houses sort of, noted if you like the success of Dior through his sort of, promotional activities?

Oh yes, they tried, obviously they tried to emulate them and to... But then Dior had a very strong commercial sense, and went out, made contracts with people which bound certain people to them for quite years to come. So that when Christian Dior died, there were many contracts they had internationally that they had to respect, and, when Dior died his place was taken by Yves St Laurent, who lasted for three years and then he was released by Dior to do his military service, simply because the American Seventh Avenue manufacturers decided that his designs were too avant-garde to please the matronly clients in America. And when he, whilst he was doing his military service, Dior hired the services of a man called Marc Bohan, who had been doing the designs in London, at Christian Dior, and he came back to Paris and took over the couture. So when eventually Yves St Laurent got out of the army, he then started his own house, and for a long period there were a lot of court actions between St Laurent suing Dior for wrongful dismissal and Dior suing St Laurent for having poached his workers and salesladies. So it went on and on and on. It was quite a fashion saga of war between the two houses. But St Laurent went on to become one of the really great, great designers.

Oh we’ll definitely get on to him obviously.

Yes.

So, what about in terms of your office space at Ricci, what did you have there?

I had quite a nice space. It wasn’t as grand a space as I had at, at Lanvin, but at Lanvin I was up on the third floor, alongside the Comtesse de Polignac, and that was the floor above the fitting rooms, and two floors above the, the presentation room where they showed the collections. Whereas at Ricci, Ricci started on the third floor, and my office was on the third floor, right alongside the showrooms. So I had, to go there I had to go up in the lift, get out, go in, and there was a little entrance with a lady sitting at a table checking everybody. And you would go straight into the showroom, Percy Savage Page 122 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10) and from there I went straight into my office. So I was right alongside the... And there, at Ricci, was up on the fourth floor, they had the design salon where Francois Crahay worked with his model girls. And then again, because my office was also right alongside what they called the cabine des mannequins, because they came out of their cabine and went into show the collection. So it was a totally different set-up, but very nice.

Do you...I mean, it was...you’re describing it as a sort of, more in the thick of it somehow than at Lanvin.

Oh yes, I was more, yes, much more.

And did you enjoy that?

[hesitates] Yes. Yes.

Why are you hesitating? (laughs)

Well I think, in Lanvin I had a big, a bigger room, a bigger office, bigger space, and along, right alongside the Comtesse de Polignac, who was very sweet and lovely lady. And all the other commercial things were going on downstairs. The boutique was on the ground floor. Ricci had no boutique; they had a, they had what they called a boutique collection, but they did not have a ground floor boutique where people could come in off the street and actually go in and wander round and shop and buy, you know, less expensive dresses or perfumes, which is what they had at Lanvin. Most, every fashion, every, nearly every fashion house in Paris was an actual house, from the ground floor up, and Ricci was not.

And...

It did become that.

So your hesitation is more...what is your hesitation about then do you think?

Percy Savage Page 123 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10)

What was...?

When I, when I asked you about whether you felt it was better to be in the thick of things or not, you seemed to hesitate about whether it was or not.

Well, it had certain advantages. Less privacy in a way, because, anybody coming to see me would...I didn’t have the...when they came to see me at Lanvin, I had a big office in which I could receive them, a big desk and, a couple of other chairs for people to sit in. Whereas in, where I was working at Ricci, I was sharing the office with the little press attaché lady, and, it was harder, I would have to leave my office and go out and sit in the, in the salon, if we wanted any sort of privacy, or, you know, rather more, shall we say more comfortable surroundings. But it was a very nice atmosphere, it was just different from what I’d been used to.

And how did the other press lady, Jeanne, how do you think she felt about your being taken on?

Oh I think she was very happy, because she, I mean I was considered to be quite a catch in Paris; the fact that I had left Lanvin to come and work there was a very very big feather in the cap of Nina Ricci, they were all very hap... It was a big move for the fashion world in Paris, that I’d left one house to go to another. And she was most [inaudible], you know, she, she adored me. She was much older than I was, and she, she was very...very motherly to me. (laughs) She was very happy to have me.

In what ways would she mother you?

Oh just being nice and attentive, and, offering to get a cup of tea, or a cup of coffee, or a, an orange juice or... (laughs)

So what was the response from, from the other couture houses, about your move?

Well it was considered, I mean by most people it was considered to be a very advantageous move for me, because they knew I was getting more money, and that it Percy Savage Page 124 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10) was considered to be an advantageous move for Nina Ricci, because they, they had, as it were, you know, taken on one of the big names in, in the fashion world of Paris.

And what about...

And I continued as a director on the board of the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture, with Mr Ricci still being the president, and I was representing Ricci also, so... The board of the Chambre Syndicale was composed of representatives from many of the... At that stage there were about fifty different fashion houses in Paris, and there would have been about a dozen people on the board of the Chambre Syndicale. So to be elected to that, to that, or be asked, invited to be a member of that board, was quite a, quite a coup for the fashion house.

And did Lanvin have somebody on the board after you left?

Lanvin had, yes, the director of Lanvin, whose name was Armand Lyon, became the representative for Lanvin at the Chambre Syndicale. But I’d worked with him for quite a few years and we were old close friends, and, we stayed friends for many years.

So there was no resentment at Lanvin?

No, no, no, and as I said, Lanvin continued to dress me, only too happy to retain the association with me, you know. Oh no, we remained friends for many years.

Could you describe your working day at Ricci, a sort of example of it?

Well, we normally arrived around, quarter to nine, nine o’clock in the morning. When I was working at Lanvin I used to arrive about half-past eight or a quarter to nine. And much the same at Ricci, I think it was about nine o’clock I was supposed to arrive, and would stay there normally until, leaving somewhere around six or seven o’clock at night.

And what would you do on a typical day? Percy Savage Page 125 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10)

Oh mostly, mostly on the phone to people, ringing them up and talking to them, taking some of them out. I switched, when I was at Lanvin I used to go very frequently around the corner, in the rue Royale, I used to go to Maxim’s for lunch, or, on other grander days I’d go across the city, opposite Christian Dior to the Plaza- Athénée Hotel. And sometimes from Lanvin I would go to the Ritz Hotel, which was close to Ricci, so when I was working at Ricci I went to the Ritz Hotel much more often, to the Ritz Hotel, for either drinks or for lunch. They had a wonderful restaurant called the Espadon, which is the French word for swordfish, and there’s a wonderful great big marlin-type fish on the wall. And it was a very very very elegant, much sought-after restaurant where you had to book, you know, had to be somebody to get a table there. And normally you had to book days in advance.

And would you have to do that as well?

Well they did know me, and I knew them in...but I, normally, I usually booked, yes, I mean it was much better to book, in order to make sure you got a table.

And, and who would you take to the Ritz?

Various visiting fashion editors, or, clients, I mean, I remember when I was working at Lanvin I used to meet and often see the lady who became the Duchess of Argyll, and, Margaret Argyll, she was a client at Lanvin and she used to, when she came to Paris she would stay at the Ritz, and we knew each other, and, then she married, and continued to come back to Paris, and I would find, I’d try and get people like Margaret Argyll to switch from Lanvin to Nina Ricci. I’d ask her to come along and see the collection, and eventually try and persuade her to get a cocktail dress or an evening dress from Ricci rather than get one from Lanvin.

So you would actually...

I mean, I would work...

...do that? Percy Savage Page 126 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10)

Oh I would do a lot of, if I could bring in a client, the fashion house was very happy about it.

And, and how, can you remember sort of how you might try and persuade Margaret Duchess of Argyll to, you know, to, to choose a dress from Ricci?

Well, I would sit with her during the collection and tell her who had been buying, and, gossip, you know, little bits of gossip about the various clients, and, little bits of scandal about this one or that one.

(laughs) You can’t...can you...you can’t give me an example I suppose, can you?

(laughs) I’m going to be very indiscreet. (laughs) But one day when I was lunching at the Ritz, I was invited there by John Fairchild, who was the owner of something called Woman’s Wear Daily, the American newspaper devoted to fashion. And it was during the visit of President Kennedy to Paris, and he came along for lunch with Jackie Kennedy. And after lunch I invited her to come back, and she hadn’t booked, but I walked in to Ricci with Lady...with Jackie. And there was a flurry of, try and find a seat, because, had to move various people here and there to make room for me and Jackie Kennedy to sit down, and I sat with her and she looked at the collection. Straight afterwards she ordered a few things. So that was a big feather in my cap also too. I didn’t have to persuade her at all, I just suggested she come and see the collection. And she was well known then to have, her favourite designer in America was Oleg Cassini, and she only just started to buy in Paris when she was there, she bought from Ricci and she bought from Givenchy, they were the only two houses she bought from.

And did...did you take her to Givenchy as well?

Oh no no no no no no no. (laughs) No, that was, that was the work, of Givenchy did that. No no no. (laughs)

And were there, were there any clients that you had to advise as it were? Percy Savage Page 127 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10)

Well, yes, for instance, when I, when we were saying before, I was thinking I would never take a client to another house, but actually I did and that was somebody I was advising. And that’s when I was working at Lanvin, and I was, I would go along once a month to what was called the school of the Chambre Syndicale, where they taught youngsters to cut and sew, and supposedly design. The idea was to supply a workforce, when the young boys or girls left there they got jobs in the fashion houses. And one of the students that I had said to me one day she’d like to, to hire me on a private basis, and I...you know, give her special lessons, and I thought, well I didn’t want any particular relationship with a student at the school. And I told her no, and I said, ‘And in any case, you couldn’t afford it.’ So she said, ‘Well let me...first of all, let’s go and have tea somewhere, and I’ll explain the problem.’ So we went very close to the school, we went to the Hotel Meurice on the rue de Rivoli, just opposite the Tuileries gardens. And she told me that she was from Iran, Persia, and that she was to marry the Shah of Persia, who was already married to somebody called Princess Soraya, but he was divorcing her because she couldn’t have children. So, this young lady, called Farah Diba, asked me would I introduce her to all the fashion houses, and show her, teach her about the life in Paris. So there I did actually take her to visit other houses, explaining always in advance who she was and what she was looking for. So we went to Lanvin, and she bought at Lanvin, and we went...that’s where I was working at the time. We took her to Christian Dior, where she eventually ordered her wedding dress. And I took her to Givenchy whom I knew quite well, and he was only too happy to have her, and we... So I took her round to various houses. And eventually when she got married, she sent me air tickets to go to the wedding, which was very nice. But it would be unusual for somebody working in one house to take a client to another house, to go shopping.

But would it...were you advising her on what to buy, and what suited her?

I was... Well, yes, I...just...the idea of being able to become at ease and move comfortably in a fashion house, to walk in and feel at home. Because, she was still only a young girl, and the fashion houses were rather awe-inspiring, you walk into a fashion house and, the atmosphere was always a little bit like going into a, a high- class museum or a church or something like that, there was a silence. And then, till Percy Savage Page 128 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10) you got used to it, and you felt at home there. So after a couple of months of doing that, and taking her from house to house, and, also taking her to various theatre parties and first nights and, the soirées that I told you about, the, Marie-Blanche de Polignac’s party and Marie-Louise Bousquet’s party, and Marie-Laure de Noailles’ party, and introducing her to literary salons and, society circles like that. And art galleries, or theatre openings. It was just basically launching her as a young person in Paris.

But did she know what kind of clothes she should wear?

She was still quite a youngish girl, and she just dressed like a nice young girl. She didn’t really know much about couture, no.

And what was she actually sort of learning at the, at the school?

Well, for her family, they had heard of this school, the fashion school, they just thought it would be nice for her to go along there and learn about fashion, learn dressmaking, and, what young ladies should learn. So she was still rather a student. But a very nice young girl.

And, how did she mix with all the sort of seamstresses and...?

Oh she was just a nice young girl working with a lot of other nice young girls, yes, I mean the seamstresses who were working there were still nice young girls. They went on to have their lives, and she went on to have her life. Very different.

So, just to go back for a moment to the Espadon, and the Ritz.

Yes.

Would...could I just ask you to sort of, be a bit more specific about the type of client that you might take there, and the type that you might not take there but take somewhere else, and where that would be, or would you take all, all clients there?

Percy Savage Page 129 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10)

I wouldn’t...no, I would say that, basically during, for lunches, during the day, I would stay mainly on the Right Bank, mainly around Lanvin and Maxim’s or around Christian Dior and the Plaza-Athénée, or near Nina Ricci and the Ritz. During the evening, there would be a lot of work, a lot of entertaining done on the Left Bank, where I lived, and also which was a totally different sort of atmosphere. Over in Montparnasse, or down in, near St Michel where there were, you know, very lovely and...St-Germain-des-Prés with lovely restaurants, and, and a totally different life from what one would find on the Right Bank.

And...

The Right Bank, occasionally I would go back to Maxim’s at night time, but not very often to the Ritz.

And, but who would you entertain at night?

Well, again visiting, if there were fashion editors in town, or, you know, friends, whoever seemed to be right for the... I remember one night when I was working at Lanvin, and I went for dinner with Picasso, who lived on the Left Bank, we went around the corner to a restaurant called the, Les Iles Porquerolles, yes, aux Iles Porquerolles, which was the name of little islands off the south coast of France, and this was a very famous fish restaurant. We went there with a few friends, and sat down next to a lovely lady, who was Greta Garbo. And they knew each other, and spoke. And then, the next day I went back to Lanvin, I was up in my office on the third floor, and the directrice of the boutique on the ground floor called me on the phone and said, ‘Mr Savage, there’s a lady here to see you, can you come down?’ And I said, ‘No, send her up.’ And she said, ‘I think you had better come down.’ So I went down, and it was Greta Garbo, who came in and asked for me. So, I showed her the boutique, and she bought a raincoat. And again, my stocks went up, the idea of having Greta Garbo come in and ask for you personally was another feather in my cap, it was... So it was great fun. That sort of thing happened occasionally, but, there we did meet on the Left Bank. And, I didn’t actually take her to dinner on the Left Bank, but I mean, not that night; I did take her subsequently. But, the Left Bank had a wonderful life to offer, very different from the Right Bank. Percy Savage Page 130 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side A (part 10)

And how, how would you describe the difference do you think?

The Left Bank had always, traditionally been a much more aristocratic side of Paris, the, what they call the 7th Arrondissement, the Septième, with very big, grand private homes. Whereas on the Right Bank, it was much more commercial, shops and, expensive apartment houses. Whereas the Left Bank was much more traditional and, and very beautiful. And expensive restaurants too. There was a lovely restaurant in St-Germain-des-Prés called the Brasserie Lipp, which was well known for its literary luncheons during the week, and very popular at night after the theatre, and would go on until...it would... Brasserie is the French word for a place which brews beer, so it was a, although they served wine, they also served beer a lot. And, it was just opposite the very famous restaurant called the Café de Flor, which was right next door to another very famous café, restaurant, called the, Les Deux Magots.

[End of Tape 6 Side A] Percy Savage Page 131 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11)

Tape 6 Side B [part 11]

Would you ever have to think about when you were entertaining... Sorry, careful, you’re going to light up the...

Mm.

...the microphone cable. (laughs) Would you ever have to think about and adapt to the, to, say the, the person that you were entertaining?

I think, yes, obviously I think it would, you know, to try and... Depends whether you know them very well or not, to put them at ease, find out about them, I mean, if they were fashion editors or fashion buyers from department stores, you asked them about their work and where they come from. Yes, but after a while, I mean, they become friends. I mean it depends whether you know them very well or whether you’ve only just met them.

And who, who stands out for you in terms of fashion editors, when, you know, when you were in Paris?

Well the most important ones for us at the time were the...among, amongst the visitors, the most important ones were the American Condé Nast, Vogue, and the American Harper’s Bazaar people, they were the, considered in America to be the most important ones. And also Life magazine eventually became a very...and there was a lovely lady working there called Sally Kirkland, who was a marvellous lady and became a very good friend. And the same applied to England, obviously Vogue in London was important, as was Queen magazine in its heyday, when Jocelyn Stevens owned it. And again, Harper’s, in those days was called Harper’s Bazaar but now called Harper’s Queen, and, they were very important also. As were the, one or two fashion editors on newspapers, in those days the Daily Mail was important, the Telegraph was important. The Times was not very important, because the Times had a policy in the early days, in the Fifties, of not mentioning anybody’s name, it would just be, ‘An important fashion house shows short skirts.’

Percy Savage Page 132 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11)

Oh.

So I just ignored the Times totally until they had, took on somebody else called, Prudence Glynn, who understood the American way of life if you like, and the way of pleasing the fashion world was to give people big reports, mention their names in big letters, and if possible illustrate with nice big pictures. And the Times has done that since. In those days the most important paper in London was definitely the Sunday Times, and again...when I say the most important paper, the most important fashion editor was working on the Sunday Times, and that was a lady called Ernestine Carter, who was an American.

So when, when are we talking...are we...which decade are we talking about?

Oh that’s back in the Fifties. Ernestine Carter was...and Prudence Glynn didn’t come on to the Times until the mid-Sixties. And so, during the Fifties the Times was not my favourite paper, by any means, they just didn’t mention people’s names. It was ‘an important fashion house’. Which was, of interest to nobody. (laughs) Might have been of interest to some readers, but it was certainly of no interest to the fashion world. Waste a good seat in a fashion house? Never.

Would you try and persuade them to change their, their policy?

The Times?

Mm.

Oh yes, I did, I took the fashion editor from the Times, I took her out to lunch, and she explained, ‘No no no, we can’t do that, no, that’s not the policy of the paper.’ So I just, you know, dropped her. I would see her occasionally, but, no. She would even come begging for a seat on the first day, and I would give her one but not even give her a front row seat, she’d be a second row seat, behind other people. And it was rather a joke, because in, in England, the Times was considered to be a very important paper, but the fact that, because of their policy on not mentioning names, we, we all had this. And I would speak out openly about it at the meetings of the Chambre Percy Savage Page 133 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11)

Syndicale, and I’d say, ‘I don’t think this is right.’ You know, if we’re inviting press people, it’s because they are the press, there’s only one reason we want them, is because they are press, and if they’re not doing the job we want them, we don’t want them. Just out.

And did she explain...

And I had that same problem with many, many people, some of whom I found to be quite nice people, but because they had, you know, they, their policies about the papers. And they all desperately wanted to be there on the first day, at the first show, and all desperately wanted to sit in the front row. So it was quite a problem.

And how much...how would you prepare the sort of seating at shows, at Ricci?

Well, at... At Lanvin, we had a series, on the first floor we had a series of four rooms that went from the front on the street, back, back, back, back to where the cabine de mannequins was, and in all we could get in, with two, double-row seating, we could get in about 400 people. In other houses they didn’t always have as... Nina Ricci didn’t have nearly as much space as that, so it was more of a problem seating people on the first day at Ricci than it was at Lanvin. But even so, seating people at Lanvin was a problem, and we used to show twice a day, because not only were there press people to accommodate, but there were all the many, many, many, many, many private clients who wanted to come to the fashion show, and all the salesladies who wanted their clients to come along. And there were also all the various buyers from the different countries, all the various, Seventh Avenue manufacturers, all the buyers from the trade in London, all the buyers from Germany and Italy, and different other countries, all of whom came to Paris to either buy an original garment or to buy a toile, which was the garment copied in calico, or to buy a paper pattern or two. And they were all clients, all bringing in money, so we had to fight amongst ourselves to find who has got priority and who we go for.

And, but who would you be fighting with? Surely, I mean...

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Well, I would say I want as many press people as possible, and those that I want, and then I have to fight with the salesladies and the...they wanted to get in their private clients, whom we didn’t consider to be of any importance whatsoever, because the salesladies, I mean they just, the private clients could easily wait three or four days before they came along. So the buyers were the most important, and the press were the most important. But we always, we always came to some sort of agreement.

And, and who were the English buyers who were coming over then?

They were houses... Well, the department stores, like Harrods, Liberty’s, Fortnum & Mason’s, Selfridges. And then of course there were the manufacturers, people like Susan Small, who were big manufacturers of coats and suits of a very high quality. And they would always come and, always order, they would, they would always have to sign a paper before they came in, which was an engagement, an engagement, which meant that they promised to buy something up to a certain value. And, so far as the Susan Small people were concerned, the wife of the owner, she always bought clothes for herself. But they always had a little assistant designer who came along and sat in the second row, would copiously make notes, and then as soon as the collection was over she’d go outside and sit in a café and do sketches, sketches, sketches, sketches of everything she’d seen. So, although they’d spent perhaps, signed to spend £5,000, for which the Susan Small lady would get one suit, they basically ripped off and copied many many many other things. And they did that in every fashion house they went to. But they didn’t necessarily go to every fashion house; they would go perhaps to only, they might go to Balmain, Dior, Lanvin, Nina Ricci, and then after that they just didn’t bother going to the other houses, they didn’t need to. They’d got enough.

And how important would, would a client like Susan Small be to...?

Oh they were an important client, they, they were a very good quality house. And, they would sell, basically Susan Small would sell their clothes to Harrods. So they would sell what they call line-for-line copies, not necessarily in the same material, but they would not be allowed to use the name of the designer in a label, but they could use the name of the designer in any advertising they did. So they would take quarter- Percy Savage Page 135 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11) page ads in newspapers or full-page ads in Vogue and say, ‘Susan Small at Harrods, designed by Lanvin’ or Nina Ricci or so on.

So they were sort of, doing what...a sort of version of what we would now call a diffusion range?

That’s, that’s right, yes. The diffusion ranges today are usually ‘Designed by...’ the fashion house. So Lanvin does its own diffusion, Dior does its own diffusion, and they would be...well not necessarily the same, they would be adaptations of, but sometimes... In Paris they would rarely do the same diffusion in the cheap range as they did in the couture; they would do a slightly different adaptation of it.

And, how, how...how important would the department store, the English department stores be to...?

Well there were a few that were important. Harrods was considered to be very good. Fortnum & Mason’s, very very good. Liberty’s very good. And Selfridges, very bad.

Oh, why?

Well, that was forty years ago, and Selfridges then was a very downmarket... I mean they were very big, but considered to be very downmarket in its quality. It was a big business, but not the standard that it is today.

So would you...where would you have seated somebody from Selfridges?

[pause] Well we might have, not necessarily invited them on the first day; they might be invited on the second day, the second showing. And they wouldn’t necessarily get in on the day, first day with all the cream. And from America you would get department stores like Sachs Fifth Avenue, and Bergdorf Goodman, who were very good ones. But then you would also get others who were not very good, because of their quality, so we would invite them on the second day too. Unless they, you know, literally on their knees begging to get in, in which case we made them sign for a large amount of money, and they had to then pay a large amount of money. Percy Savage Page 136 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11)

And...

And the Americans paid more than the Europeans.

In terms of quantity?

Well, yes, they would pay, they would pay more for a line-for-line copy, suit or coat, they would pay more than the English would pay, or the Germans would pay.

Why was that?

Because they were a far, they had a far bigger consumption, a far bigger production. We knew they would churn out thousands of copies, whereas in London they might only turn out hundreds of copies.

I don’t think I understand the phrase line-for-line copy.

Well, a line-for-line copy means that they take, they take a garment, and although they don’t exactly use the same fabric, they would produce that garment impeccably in the same, in the same line. Whereas they could, if they wished, they could alter it, but they would never be allowed to use the name. I mean they could say that we want a slightly higher waist, or a lower waist, or shorter sleeves, or, deeper arms, bits, or a V-neck instead of a round neck. Because they very often did that, they would...I mean they might not want to have a V-neck so they would do round necks.

But then they couldn’t use the...

They couldn’t use the name. And up to a certain point we were able to check on things like that, and police things like that and so on; if we ever saw discrepancies we didn’t like then we’d, you know, discuss it with them, and sometimes they would have to pay a fine. We would take them to court.

And how, how easy or difficult was that? Percy Savage Page 137 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11)

[pause] Well word would get back to the house that perhaps one unhappy manufacturer who had bought a lot from Lanvin would see that somebody else had done something and used the name of Lanvin when they weren’t allowed to, so they would eventually complain to us, and we would then eventually speak to them, or sue the other house. That happened, fairly regularly. Not just between England and France, but it happened a great deal with the Italians. The Germans were very respectful, but the Italians were not. The Americans were reasonably good, and they paid a lot of money so we let them get away with a bit of murder sometimes. America was the biggest source of money for the, what they call Seventh Avenue manufacturers, the biggest source. On Seventh Avenue you just got building after building after building full of literally hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of manufacturers.

And, would you have to entertain them?

Well, pick and choose the best, yes, the nice ones. Because many of them were not very nice. I mean, the best meaning they were at least reasonably well educated, they bought well, they paid well, and, I mean the store presidents, well Sachs, people like Sachs Fifth Avenue were very highly desirable clients; people like Bergdorf Goodman, very highly desirable. Bloomingdales, not so good, because they were more downmarket. And then a lot of the Seventh Avenue manufacturers were not desirable at all, wouldn’t be seen dead with them. (laughs)

And would they still try to, to get in?

Oh yes, they got in, they would get in, because they signed an agreement and they paid and they came in, and consequently, you know, they... They all, in those days they all had offices in Paris, buying offices they were called, so when they came to Paris they would go to the buying office where somebody would represent them and that person would ring up and say, ‘I’ve got four people from Bloomingdales, I’ve got two people from Sachs Fifth Avenue, and five different manufacturers,’ and so on, ‘can I have seats for them, two seats each? And, whoever, the saleslady or director or whatever it was, they would allocate the seats. Trying to take care that they wouldn’t Percy Savage Page 138 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11) necessarily put them in the same room or next to each other. So you would put people from Bergdorf Goodman alongside people from Harrods, because they were more or less on the same level. But you wouldn’t put people from Seventh Avenue necessarily on the same level as the people from Harrods or, or Bergdorf’s.

And would you entertain them together, or separately?

Sometimes together. Not the buyers, I wouldn’t take out store people together, only on rare occasions.

Why not?

Well, conversations you would want to have with Bergdorf Goodman might be too personal, about store promotions and so on, we would agree to do something for them and perhaps under certain conditions, and the same sort of thing we would do with somebody else under other conditions. We might be able to get more money from them for doing it. They might perhaps pay for flights to New York and hotels, whereas the other would only pay two flights, and no hotels, or something. Depends on what you could, what terms of business you do. So you wouldn’t necessarily want to see them together. But you might, for instance you might take somebody out from American Harper’s, the fashion editor from American Harper’s, you might her out with somebody from Sachs Fifth Avenue, or Marshall Field, which was another very good department store in New York.

And would you...would you be the only person from the couture house to go to these evenings out, or...?

To go where?

Well, if, when you were entertaining, would, would you be the only person from, say, Nina Ricci, or would, would...?

No, I might perhaps, occasionally the designer from Nina Ricci might like to go out, or occasionally Mr Ricci might, Mr Ricci might decide to entertain somebody, and Percy Savage Page 139 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11) invite me, or I might tell him I’m having dinner or so with so-and-so, and would he like to come along, you know. Occasionally, mm.

And who...

And occasionally also at Nina Ricci there was a very very nice directrice, the directrice of the salon was a lady called Genevieve Antoine Dariaux, and she was a very very very good friend to me, and a very close friend of the designer, Francois Crahay, and she would, occasionally I would...and she spoke very very good English, she wrote a very good book called Élégance, which I have somewhere over there, and, no she was a close friend, very close friend. Occasionally there would be somebody else from the house. But normally the rest of the employees, they would either be the model girls, and very rarely did we invite model girls out, and, occasionally...but other than that, none of the salesladies would be the sort of people we would invite out, or very rarely. In some of the houses, yes, there were one or two salesladies who were grand enough to do that, and lived in a very grand way, perhaps, so they could entertain at home, have parties in their house. But most of the salesladies were nice, respectable, married women who went home to their husbands and, you know, eventually, had a nice pay packet at the end of the year.

So... And how...how would you discuss things, you know, that are sort of quite financial? You know, how...what was the sort of... Where would you have those discussions, not with...I’m talking about in terms of the actual couture house.

You mean the...discussions with whom?

Well, sorry.... I know, I didn’t put that very clearly.

With the, the store department people?

Yes, I suppose...

Department store people?

Percy Savage Page 140 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11)

Yes. And the buyers, you know.

The buyers? Yes, well, perhaps over dinner.

Mhm.

Or, you know, or perhaps they might come and, during the day they might come and, or over lunch, I mean, during the day they might come to the office and talk about things. They would say, ‘We’re doing a promotion in September, and we’d like to have this, that, and so on, we’d like to invite half a dozen different houses, and we’d like you to be there, and, you know, we’ve bought so many pieces, and, can we do this and do that?’ and so on.

But the signing of the engagements and things, would you have to deal with that as well?

No, I didn’t really deal much with the buyers, but that was a, those engagements that they signed were, they had a book with carbon copies, and they would come in, there would be a, their name would be written there, and the amount that they had to pay; when they came in they would sign that and take away a copy. We’d keep the carbon copy. And then we’d send an invoice to their buying office in Paris, and say, Bergdorf Goodman owe us, whatever it is, $20,000.

And how would you, how would you know, apart from your sort of, you know, meeting these people, what their relationship was to the buying policy of the house?

Well, obviously the director would tell me what...I’d say, ‘I think they’re very good,’ and he’d say, ‘No we don’t want to have anything to do with them, because,’ this or that and so on. So, there might have been people that I knew that I liked, and people that they didn’t want.

And what would you do in that case?

Percy Savage Page 141 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11)

Well, follow the director[???] of the, the ideas of the house. I mean if they didn’t want somebody for some specific reason, I mean, they might have had other business deals that they didn’t want to infringe or in competition with somebody. I mean if they were doing, if they were doing a, a business arrangement with Harrods for instance today, obviously Harrods would not want them to do the same arrangement with Harvey Nichols. Harrods might like to have an exclusivity, and in order to get an exclusivity they would have to pay much much more. If they wanted a name exclusive, they would have to buy more, and agree to stock more, and in that case we would not sell to Harvey Nichols. Or vice versa. And that happened in every, in every town, you know, it would happen in New York, happen in London, happen in Paris, happen in Berlin, Rome or wherever, Milan.

And did...were there sort of, business briefings at Ricci and Lanvin, you know, with you and, I don’t know, the directrice?

Yes, the, the head of the house, as I said, was Robert Ricci; his mother had very little to do with it, she might come in once a week and just come in occasionally, sit down and look at the collection, and just come in and say hello and have a fitting for some of her clothes. But there was a, a financial director was called Vladimir de Kusmin, he was Russian; and then there was the designer, Francois Crahay. But basically, it was between Robert Ricci, Mr de Kusmin, myself and Madame Antoine, Madame Antoine Dariaux, the four people, and we’d discuss policies or, what we’d do and so on.

And how often would you have meetings like that?

Well they wouldn’t necessarily be scheduled as sort of, regular board meetings; we might just say, we want to talk about something or other, ‘Come along, come in and see me tomorrow morning at ten o’clock.’ And we’d talk for perhaps half an hour or a couple of hours about something.

And could you explain exactly what the role of the directrice was?

Percy Savage Page 142 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11)

She would be the person who basically had control over, or authority over all the salesladies, and there might have been, at Nina Ricci there might have been, about a dozen salesladies. At Lanvin there were at least twenty salesladies. And, she would decide who would be sitting where, yes, so-and-so is important. Because I would say, ‘Oh I’m expecting the Duchess of somebody to come along,’ ‘I’m expecting the wife of the Prime Minister to come along.’ Decide where the best seats were, and who would sit where. Again very much along the same lines as when we did our first day shows, and, we’d be discussing where we’d put the press and where we’d put the buyers. And that would happen on a day-to-day basis at Ricci, every day, at every fashion house they would do that, they would know that so-and-so’s... They’ve got a full house, they could only have about 100 people at the most, so they, when they had 100 people they couldn’t have any more.

And where are the best seats?

Well, as I said, in, at Lanvin we had four different rooms. The first room, looking out onto the Faubourg St Honoré, was the best room, and on early days in the fashion shows they would have two rows of seats. So the best seats would be in the first room in the front row. And second best would be the first row of the second room. And so on. And the worst seats would be in the second row of the third room.

And would the first row in the second room be better than the second row in the first room?

In principle, yes. Yup, in principle. Not only that, but I mean if somebody came along with, wanted four seats, you might give two seats in the front row to somebody, and her same group, her friends, she wanted them behind her, in the second row. Wouldn’t necessarily give everybody a front-row seat. Depends who they were.

And what would you be doing during the shows?

Well, during most of those shows I would be up in my office, unless I knew somebody was coming along. And when the collection had started, the collection usually started around three or half-past three, I might go downstairs just to have a Percy Savage Page 143 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11) look and see who was there, and if there was anybody I liked or wanted to speak to, I might, you know, just pop in and sit next to them. Though mainly during the thing I was upstairs, unless I had people coming along. But I usually had people coming along nearly every day for the show, so, sometimes I might sit down with them, or I’d just sit them down and then go up and work.

And what would you...so what would you be doing upstairs?

Oh I’d be on the phone, calling people up. (laughs) Or I might have been out at a meeting. We would have meetings... Normally outside meetings took place in the morning, because the fashion shows took place in the afternoon. So we would try and have, either internal meetings or external meetings at the Chambre Syndicale, they would happen in the morning. And when we had external meetings at the Chambre Syndicale, where we would discuss worldwide plans, or just nationwide plans or whatever we were going to do for the, the couture in general, when there was something being organised by the Chambre Syndicale for, say ten or twelve, fifteen members of the Chambre Syndicale, would group together into a group show at Cannes or Monte Carlo or New York or, a whole big group of travelling, right across South America for a cotton promotion, or a wool promotion in Australia, or, various things. There were all sorts of big and small projects that were discussed.

Do you think the Chambre Syndicale had a role in...well perhaps not preventing, but perhaps alleviating competition between the houses?

Mm....not to a great deal, no. We knew there was competition, and, first of all, being a member of the Chambre Syndicale, as I was, meant I was from of the better houses, and consequently there were twenty other houses that were not nearly as good and they would hardly ever have a chance of having a seat on the board there. So we didn’t do much, we just sent them notices of what we’d talked about and what we were planning to do, and invite them, if they wished to join something or other, they could, and if we didn’t, we just didn’t want them. And there were times when some people were quite successful in business, such as the house of Carven, and they were very very very successful in the perfume business, and very very successful in the ready-to-wear business, but not of the quality we wanted for the haute couture Percy Savage Page 144 C1046/09 Tape 6 Side B (part 11) business, so we wouldn’t, we’d try not to include them in a lot of things, because they weren’t good enough. They didn’t have the same standard. Then we’d get a nasty phone call from them, ‘Why aren’t I included in this particular show?’ you know.

And who would phone?

Well, a director or a press officer or, directrice, I mean it depends who knew who. So we sometimes tried to avoid, you know, shun the ones that we didn’t want. But they had, if they’d joined, then they... In order to join the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture, you had to measure up to certain standards, such as, having so many employees, and producing so many collections per year of so many pieces per collection, and if you didn’t do that, you weren’t admitted to the Chambre Syndicale. So you, although there were many people perhaps that had talent and could design clothes, unless they could measure up to this and had the financial backing, they could not become members of the Chambre Syndicale. And the same thing exists today.

But what about in terms of quality, how would you measure that?

Well, quality, workmanship, depends upon the people you employ, you know, you can... There are a great many, many capable seamstresses in France.

[End of Tape 6 Side B] Percy Savage Page 145 C1046/09 Tape 7 Side A (part 12)

Tape 7 Side A [part 12]

How seasonal was your, was your press office work in Paris?

We had... Well it was very busy for the... We showed basically twice a year internationally, I mean when I say internationally, to an international audience, and that was for the spring/summer collection, which we showed about the end of January, and the autumn/winter collection which was shown at the end of July. So we’d be very busy... And then everybody in France goes away for holidays in August, so, about the, well we’d show about the 20th of July for about a week, and then after that the house would more or less close down, everybody went on holidays. When I say everybody, the seamstresses had to stay there and make all the clothes that had been sold to the buyers. And then they were not delivered until a month later, they would be delivered about the end of August or beginning of September. And they would be delivered to the buying offices in Paris, and then the buying office in Paris would take delivery, and then look after the shipment to America or to England or wherever it was.

But what about your own work?

For the press? Well, we were basically, we’d be frantically, frantically, frantically busy during the period of showing; not, not madly busy before, I mean basically we had to organise the printing of catalogues, writing of press releases, printing of invitations, writing the envelopes, and, numbering all the invitations and so on. There was quite a lot of little, you know, administrative work. We would have floor plans for the seating, and pencilled out who had what where. So in the press office I would know which particular seats I was allocated, and I would work out where I wanted to put my different press people.

And what about writing press releases?

Well that was, basically I, I had to handle that on my own, we had to do a press release for each collection, and, try and work out, they wanted to call it the A line or Percy Savage Page 146 C1046/09 Tape 7 Side A (part 12) the Haricot line or the Trapeze line, we would try and work out some sort of name and, talk, a hell of a lot of rubbish frankly. (laughs)

I was going to ask you how you, you know, how you went about writing them.

And then we’d have to translate it from either French into English or, depending who was writing it, if it was from English into French, or... And, you know, it was...that was... And then we’d have to send it out to the printer and get it back in time. It was, no, there were little, little, lots of little jobs. And then once the collection was shown, there was the big job of handling all the, all the photography that was, we hoped would take place, where you would get calls from the editorial offices of Vogue or l’Oficiel de la Couture, or you’d get overseas magazines, or French newspapers who would want to do photography, or, people would want to come in and do sketches and they would want to come and do photography in the house, on our girls, and I would try and get them to pay a little bit towards the girl, because they didn’t want to hire their own models outside. There were always lots of... That went on for about, each collection, that went on for about ten or twelve days. And then after that, everybody would go back to their countries, and we’d get down to the, you know, rest of the life’s work. But it was a constant, constant, constant job, it was very big, and very time-consuming, but very exciting job.

And what made it time-consuming?

Well there was no, no...it wasn’t a sort of nine to five sort of job, you know, you really, as I said, I would often arrive in the mornings at half-past eight, and very often during the collection period I would work there until nine o’clock or ten o’clock at night. Or even later, depending on who was, who wanted clothes, and, or photography, and I would have to sit in my office calling in clothes or using our messenger service, we had a little, a little van would go and deliver clothes, or go and pick them up, or somebody would bring them back on a bike or a van. Because the same dress might go out to three different photo studios in the same evening. It might go to French Vogue, and then it might go to American Harper’s, or it might go to the British Sunday Times or things like that. Or it might go to somebody who wanted to photograph it for advertising for the wool secretariat or the silk, silk centre. No, it Percy Savage Page 147 C1046/09 Tape 7 Side A (part 12) was a lot, a lot of work. And that went on in most of the big houses, as I said, there were other houses that didn’t get much publicity, and they didn’t have nearly as long or tedious a life.

Well were you...were you ever exasperated by, by anything?

I was very exasperated once, I think it was about 1959, we had...the Lunts were two actors from America, Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne, his wife, and they had the Lunt Theatre in New York, and they were coming to England to play [inaudible] Brecht play called The Visit, The Old Lady’s Visit[sic]. Which... And at Lanvin we were doing the costumes for Lynn Fontanne. And I had to bring the costumes over with a seamstress to London, we landed at Victoria, and went down to Brighton where they were having the first night. And, during the rehearsals... And they had to finish the dresses off, the last fittings. And during the rehearsals there was a young man running around taking photography. So I thought, she’s a famous actress, I might be able to use some of these photos in Paris, and I said, ‘I’d like to see the shots afterwards,’ and ordered some. So I, he...when it was over we met back in London, I went to his studio, and ordered, possibly about 100 different shots of this woman in her clothes, in the Lanvin clothes. And they were delivered, and I took them all back to Paris, and began to use some of them, sending out to various press people, wherever the name was important or wherever an article would come up and I’d think, right, I can use that photo there. And, he sent in his bill, which I think in those days was about £39, and, I gave it to the director, and he said, ‘Well that can wait for a month,’ you know. Our normal policy is, pay in 30 days, and we normally paid in about three months. But, after a while he sent back another... And when I was in London he said it was such a wonderful thing to photograph such beautiful clothes, because in London he never had such beautiful clothes to photograph, just didn’t make them here. And, he said he’d like to come to Paris. I said, ‘Right, well come over next month.’ This was all happening in the end of December in London. And he came over at the end of January, and when he...I gave him a seat, third row, or second row, third room or something like that. And then when it was over he came up to my office, and I made him wait because I was busy with other people, and eventually he said he wanted that that and that, he had a list of the clothes he liked very well. And, I said, ‘Right, well you can come back and them up tonight, somewhere around nine Percy Savage Page 148 C1046/09 Tape 7 Side A (part 12) o’clock.’ And, next morning I checked, and his particular set of clothes hadn’t come in. So I...he had given me his hotel address in Paris. I rang the hotel and they said he wasn’t there. And neither were the clothes. And I think this was on a Friday. We’d shown on the Thursday afternoon and he’d taken them the Thursday night. Friday they were not there. Saturday they were not there. And Sunday I practically lost my job. And Monday morning, he turned up with the clothes. I said, ‘Where in the world were you?’ And, he said, ‘Well, I went out to Versailles.’ (laughs) And included in amongst the clothes I think was, one of them was a bride’s dress, which was a traditional way of ending the fashion show. So, I was very patient, explained all this to him, and he apologised profusely and said, ‘Well in London it’s never like that. We take the clothes and take them back a week later.’ So, eventually, you know, he asked about his bill, and I told the director, ‘This young man wants his money.’ And he said, ‘To hell with his money. He’s cost us a hell of a lot by...’ you know, there were six different garments we couldn’t show to the buyers. And, anyway, time went on. And I went up to see, a couple of years later I went up to see the director, and I said, ‘I think perhaps that bill for £39, perhaps we should pay it, because, his fiancée, Princess Margaret, is downstairs buying clothes.’ So... (laughs) Mr Snowdon finally got his money, three years later. So that’s, yes, I think that’s an example of being able to be exasperated. (laughs) Royal exasperation. (laughs)

Because...

No, there were...there were problems sometimes, but normally we could cope. But it was living on the edge very much for, you know, weeks.

Because were you... I mean how would you cope with stress, do you think?

[pause] I’d probably go out and have a double whiskey. (laughs) No I didn’t drink much in those days, and I didn’t drink whiskey either, because they didn’t have whiskey in France in the Fifties. The drink in Paris was champagne, or, as the French would call it, a fine al’eau, which as you know is a, a brandy with soda. So brandy and soda was the drink for, the popular drink other than champagne. And, eventually they introduced whiskey, but it was, bourbon was the first whiskey to be introduced to Paris, because of the bourbon family, the bourbon. And then eventually they began Percy Savage Page 149 C1046/09 Tape 7 Side A (part 12) importing scotch to Paris, but scotch did not become popular in Paris until about the Sixties. And now it’s taken over totally. Very much the drink.

Could I just ask you a bit more about the press releases, because, can you remember having to write your first one?

Mm. Yes, we sat... Basically, we had a sort of rehearsal, looking...we’d be half a dozen or more people sitting down looking at the, with the designer, downstairs on the, on the first floor; he was upstairs on the fourth floor, I was on the third floor, and the fashion salons were on the first floor. So we would be down there, and the girls would, all the clothes would be out on a rack and the wardrobe mistress would be putting the clothes on and sending them in, we’d be looking at them here, and, see them more, more or less in the order that they wanted to see them. And, we’d be taking notes, and writing about colour, you know, and for summer you’d obviously have pastel colours and yellows and pinks, and a little black, and, in winter you’d have ruby reds and blues and purples and, so on. So we would have a section on colour, a section on materials, talking about silks and, talking about wools and cottons. And, talking about the line, whether they were on the knee, below the knee, above the knee, whether they were midi length, maxi length or mini coats, and so on. Little short, box jackets or long three-quarter jackets or three-quarter sleeves and, so on. And all these were little details that would make up about 600 words, which was the normal sort of length of a press release. And that would be double, printed on double A4 paper.

And would there be any images accompanying the press release?

No. Well there might be an image occasionally, an image, occasionally. But it wasn’t, it wasn’t... Since it was forbidden for people to publish any images, until late, much much later, like, now they can publish anything, the more they publish the better, but in those days it was forbidden to publish either photos or line drawings of anything from the collection until one month later, when they had delivered all the clothes. And then they could publish it. They had a delay of over a month to publish, publication day.

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And where did this rule come from?

Well that was decided by the Chambre Syndicale, basically to protect the buyers who had spent a lot of money buying, and didn’t want anybody to copy the clothes from photographs in papers. And also to protect the glossy magazines, like Vogue and l’Oficiel and Harper’s who had a, a printing delay, they couldn’t take a photograph today and publish it tomorrow like a newspaper can. So it was to protect the glossy magazines who gave the best and most prestigious publicity, to protect them from the newspapers, and also to protect the buyers who had spent money from unofficial ripper-offers who would perhaps try and copy something and get it into the shops before they could. It was a two-edged sword. And then later, much later, it became a free-for-all, and, today, you show it and very often they get previews even of fashions before they’re even shown. They’re all out there desperately wanting as much publicity as they can get.

So when do you think that change occurred?

Basically that occurred somewhere, I would say somewhere in about the, the Nineties, about, in the last twenty years, last ten, twenty years.

And was the procedure for writing a press release the same at Nina Ricci?

Much the same. Much the same as it was at Lanvin. And, they would have, you know, they would... Also they would, very often they would have a whole list of names you see, each of the garments would have a list of names and they would call, name the names after some of their perfumes. For instance at Lanvin there would always be one called Arpège, because Arpège was the, one of the Lanvin’s famous perfumes. And at Nina Ricci there was another one called l’Air du Temps, and l’Air du Temps, or Fleur de Fleur, because they were their perfumes, so there would always be different... In every house, much the same. So they would give a list of names to the buyers, and they would have a, a sort of, not necessarily in, in order of passage, in order of presentation; they would sometimes have an alphabetical order and, from one to 100 or, whatever, you know, was...that was... There was not much sense in it all really. But it all had to be done. Percy Savage Page 151 C1046/09 Tape 7 Side A (part 12)

And how involved would you have been in, in sort of, devising names for garments?

Oh everybody tossed in a name. Sometimes they would think, how...wouldn’t it be nice and chic to, in Paris to call everything after a London park or something or other, so we’d have a Hyde Park, and, Kensington Park, and, St James’s Park. (laughs) ‘No. 24, Numero vingt-quatre, St James’s Park.’ (laughs) So it was, it...they had themes like that, you know. Or sometimes they’d go Shakespearean, Othello, and Oberon, you know.

And, how independent did you feel, you know, in terms of writing things like press releases, and, and suggesting features?

I had more or less free rein, I could do more or less whatever I wanted. I mean in the first, obviously the first couple of years at Lanvin, I didn’t have much free rein, but then I was, you know, once I’d learnt my job and they trusted me, and they knew... And then, the press release would be written in English, and again then translated and written in French, or, vice versa, depending which house. Sometimes they would, some of the houses would ask me to do their English translation, you know, because they didn’t have anybody in the house that could speak English well enough, so they asked me, would I help. And in exchange I might get a big bottle of perfume, rather than twenty quid I’d get a bottle of perfume costing about £100. But which only cost them about £5. (laughs)

I think, in this period, you got married.

I was married in 1960, yes. In London, mm.

Could you just describe how, how you met your first wife, and...?

Well it was when I was working at Lanvin, and she was, she came to Paris, as the assistant for an Australian fashion editor, who was putting on a fashion show in Australia and they were getting dresses from the various houses in Paris, and, this fashion editor came to see me and this young lady came along with her. So that’s Percy Savage Page 152 C1046/09 Tape 7 Side A (part 12) how we met. And then, she was living in London at the time, and, she came to Paris occasionally, and then, I found her a job in Paris, working for the French cotton syndicate. And, her father in Australia had been, he was Irish origin, married to a Spanish lady, and, my wife, their daughter, Frances, was born in London before the war, and then when the war broke out the family all moved to Australia. But he became the agent in Australia for a French cotton company called Boussac, who were the people who owned Christian Dior. And, consequently she knew a little bit about cotton and the history of cotton. She also spoke very good French. And she got a good job in the cotton industry in Paris. And then we got married, and we got...I preferred the idea of getting married in Paris, because I had masses of friends in Paris, but she had most of her friends here in London. So we decided to get married in London, and chose the French church in Leicester Place to get married. And then we had a, we were given by our friend, we were given a suite at the Savoy Hotel as a wedding present, and stayed there for three days, and then, I’d come over by car so we got in the car and drove back via Dieppe and stayed in Normandy for a week, had a honeymoon in Normandy.

And what did you both wear at your wedding?

Well I hired a suit from, what were they called? Moss Bros I think were the people you hired suits from. And my wife wore a white lace, floor-length dress made by Nina Ricci. It was very beautiful. No, she was stunning.

Is it a... You know, what is the significance, if any at all, of her, you know, coming from Australia?

Oh that was just a coincidence, totally. I mean, I mean I had... It didn’t mean anything whatsoever to me that she came from Australia, she was just a very lovely lady, and very...fitted in perfectly with French friends that I had, French society, she spoke very good French. And she loved the fashion world, and was very very elegant, dressed very well. Loved hats, she was very... No, a very elegant girl. We used to have great fun going out together in Paris, going to the races, going to restaurants and, meeting friends. No, she fitted in very well with my life in Paris. And then we had a baby, had a, about a year later our little daughter, Catherine, was born. And then... Percy Savage Page 153 C1046/09 Tape 7 Side A (part 12)

And my daughter, Catherine, has just had a baby just over a year ago, so I’m a grandfather now.

And how do you feel about becoming a grandfather?

Well, it’s about time. (laughs)

How did, how did having a baby affect your lives?

Well, it was... I remember the night the baby was born, my wife had gone to what is called the American Hospital in Paris, out in Neuilly, and I was working that night, because, as I think I mentioned to you earlier, I had for quite some years in Paris taken on work as a proof-reader, working at night time. And I kept that on year after year after year after year, mainly because, it was a very good source of income, it was very well paid. And, the night my daughter was born, I was working at the Herald Tribune as a proof-reader, and they rang up from the hospital to tell me that she was born, and so on. And I went long next day and saw her in hospital. But I was just very busy working. And I kept on working. And I think after about a, after about a, nearly a week I think she stayed in hospital and then came home, and we had a very nice daily, sort of housekeeper who came along called Carmen, who was Spanish, and she helped look after the baby for a while. No, I kept on working, I was... I was still working at Ricci then during the day, and working as a proof-reader at night.

Even though you had had a...did you feel you actually needed to, even though your salary had increased?

Oh yes, oh I was still very... Well, having a baby was quite, quite a costly business. (laughs) Especially when your wife chooses the American Hospital. And I didn’t...I wasn’t on French social security, or, at least I was on French social security, but you don’t get the money back until a lot later, and you’ve got to pay the bills at the hospital. And the American Hospital was quite an expensive hospital. Not by any means a reasonable little maternity clinic.

And did Frances carry on working? Percy Savage Page 154 C1046/09 Tape 7 Side A (part 12)

No, she decided not to work, no. No no no. And then shortly after that she left and went off to Australia, and then decided not to come back, and, after five years she sued me for desertion, on the grounds that she was Australian, I was Australian, and that I was living abroad. And I didn’t know I was being divorced, and I didn’t dispute it, because I didn’t even know I was being divorced. And then suddenly I heard from people that I was divorced and I owed alimony, lots. And that went on, until eventually she came back, in 1981 she came back with Catherine, and that was the year Charles and Lady Diana were getting married, and, my daughter stayed with me and Catherine stayed...Frances stayed at the Savoy Hotel.

So, how long was it since you’d seen Catherine?

Oh I’d seen her, because I’d gone back to Australia and seen her, and she’d gone to the same school, which is called Notre Dame in, in Sydney, a nice little, nice little Catholic school, and, she went to the same school as her mother.

But, did you have any inkling when she left for Australia that she wasn’t coming back?

No way. I had bought her a return ticket to Australia, and, which she had, and then she just cashed it in, and didn’t return.

And how did you feel about that?

Oh I was...well, a bit distraught at the time. (laughs) But eventually got over it. And then I, I didn’t see her for about ten years. But eventually we sort of made up and, she did... We had appointments to meet when I went to Australia, and she didn’t turn up, and afterwards she told me that she was afraid I was going to kidnap the child, you know, which, I wasn’t thinking of doing, but still.

Yes, how old was Catherine when she left for Australia?

Oh she was only, she was only about two. Percy Savage Page 155 C1046/09 Tape 7 Side A (part 12)

And did Frances ever explain why...?

Well she did, she had wanted me to go back to Australia with her, because she was very unhappy. When her father died, her brother, John, had inherited the business, and she thought she should have inherited far more of it, and she wanted me to go back, and basically, you know, take the business away from her brother. And I had no intention whatsoever of doing that. I’d been living in Paris for nearly twenty years, made my life in Paris, and no way was I interested in going back to work in Australia in the French cotton business. No way. But that’s what she wanted. She’d got a husband, got a child, and wanted to go back and set up her life her way. No, she had a lot of character. Not all good. (laughs)

And did she, did she achieve her goals?

No, her brother was very successful in keeping his business, but she started another business, she started a very successful business of contract cleaning, where she had a number of people working for her, and they would go out and clean offices and clean buildings and clean homes, flats and so on. And she was quite a successful, she became quite a successful business person, yes.

So how did you meet your second wife?

We’d met in the Fifties, before I married. And she was an actress, from Poland, and one of her films was being shown in Cannes, and I happened to be in Cannes for the film festival, and we met down there.

Can you remember what the film was?

No, it was a Polish film. (laughs) No I don’t remember it, no no no. And then she went back to Poland, then she came and lived in Paris, and we saw each other occasionally. And I got married, and then divorced, and, so, we continued meeting through friends and so on, and then she came to London and stayed over here with me, and then, we got married but this time, instead of being married in a church in Percy Savage Page 156 C1046/09 Tape 7 Side A (part 12)

London we were married in a registry office in Paris, in the Mairie du Neuvième, in the rue de Richelieu...rue Drouot.

And what...

In the Richelieu Drouot, near the sales room.

And what, what did you wear then?

Oh just a nice suit, I think. (laughs) And, no I didn’t, didn’t wear a top hat and tails, no.

And, and what was your wife’s name?

Alicia Sedniska.

And what did Alicia wear?

She wore a Bill Gibb knitted three-piece skirt, jacket and coat. She looked nice, she was a very elegant, very beautiful woman.

So what date was this then?

That was ’74.

So that was only when you...

Just after I came to London. I went back to Paris to get married. [telephone ringing] Excuse me.

[End of Tape 7 Side A] Percy Savage Page 157 C1046/09/ Tape 7 Side B (part 13)

Tape 7 Side B [part 13]

So how long were you married to Alicia?

She died in ’86 of breast cancer, sadly. It was, very sad. So we were just married twelve years. But she was quite a successful businesswoman herself too, she was, whilst I was working in London, working on the fashion, London Fashion Week and various other fashion promotions and things, she was buying apartments, redecorating them and selling them, and doing very well. (laughs) She was quite a successful lady. She didn’t act any more, she stopped her film work.

And...

But I did have and do have photographs of her somewhere, but I can’t show them to you today because I, the book that they are in, where I know they are, is away, it’s out, somebody’s doing a, a film about me you see, so, he’s using some of these photos in the film.

So how do you feel about having a film made?

It’s been a long, tedious project, but I think, it’s supposedly coming out at the end of September, October. And, I’m just dying to see it. We’ve done a...he’s done interviews all over the world, in Paris, London, New York, interviews with Mary Quant, interviews in New York with Barbara Hulanicki, who started Biba, and who was a great friend, interviews in New York with a lovely lady called Eleanor Lambert, who died just a couple of weeks after the interview, she was 102. And, interviews in Paris with Hubert de Givenchy and Pierre Cardin, and lots of other friends. Susan Train who is the head of Condé Nast in Paris. And, interviews with all sorts of people all over the world.

And, sorry, who was Eileen Lambert?

Eleanor Lambert was an American who used to come to Paris, she was a PR in New York for fashion, and art. Then, during... Before the war she used to come to Paris to Percy Savage Page 158 C1046/09/ Tape 7 Side B (part 13) dress in one or two of the houses, and in Paris they used to have what they called a Concours d’Élégance, which was usually, a sort of competition between very well dressed, elegant ladies, all dressed by couture houses, and cars, they had to arrive in a car and step out, many of them with a dog or something or other. And they would be basically, the Best Dressed List. So this American lady said she would, when the war started, she would continue this thing in America calling it the Best Dressed List. And I met her after the war when she came to Paris, and she put me on her international committee to judge the best dressed women. And she went on doing this for years and years and years. And that has now been taken over by Vanity Fair, the Condé Nast magazine, and they are continuing to run it. So I had known her for many, many years, stayed with her, she had a very palatial flat on Fifth Avenue, on the corner of 86th Street. And she was great. She lived quite, next door to Alistair Cooke, the English radio man who has just died, and he was only ninety-five when he died; I think she was 102, but they were neighbours, and, old friends.

And who is making the film?

Oh it’s being made my a young man called Winston Cuthbert. And it’s being, I think he sold it to Channel 4.

And how did he approach you about, about it?

He knew me through a photographer. (laughs) And, a photographer put him on to me. So we met, and, he explained what he’d like to do, so we talked, yes. I cooperated with him as much as possible, very patient.

And what sort of things did he want to know about you?

Principally about my life and work in Paris with the couture. And he met various other... You know, we, speaking about it, I mean we, we filmed with Mary Quant out in Kew Gardens, and, he’d done hundreds and hundreds of hours of filming, and it’s all got to be cut down to just one hour. So what he’s going to do with all the, all the bits and pieces on the floor, I don’t know. (laughs)

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So, how, how did you meet Mary Quant?

I met her through Lady Rendlesham, who had the licence for the Yves St Laurent shops in London, the Rive Gauche shops, and I was working for Yves St Laurent, in the Rive Gauche area. And she had been fashion editor on Vogue; she’d gone to be fashion editor on Queen magazine, with Jocelyn Stevens when he owned it; and then she used to come to Paris to cover the couture collections. Then she left Queen magazine and, at the same time Mary Quant had been bought up by Gala cosmetics, and she was closing down her shop Bazaar, which was in Bond Street, and the people who actually owned the shop said to Clare, ‘We’ve got this shop, [inaudible] help us promote it, and what do you suggest?’ And she said, ‘Well I think we should do a mix of English and French ready-to-wear.’ And she came to Paris, we knew each other very well, she stayed with me, and said, ‘I’ve got this shop, got this job. What do you suggest?’ And I said, ‘Well I think you should look at the Yves St Laurent Rive Gauche.’ And she was rather scornful and said, ‘Well, you know, I think that couture is dead.’ She said, ‘You may remember a year ago Queen magazine photographed all the couture in coffins, and a headline on the front cover was, “Queen Buries Couture”.’ And she believed very much in the ready-to-wear industry, and I think she was quite right, but, eventually after seeing various people in Paris for a week, she did come home one evening, one day, and said, ‘I’m terribly sorry to say, you were right, I have today signed up exclusively St Laurent for England.’ So then St Laurent said to me, ‘We’d love to have a good client and friend like yours in London, but, we’d like you, we’d like you to go to London at our expense and supervise the building of the shop to make sure that it’s built to our standards. You know our shops in Paris, you know how we like them and what we do. You know our decorator.’ And so I came over, and Clare was very happy because she knew that at the same time as helping with the building of the shop, and the decorating of the shop, I’d be able to help her promote the shop. So... And that’s...it was basically she who introduced me to Mary Quant. But before that, Mary quant had come to Paris constantly when we showed the collections in Paris, and because she and her husband were such nice, fun people, I invited them to come along to the fashion shows, and introduced them to lots of other people at parties, and gave parties for them. So we’ve been friends for many many many years now.

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And had you...how had her, her work been publicised in France?

Well, she...it wasn’t publicised in France, but she did come to France basically at the times of couture shows basically to meet Americans. Because she was selling in America, and selling her Mary Quant designs and Bazaar designs to America, and it was basically important for her to get to know the American Vogue, the American Harper’s, Life magazine, Look magazine, the New York Times, and people like that. She wasn’t interested in France so much, she was interested, purely and simply in Paris as being a meeting place to get in with the right people. Because those people from America did not come to London. London didn’t have that sort of pull in those days. It wasn’t until later when Mary Quant really helped London a bit, and then, well into the Sixties, end of the Sixties and the Seventies, that London became popular. But in the, in the Fifties, it just didn’t happen that way.

And had you seen her clothes?

I had seen her clothes, oh yes, I’d seen her clothes from, I’d known her when she was a student at the Royal College. I used to come over, I used to be invited from Paris by Janey Ironside, who was the professor of fashion at the Royal College, she invited me to come to London to talk to the students at the Royal College, and Mary Quant was one of the students there. So was Zandra Rhodes, so was Bill Gibb, so was Ossie Clark and, you know, I knew lots of those young designers. John Bates.

And what would you talk to them about?

I’d just tell them about what we did in Paris, and how the fabric houses would work, and how we would...how the model girls were, you know, chosen, and what... It was, just let them know and... Then, one of them came over and I got her a job at Christian Dior, and then another one came over and I got him a job at Lanvin, as a hat designer. And, you know, I...

Can you remember who they who they were?

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The one that...was a girl called Hilary Floyd, who came to Paris and I got her a job at Christian Dior working in the boutique, and she now lives in Delaware, she’s, she married an American, she stayed in London, and she left London about, oh about ten years ago, but she comes back every year, and we see each other every year, she married a nice young American. But she still designs in Delaware.

And when you came over to do these, these talks at the, at the Royal College...

Royal College.

...what, what was your sort of feeling about the college, you know, what impression did you have of it?

It was far superior to the school in Paris where I taught, where I told you, I was, where I met Farah Diba, it was far, far, far superior. Because, the school in Paris basically was intended as a, a place to teach young people, boys and girls, basically how to cut and sew, but not how to design. Whereas in London, they were teaching them how to design, and cutting and sewing were secondary. Cutting was obviously important, and sewing. They’ve never had very good production here in England; no way could they sew a dress here in England the way they did in Paris.

And what about the sort of different relationships with textile companies? I mean, what did you think about British textiles?

Well, there were a few, half a dozen, very very very good English textile companies. One of the greatest was one called Ascher, Ziker Ascher, who was originally from Czechoslovakia, and another very promotionally conscious person was Sekers, his name was Nicholas, Miki Sekers, Sir Nicholas Sekers, and he was Hungarian. And then there were another company called Otterburn, who were wonderful English tweed people from the Midlands. And they were, they were represented in Paris by one particular woman called Juliette Duclos, who was half English and half French, and her entrées to all the couture houses. So, there used to be a few English fabrics used in Paris. But because of the help that the French couture houses got from the Government, they were only allowed to use about twenty per cent of foreign fabrics. Percy Savage Page 162 C1046/09/ Tape 7 Side B (part 13)

Well foreign fabrics in those days meant, basically Italian, Swiss and English. So that the English did not get many many many...but that was simply because the, the French wanted that money that they got from the French Government.

And what do you think students, you know, like Mary Quant and Bill Gibb and Ossie Clark, what do you think their attitude to, to Paris was?

I think they were probably a little bit envious of the grandeur of Paris, a little bit envious of the luxury of Paris. But I think they far more enjoyed their work, their, their creative work, far more because, I think they were designing for a younger clientele. So many of the, the people in Paris who could afford to dress in couture were the more matronly types, the mothers and grandmothers. And the youngsters were, they might get their wedding dresses from a couture house, but after that they were dressing in the French ready-to-wear, which was, fun but not as much fun as the English ready-to-wear. I think Mary Quant was most innovative, wonderful. And Biba did a fabulous, fabulous job, fabulous.

How did you meet Barbara Hulanicki?

She was an illustrator for an English magazine, and she came to Paris and wanted to come and see one of the fashion shows. And I was, you know, very sympathetic and let her in. (laughs) I just thought she was a lovely girl. No, she was great fun.

How would she have approached you?

How did she approach me?

Mm.

Well simply because she, she just rang up and said she was doing sketches for some, some women’s weekly paper in England, I’m not quite sure what the paper was called, some magazine. So I said, ‘Fine,’ you know, ‘come along.’ You never now how people are going to turn out. And eventually she started her own business, and was called Biba, because, she was one of three daughters, three sisters, there was Percy Savage Page 163 C1046/09/ Tape 7 Side B (part 13)

Barbara Hulanicki, Biba Hulanicki, and Beatrice Hulanicki, and Beatrice married a man called Tony Porter, who had a PR company in London, worked in fashion, and Barbara got married, and it was Biba who did the designs basically, and they called the house Biba after the sister. And it was, it was a fascinating place, Biba’s original shops were wonderful, and the great big emporium they later had at Derry & Toms was incredible. No, she was a lovely girl.

[coughing] Sorry, could I have a drink of water?

Oh yes, by all means. Can you do it on your own?

No, I’ve brought some.

Oh you’ve got some. Right.

And would you socialise with them when you came over to do talks?

With the students? No, not much, no. Janey, I used to see Janey Ironside every time. But no, I preferred slightly older, more mature people. I socialised more with the fashion editors whom I knew, and, Janey was always, she always gave a dinner party for me. But not for the students, no.

What was your impression of Janey?

I loved her, I thought she was a very very dedicated person, and, she was great friends then with... The person who started the fashion department at the Royal College was Madge Garland, who was editor of British Vogue, and she went to Paris in 1947, saw the Christian Dior collection, the New Look, came back, and said that they had to have a fashion department at the Royal College, and it was she basically who started it about 1948. And Janey Ironside was the girl who was taken on to be, teach fashion. She was the first person taken on. And that was when they were down in Cromwell Road.

Did you meet Robin Darwin ever? Percy Savage Page 164 C1046/09/ Tape 7 Side B (part 13)

No, I never met him. I heard about him but I never met him, no.

And what did you hear about him?

Not very nice things really, nobody seemed to have liked him very much. But, in those days the Royal College was just opposite the Natural History Museum in Cromwell Road. Not where they are, in the grand place near the Albert Hall.

So, tell me about why you decided to go freelance. I think, was that 1967?

About...yes, about 19...yes, about 19...yes, about 1965, after, after Nina Ricci. Because there were more...that’s when St Laurent asked me to do things for them also, which was very exciting, just before he started his Rive Gauche in 1968. And there were many other things being offered to me, many other jobs being offered to me, which would have stopped me being, working with Nina Ricci. And also the designer whom I knew at Nina Ricci had left, and gone to work at Lanvin, Francois Crahay; he was replaced by François[sic]...Pipart, and, I just didn’t...I wanted to, you know, extend, extend my field and do other things.

Was it important for you to get on with the designer?

Oh I think so, yes. Oh yes, no I, I got on very well with Pipart, you know, we were... I was the person who suggested Pipart as a designer for Nina Ricci, and there was great opposition to it, because Pipart at the time had been working for about ten years but always working for top quality French ready-to-wear houses, and in the couture it was more or less understood that you came from a couture house to work in a couture house, and the idea of getting another designer from outside in the ready-to-wear was just unheard of. But, Ricci made various inquiries amongst other people, and they said, yes, he is very good. He was taken on. And his collections proved to be constantly successful. So, it was a very good choice, and he stayed there for over thirty years. He was there when the company was bought out by Puig, and he’s now retired and living very happily, and, very much at ease, very comfortably off.

Percy Savage Page 165 C1046/09/ Tape 7 Side B (part 13)

And why did you recommend him particularly?

Because frankly, looking around the couture houses in Paris, there wasn’t, in my opinion there wasn’t the talent in the way of young designers who would leave Dior, or leave Givenchy, or leave another house, and come to work at Nina Ricci. I just didn’t think there was any real talent available. Like St Laurent who would have been ideal, but St Laurent had already started his own house. And I didn’t know of anybody. The only other person I, another person I suggested was Karl Lagerfeld, and again they didn’t particularly like Karl Lagerfeld because he was too closely allied with other ready-to-wear houses. They wanted more couture.

Do you think Lagerfeld would have, would have taken it up?

Well he was very involved with Chloe at the time as a part-time job designer, and very...he had I think too many other contracts with other people; he had contracts in Italy, contracts in Germany, and contracts in France. I don’t think he would have had the time, he would have...I don’t think he would have given up all the contacts he had to go and work for one house. I mean even now, today, he still works for Chanel, but, he still has all those other contracts. And I don’t think Ricci were prepared to sort of accept him as a part-time couture designer. So they settled for Pipart. But Lagerfeld was a very talented man, I think still is.

Who was it most important for you to get on with, in a house?

[pause] I think the owner was vitally important. At Lanvin for instance Madame de Polignac, the Comtesse de Polignac, she was an adorable, wonderful person, and we got on very well together. And the director of the house was quite an important person. The designer at the house was Castillo, he was a very important person. And then it was very important to get on, well, lots of, lots...I like to get on with most people. (laughs) I just think of all the friends I had at Lanvin. The wardrobe mistress was a wonderful person, a very elderly lady who was very bossy, looking after all the, all the model girls.

Did she look after the girls as well as the clothes? Percy Savage Page 166 C1046/09/ Tape 7 Side B (part 13)

She looked after the girls as well, yes, she was very much a sort of, matronly type of, you know, mother [inaudible] type[???] [inaudible] ready[???].

But it was the designer who was responsible for hiring the girls?

The designer would, yes, he would, he would be the one that they would, when they were choosing girls, they would come in and he would look at them and say yes or no.

And, and were they exclusively bound to the house?

At that time, yes, they were house girls. They had very few freelance girls unless they came, as my sister was hired, on a freelance basis just to replace a girl going on holidays. As one girl went on holidays, and when she came back another girl went on holidays. They all had their month’s holiday at a time. So that’s how my sister was taken on. If she hadn’t been taken on there, they would have taken on somebody else on a freelance basis.

So what did you know about working as a freelance person, you know, as, for yourself, instead of having a regular salary?

Only from what I had seen from other people who were freelance PRs, and some, there were a few freelance PRs in Paris but there were quite a few freelance PRs in London that I knew. And, also in America, freelance PRs, for instance the lady, Eleanor Lambert whom I knew who came over, she had her own company, and took on clients for perhaps a year or six months, or just ‘an event’ which might last three months, preparatory work, a ball or something like that. So I did a lot of work similar to that in France.

And, did anybody advise you about, you know, how to, how to organise a freelance business?

No, I... No, just, found an office, took an office and hired a secretary. (laughs)

Percy Savage Page 167 C1046/09/ Tape 7 Side B (part 13)

Where was your office?

The office was in the building next door to Givenchy in the avenue George V, just opposite Balenciaga and next door to Givenchy. And it was a nice, modern building up on the, I think the second or third floor. Very nice, looking out on the street. Just two rooms. And, I worked there with just one secretary, and sometimes a second secretary, or sometimes ask somebody to come in and do a bit of temporary work for me.

And who was, who were your secretaries when you were freelance?

Well the one that I hired in the avenue George V was a girl who had been a fashion editor on a newspaper, she had worked for this Fairchild publication, Woman’s Wear Daily. And I knew her parents, who were both in the textile business, I knew the girl for many years and she was, she’d been a good fashion editor, we got on very well together, and, she had, she didn’t want to continue working for the paper. So she was an ideal person. She understood problems of press people and so on.

And did you, did you...what sort of...what sort of other things, sort of business related things did you have to do to set up on your own?

Oh I had to get a good accountant. (laughs) Basically, that was the main thing, to make sure that money came in, make sure the, you know, income tax was paid, company tax, and... And I had a bank who gave me a little bit of advice, but I never had to borrow money from the bank, there was no...it was a reasonably solvent sort of company.

And what happened, how did you announce that you were leaving Nina Ricci?

Well I had a three-year contract with them, and we were talking about renewing it, and I told them that I, you know, had possibilities of doing other work, and, did they mind? And they said no. So, we came to a very agreeable... And continued to see each other constantly after that, there was no problem whatsoever.

Percy Savage Page 168 C1046/09/ Tape 7 Side B (part 13)

Did you have a contract at Lanvin?

I started off with a three-year contract which was renewed and renewed, until I left and that’s, I left when the contract had expired, which was nine years. So it was renewed every... It was the normal sort of period in France, was a three-year contract. Which is exactly what Yves St Laurent had when he started at Christian Dior, he started with a three-year contract, and then they let him go.

And what...what did your contract specify, can you remember at all?

Well that I was...it was just working for, exclusively, I wouldn’t be allowed to work for any other fashion house, working exclusively for Nina Ricci, or exclusively for Lanvin.

But did it include things like, you know, what, what your pay would be, and...?

Oh it was purely salary, and, you know, I mean, working for so much per month or whatever it was, per year. And in the case of Lanvin, also, you know, specified that I had a wardrobe allowance.

So they were quite formal contracts actually, weren’t they?

Well, just say, sort of, letter form, yes, I mean there were exchange of letters. But not a... I didn’t get any percentage[???] on this, and, anything like that[???], you know, there was... Where other people get contracts and go on and on and on and on, you...

So, can you remember sort of, the day that you left Ricci, you know, and went freelance, how you felt?

Oh I was quite excited about it, because I took... Originally I took an office very close to them in the rue St Honoré near the Ritz, near the Place Vendôme, and then after that I moved to George V. I took an office in a, in a nice little building, which was very central, and very close to another client that I had in the rue St Honoré, who were called Chambert, who were furriers. And I worked a great deal in both Lanvin Percy Savage Page 169 C1046/09/ Tape 7 Side B (part 13) and Ricci, a great deal in the fur business, because they were both, they both had fur departments. Lanvin had a very important fur department; Dior had a very very important fur department. And eventually, when Monsieur Chambert died, his wife Carole Chambert went to Dior and ran the Dior fur department.

Is this where... Actually I’ve got to turn over.

[End of Tape 7 Side B] Percy Savage Page 170 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14)

Tape 8 Side A [part 14]

How, how did you become involved with the, with furriers?

Well, originally because at Lanvin there was a very important fur department, and, fur was, in many of the fashion houses when they showed in their winter collections, they would show either a few fur coats or they would show a few coats trimmed with fur, with either fox collars or mink collars or mink coats with...and eventually...whichever furs they were using. And, astrakhan, there were people who were promoting, from America there was a group of furriers called EMBA, E-M-B-A, which was the Mink Breeders’ Association, MBA. And then in Scandinavia there was a group of people promoting minks, and they were called Saga. And then there was another group of people in Canada that I eventually used to have as a freelance client, and they were the Canadian Mink Breeders’ Association, their label was Canada Majestic. So when I said I had different clients and freelance, the Canada Mink Breeders was one of them. And it was quite a big account, for both advertising and promotions.

So, I didn’t realise there was a sort of difference. Could you explain that?

Well, it was purely and simply, the breeders of America, in the United States, had their promotion organisation, and the breeders in Canada had their own mink breeders’ association, and the same in Scandinavia, they were all promoting their own label.

But I meant, the difference, the distinction you were making in terms of your account for promotion and for advertising.

Oh well, it’s just that I said, the Canadian Mink Breeders’ Association asked me to do their promotion in Europe as a whole, that’s including France, Germany, England. And I had an advertising budget where I was taking advertising pages in French magazines, the same in German magazines, and the same in English magazines. So I would choose different furriers whom I knew had bought the Canadian mink, and go and see them and photograph, take a garment, photograph it and book a page in Vogue or Harper’s and settle that. Percy Savage Page 171 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14)

And, did all your accounts include advertising?

Very few. Not many, no.

Why is that?

Well when I was working at Lanvin, they did very little advertising of their own, very very little. They would advertise their perfume, and I didn’t handle the Lanvin perfume business. The same at Nina Ricci, they didn’t do any fashion advertising; they had advertising for their perfume business, I didn’t handle that either.

And, and, can I just ask you what sort of photographers you would employ for...to work for you?

Well I knew lots of different fashion photographers, and, find the ones that wanted to accept our prices and so on. (laughs) I did a little bit of advertising for Lanvin, I used to do the advertising for the Lanvin scarves, and I used to do the advertising for the Lanvin stockings, and I used to do the advertising for the Lanvin lingerie. And for the Lanvin lingerie and stockings we used a man called René Gruau, who is very famous, and who did the Eau Sauvage card for Christian Dior. And for the scarf promotions we, I just used photographers.

And, are there any photographers that stand out for you as sort of good to work with?

Well one of the ones I worked with was Norman Parkinson, who was an English photographer and he did some work for me. Then I had an American photographer called Peter Fink, who was very well known, and, now is no longer, but I mean he, I met him in, when I was at Lanvin, he came over from America. And, although I knew many many photographers, I didn’t really employ very many of them.

And, would, would...who would design the look of the advertisement?

Percy Savage Page 172 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14)

Well basically, myself and the photographer. And then, work it out, and I’d give it to people who would make the blocks, and then we’d hand the blocks on to the, on to the, the publisher.

And can you remember any particular one that you worked on with Gruau or Parkinson?

Well Parkinson did the photography for the Lanvin scarves; Parkinson did a lot of the photography for the Canada Majestic mink, and he did that in, both in, he came to Germany for photography, he came to France for photography, and he came to England for photography. And basically we had the, we had the Canadian mink logo, which was a, a maple leaf, Canadian maple leaf, and just Canada Majestic, and the name of the furrier. So they were not... And we didn’t do many, I mean, sometimes when you have a big budget, you might do as the French textile people would do, they might take what they call a cahier and do twelve or sixteen pages in the same magazine. And then there would be a, quite a big...and then they would produce a separate booklet of their, of their fabrics, showing the garments that they’d photographed, and that would be sent out to other people to whom they were trying to sell their fabrics.

But would...for the fur ones, would you normally have a model wearing something?

Oh yes, always take, always photographed, always photographed on a model. And then there was another organisation called Great Lakes Mink Association, and they abbreviated that to GLAMA, and, they photographed people like Marlene Dietrich and so on, who were obviously very very very very well paid for their help in the promotion. So that was another brand label for mink.

And did you work for them as well?

No, only Canadians.

And...

Percy Savage Page 173 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14)

But every year there was a, a fur fair at Frankfurt, and furriers all over the world would come to Frankfurt, show their ready-made furs, and show their skins and so on, so I went there every year with, met the people from all over the world, whether it was from America, Neiman Marcus, New York, or, Seventh Avenue, or, Germany, Italy. There were wonderful furriers in Italy, and wonderful furriers in Germany. No, it was a, it was a very exciting field. And then with Boris Solomon, because I helped him, and, go to Moscow with the Christian Dior thing, he then invited me every year, for twenty-seven years we went to Leningrad for the fur sales in Leningrad where he would buy sables and foxes and astrakhans and, not minks because the Russians didn’t have good mink. He bought his minks either from Scandinavia or America or Canada.

And what would you do with him in Moscow – Leningrad?

Give him, basically give him ideas and persuade him to buy different furs and so on. One of the greatest things that I ever did for him was to persuade him to buy some sables, which I liked, and, thought were quite extraordinary; he said that they were rubbish, because they were sables that hadn’t grown to the proper colour. And he said they always sell very cheaply, at around £1 a skin, and then they dye them black and then they sell them for rabbis’ hats. And he said, ‘No no,’ he said, ‘that’s just rubbish.’ And I said, ‘Well, buy the lot.’ And I told him, I said, ‘You know, I think we can do something with this.’ So, we bought the lot, had them all tanned, and then they all came back, and, he must have had about, 3,000 skins I believe, as opposed to the other five or ten thousand sables that he bought which were the beautiful, natural, what they call Barguzin, brown with little silver tips and so on; these were all in various shades from pale to yellow to sort of orangey colour. And we sorted all these, and we were able to get, I think three almost pale chicken yellow skins, and we launched the golden sable, which sold at a colossal price, because it was so rare and so new and, everyone wanted this new golden sable. And he made a fortune out of that, because he’d bought them, as I said, for £1 a skin, and was selling them for about £150 a skin. It was a very very very big, big coup for him. So we, we talked about various things. And I would tell him to buy this and buy that, and, try and promote certain things. In France it was unusual to see a mixture of furs; you would have a mink coat with a mink collar. And I suggested we could have a mink coat with a Percy Savage Page 174 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14) sable collar, or a mink coat with a fox collar. Black mink with a, with a silver fox collar, or a blank mink with a black fox collar, or a white mink with a white fox collar. And that was a trend in fur designing that was introduced during the time I was there.

So when...what decade was this?

That was in the Fifties.

And, and...

Fifties and Sixties.

And was there any other aspect of, where you were able to sort of drive the design?

The designs of coats?

Or, or any sort of, any garment really.

Not really, no.

It was unique to fur...

Not...

...your role in fur?

No, not really, no. I designed a few fur coats from Lanvin’s men’s, I think I designed a collection of six different coats, which wasn’t...very difficult because, I just looked around and saw the sort of coats that I liked, and said, why didn’t... I remember buying one, a sort of, caban from Jaeger in London, and I said, take this one and make it in beaver, you know, and put, sheared beaver and then longhaired beaver on the collar. Or do the same thing in mink, you know, it was... Or take, do something in black astrakhan with a black mink collar. Percy Savage Page 175 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14)

What sort of...

Grey astrakhan we had, you know.

What sort of, what was Boris Solomon like?

He was originally from Kiev, he was Russian, and, not very tall, a very dynamic man, loved the arts world, loved music, and loved painting. Had a big art collection, loved painters and, collecting, and would love to go to museums, and, he was very much a... Married, had a daughter and two sons. And he was the president of the French fur traders’ association, he was also the president of the international fur traders’ association, worldwide. So he was quite an important figure in the, in the fur business.

And how, how would the fashion world regard somebody like him? You know, what, what would be his, his sort of...?

Well his wife was a client at Christian Dior, and his wife was also a client at Lanvin. But she was a rather quiet, nice, quiet little lady, and he was just, so far as Dior was concerned, they looked upon him as a tradesman, and when I suggested that he should come to Russia with them, they said, ‘Mais ce n’est qu’un commerçant,’ you know, he’s just a tradesman. He comes in by the back door. I said, ‘Yes, and his wife comes in by the front door, and she’s a client,’ you know. (laughs) ‘And he’s the president of the fur traders.’ ‘Ah, well if he’s the president, we can invite him as the president, but we can’t have any more tradesmen.’ They didn’t want to take any tradesmen to Russia with them.

So would...is that also how they thought of the textile manufacturers?

Oh yes, the textile people all came in through the back door. Carried their suitcases up, two, three flights of stairs, to show their collections. They were all very much tradesmen. And the same as the, in the jewellery business, when the people who Percy Savage Page 176 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14) would make costume jewellery, or, the people who made all the wonderful, wonderful, wonderful embroideries, they always came through the back door.

And how do you think they felt about that?

That was the custom, you know, it was... (laughs) Very much, very... They were lucky to get in through the back door. (laughs) Hard enough to get in through the back door, you know. (laughs) At least they had their foot in the house. Because once they came in, they had to, they wouldn’t be allowed in unless they had an appointment. So they could turn up at a fashion house and unless they had an appointment, unless the designer wanted to see them, they wouldn’t be allowed in.

And, did that ever change?

I think possibly with some of the younger clients today, possibly with Galliano and McQueen I think it’s changed a little bit.

Because...

I know certainly with St Laurent, St Laurent had a, a great admiration and respect for a few people in the textile business. He had a very very good friend called Gustav Zumsteg, who was in Zurich, and who ran a fashion house called Abraham, and they made, they produced these, a collection of silks every season, which had in the selvedge, in the border, they had the name St Laurent. And St Laurent used to get a special, you know, extra discount, well not discount, he got a percentage. So in addition to what he earned at St Laurent as a designer, he was getting more money from them, and he was very close friends with Zumsteg. He was a wonderful man. Had his own shop in Paris, not for selling dress fabric but for selling decorated fabrics, house, house curtains and sheets and things. But there weren’t many people in the textile business who had close relationships with, with the textile, with the fashion houses. A few, one or two women in the textile business who were big clients, and bought their own clothes, and were, became quite close friends with the designers, and who produced beautiful, beautiful fabrics. But some of the fabrics would sell at £200 a yard, some of the fabrics they made. Percy Savage Page 177 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14)

So, apart from the furriers, who, who else were your clients when you were freelance?

Well Maria Callas was a client for a while, because when her friend Aristotle Onassis was planning to marry Mrs Kennedy, he let her know that their liaison was coming to an end, and her impresario knew that she and I were, had known each other for quite a few years, we’d originally met at Spoleto just outside of Rome, and, I’d been to one or two of her concerts and operas in Milan. And we knew each other, and, he suggested that during this period prior to the Onassis marriage, Maria Callas wanted to be seen with a number of other men, and give the impression that it was she who was breaking off the relationship with him. So I had a budget to entertain Maria Callas, which I did at, a private dinner party at home, and take her out, and then she would take me out and give a dinner party at home, and, we travelled to New York to the Metropolitan, and we went to Houston to the opening of an opera. And someone who was quite a, an interesting client, and a profitable client. Very good. Her impresario was a very nice chap; he was also the impresario for the Houston opera house at the same time. And I’d known him for years also.

So was that an unusual sort of client for you?

Yes, I think it was...it was...pers... I didn’t have many personal clients, I didn’t sort of promote an actress or an actor or a dancer or, the singer. She was a very, you know, it was a special case, yes. But it’s not unusual for people to have a personal PR, you know, like, a spin doctor, I mean it’s a, it’s what politicians have, and, artists have. It just takes a lot of, a load of work off their back.

What about...but what about other, other sort of more fashion related clients?

Fashionable ladies?

No, fashion clients, you know, fashion houses, or, or...

Well I had clients in London, one was called Kanga, a lady called Lady Tryon, and she had a shop in Beauchamp Place. And, I did a lot of work for her. Percy Savage Page 178 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14)

While you were in Paris?

Oh no no no no, that didn’t happen until much later. It didn’t happen until 1984. But in Paris, no, I didn’t have many other clients in fashion, other than as I’ve said, Lanvin, Nina Ricci and St Laurent. And Chambert, it was, you know, the... And later I did a bit of work for Emmanuelle Khanh, who had been a model girl for Givenchy and started her own ready-to-wear. No I didn’t do much work for fashion in...

And...

I knew a lot of them, but they didn’t sort of have the, the budget for it, you know, I mean there are...certainly quite a few people would ask them to do things, but I just wouldn’t do it because they didn’t have the budget.

Because how would you work out your budgets, you know, how could...how would you decide...

Well...

...what a budget would be?

Well, depends what sort of work people would want done, you know. It’s...you want to... I didn’t work out a budget for Maria Callas, it was the impresario who suggested, ‘We have so many thousand dollars.’ I said, ‘That’s fine. We can, you know, do quite a lot with that.’ So that was no problem at all.

So what about somebody like Emmanuelle Khanh, what, what would she say?

Well she was starting in Paris, so, she was married to a very nice man called Quasar Khanh, and he was a, a very interesting man. She was a very interesting lady, she was a, a relatively unattractive girl with a biggish nose, and she always wore great big sunglasses to sort of hide her big nose, and she was a, again, she believed very much in ready-to-wear as opposed to being, as she had been, a client, a, you know, a model Percy Savage Page 179 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14) girl at Givenchy. And she wanted to produce ready-to-wear. So I helped her and organised fashion shows for her, inviting the press people that she should know, and, so on.

But how would you work out what her budget needed to be before you took her on?

Well I’d tell her that, I’d just tell her that, you know, you want a fashion show, and, you need whatever it is, twenty model girls, you need to do this, you need to give a party, you need...so... We’d work costs out together, and I’d say, ‘OK, and you pay me two or three hundred pounds,’ or whatever it was. Not, not necessarily a great deal. And then also another client I had was called the Israel Development Corporation, which was a bank on Park Avenue, and their problem was that they wanted to do fashion shows in America of clothes made in Israel, in order to raise money, people would come along to a dinner party, or a, in a fashion show, and pay $1,000 per person, and after that show was over they would move to another town and do the same thing. And six months later they would be doing luncheons or afternoon teas for $100 instead of $1,000. And this lady came from New York to see me in Paris, and she came first of all to see the president of the Chambre Syndicale, who was then called, and this was in 1953, and I went on working for them for twelve years. She went to see Jacques Heim, who listened to her story, that she wanted to do these charity shows in America, and he said, ‘Right, well that’s fine, it’ll cost you $1,000 per dress.’ She said, ‘But I don’t want to pay.’ He said, ‘But...’ So she went along to see a friend called Rothschild, who rang me, and said, ‘I’ve got a young lady here I’d like you to meet.’ And she came to see me at Lanvin, and told me her story, what she’d like to do. And in addition to that, they wanted to have, in addition to having the clothes from Israel, they wanted to have clothes from a dozen, or half a dozen French houses. So I said, ‘Well I don’t think that’s a problem, I’m having dinner with Balenciaga tonight, he’s an old friend, and I’m working at Lanvin, that’s another one you’ve got, without any problem.’ And I went to see Balenciaga, and told him the story. He said, ‘Well, half my clientele is Seventh Avenue manufacturers in America, and if all this for the State of Israel, I imagine that’ll go down well with them.’ So, the next day I rang Christian Dior, and then I rang somebody else, and got them. And then I had a call from Mr Jacques Heim, the president, and he said, ‘I hear you’ve been going around town with, for this young lady, and putting her house in Percy Savage Page 180 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14) order.’ I said, ‘Yes, I’ve got the six people I need.’ He said, ‘But you haven’t asked me.’ I said, ‘I understand you refused, you wouldn’t do it.’ He said, ‘But I’m the only Jewish designer in Paris, and I'm the president of the Chambre Syndicale. I have to be in it.’ And so I said, ‘Right.’ So I told her that he’d come down in his price, and we would have seven designers and not six. And I did that for this organisation for twelve years. And went to Israel constantly, and we had the premiers in Paris at the Crillon Hotel. And then it all went off to... And then Rothschild would give a ball, a dinner at his place at night, and showed the clothes again, and, then it all went off to America. And they raised millions and millions and millions. And built roads, and planted forests and orange groves, and, so on.

But have you ever been approached by somebody and refused them?

Oh yes. (laughs) I still get approached by people asking me to do things, simply because I don’t believe in them, either because I don’t like their work or I don’t trust them or I don’t think it’s worthwhile. Oh yes, I’ve refused lots and lots of people. Lots of people. Oh yes.

Well maybe, we’ve got time just to, to move you to London. But before, actually before that, I wanted to ask you, were you actually in Paris in 1968?

Oh yes, mm.

And what was your experience of, of ’68?

Well on the evening of the students’ revolution in 1968 I was having a, a dinner party over on the Left Bank in front of the Odéon theatre, on the Place de l’Odéon there was a lovely restaurant called the Mediterranée, right opposite the Théâtre de l’Odéon. And I had a drinks party at home where I was living then on the boulevard St Germain, and I had friends there, and we all went over to the dinner party and sat there, and whilst we were there we saw all the students entering the Odéon, where, Jean-Louis Barrault was the, the director, and he opened the gates and said to the students, ‘Come in, it’s yours, your theatre.’ And then, the tanks roared over Paris, and it was impossible to do anything, and, basically, lots of businesses closed down. Percy Savage Page 181 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14)

And it was in the month of May. And, I had a telephone call from friends in Normandy who said, you know, ‘We hear that Paris is closing down.’ And I said, ‘Not only Paris is closing down, but all the clients I’ve been working for have also told me there’s nothing to do for the next couple of months.’ So I left Paris and went to spend the next couple of months in Normandy.

And what was your feeling about, about, about what was going on?

Well I didn’t particularly agree with what they were doing, I thought it was pretty...I thought the police were being pretty bloody-minded, the students were being very silly. I actually did go out and help a student who turned over a bus, and watched all that, and then I saw them, stood by whilst they set fire to a police station. (laughs) But, I had half a dozen different people staying with me in the flat that I had on the boulevard St Germain, because they’d been chased by the police and they’d just, the students had just run into the building and run up the stairs, banged on the door, and my secretary had let them in. And, they stayed with me for a couple of weeks. It was...no it was, it was a very disruptive period, and it did literally close down Paris, I mean businesses just closed totally. People pulled down their shutters and shut up shop.

And, what, what do you think the couture houses felt?

Well it was very bad for their business for a couple of months. May, June, July, and then August holidays, business didn’t start up again until about September. And at that time, the people I was working for just said, ‘Well, we’re leaving town,’ you know, there’s no more work, no, nothing to do. So it was, it was economically bad for me. It was a tough time. But, business picked up in September, and from then on it was OK.

But this is while you were, this is your sort of, second or third year of freelance work, isn’t it?

That’s right, yes, mm. And then, I think when, in September when I came back, I had a job to do in Copenhagen for a furrier, and after the Copenhagen show, where I was Percy Savage Page 182 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14) supposed to be taking half a dozen people up for the show from Paris, he was then moving on to New York and doing a fashion show at the Plaza, the Plaza in New York. So we travelled and then went to New York. And then I came back I suppose about mid-October, by which time Paris was back in full swing, and business was booming again. (laughs)

Have you...I mean did that affect at all your view of, of Paris or the kind of clients that you, you needed?

Not really, no, I don’t think, it didn’t... It was the year also in which St Laurent had started up his Rive Gauche operation, and it was, another sign that, if you like of the democratisation of fashion, that it was leaning towards a younger and less wealthy clientele, from the couture. But the couture continued to go on and on for quite a few years before it really began to feel the pinch.

And what did you, what were your...what were your feelings about ready-to-wear?

I was always very much in favour of ready-to-wear, very much. And when we launched a ready-to-wear in Paris, as a group, I organised the very first showing of half a dozen different houses at the Hotel George V, which included Lanvin, and included also Pierre Cardin. And basically Lanvin had their ready-to-wear collection which was their Boutique collection which they were promoting as a ready-to-wear collection to sell abroad and to other people. And one of the conditions of doing this was that the houses involved, according to the understanding and the agreement with the Chambre Syndicale, they would not sell to any Paris house other than in their own shop. That’s to say, Lanvin would sell their ready-to-wear in the Boutique, but not to any other shops on the Champs-Elysées or anything like that. And Pierre Cardin disagreed, and he sold, he got a contract with Printemps, and he was then, according, in agreement with the Chambre Syndicale, he was expelled from the Chambre Syndicale, because he didn’t agree to their...he wanted to sell, he wanted to make money and sell in Paris.

And did you agree with his expulsion?

Percy Savage Page 183 C1046/09 Tape 8 Side A (part 14)

Oh he was, he left with the greatest of pleasure, he said, ‘Up you!’ (laughs) And went ahead with his own plans.

But what about you, what did you think?

I, well I agreed with what we wanted to do, keeping it exclusive to, to the house in Paris. Whereas we could sell to Lyon, or Marseille or Deauville, where Lanvin already had their own boutiques anyway, so we were all for expansion, but not in Paris. I thought it was best to keep Paris as, as important and private as possible.

[end of session]

[End of Tape 8 Side A] [Side B is blank] Percy Savage Page 184 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15)

Tape 9 Side A [part 15]

.....become quite a famous person, you know. (laughs)

Could I just ask you to say your name, while I adjust the levels.

Yes, my name is Percy Savage, and I was born in October 1926, and here we are in Mornington Terrace.

Thank you. I asked you whether there were any clients that you had refused to work for, but I didn’t press you to give me any examples, and I just wondered whether you would mind giving me an example.

Well there were quite a number of people I didn’t particularly wish to work for. I mean, during the Sixties, after I’d been to America there were quite a number of different people in New York who asked me if I’d like to move and live in New York and work for them, and I didn’t want to leave Paris in any way whatsoever; much preferred to continue and stay on living in Paris. Then there were a number of different people in Paris asked me to work for them, and I didn’t because they didn’t have the budget necessary. And then when I was back working in London, there was one particularly famous person who asked me to work for her when she was not at all well known, and that was a designer called Katharine Hamnett. And I just, didn’t, didn’t particularly like Katharine Hamnett as a person, she was a very pushy, bossy little lady and I didn’t, didn’t think she had the charm or the grace that I liked, but she did go on to become a very very, very successful designer.

And, how important were...

I mean money wasn’t always the, the object, I mean, but, I think, you know, there were people I used to do work for where basically I wasn’t necessarily paid a great deal, but I liked them, I liked their talent, I liked their personality and I liked their work. And sometimes I would work for people for, perhaps not a great deal of money, but they would, they would be very satisfying people to work with, they’re just very compatible people. Percy Savage Page 185 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15)

And what about the clothes that somebody like Katharine Hamnett was designing, what would you have thought of them...?

I didn’t particularly like her clothes either. (laughs) No, I had a much higher standard of clothing, I mean she was very, very, into ready-to-wear, which was very basic ready-to-wear, and I didn’t think... But she did have a lot of, she had a lot of personality, and she had a lot of, she didn’t really need a PR, she just needed a very, she needed a couple of very good secretaries to do as she was told, and not a PR.

So how did she react when you...or respond?

Oh no no, it was, it was, it was quite an amiable meeting. She took me to dinner somewhere, I think we went to Mr Chow in Montpeliano, and, had a very nice evening, and talking about it, and I just, you know, said, I was too busy, or had too many commitments, and didn’t...didn’t... (laughs) But she went on to become... That was in the middle Seventies I think it was, early, early, mid Seventies. And then later, I remember she was invited to something which I helped organise which was a reception at Downing Street given by Mrs Thatcher for the fashion world, and, she turned up wearing an anti-nuclear T-shirt which caused colossal scandal, and that was I think one of the very good reasons why I didn’t like to sort of work with her. She, she didn’t have the taste that I like.

Actually I’m just going to move your.....

[break in recording]

Could you tell me how, how you became involved in organising that for Mrs Thatcher?

Yes. I met Mrs Thatcher in 1979 when I was, I had been in Peking doing a photography shoot for the magazine, The London Collections, and, from there I went to Tokyo. And the hotel where I was staying had been chosen by the G7 members, and when I arrived at the hotel I was walking through the reception downstairs, and I Percy Savage Page 186 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15) thought I recognised somebody speaking to a, a brassy blonde. And he bowed as I went by, and I recognised it was President Giscard d’Estaing of France. And I went on and sat down, and he then kissed her hand and came over and asked me to come back and meet her, and he explained that he’d known me for many years in France and I’d done a great deal for the French fashion world and how fortunate she was that I was living in London. And she asked me, when I got back to England, to come and meet her, so I did. And immediately asked her if she would come and open up one of the exhibitions I was organising, and she said, ‘No no no no no, I’m the Prime Minister, I’ve nothing to do with trade.’ And she asked me to meet Mr Norman Lamont, and that he would open the exhibition. Which he eventually did. And then after that in 1980 I again asked her, and she said no. Then in 1981, after the Princess of Wales was married, I asked her if she would come, and she did. And then in 1982 I asked Mrs Thatcher and she eventually agreed to come and open the exhibition.

And which exhibitions were these?

The exhibitions which I organised in London for London Fashion Week. They were called the London Collections, and they were taking place at the Intercontinental Hotel, and then later at Olympia.

And what was Norman Lamont like, as somebody to open that kind of thing?

Oh a charming, charming little man. (laughs) But didn’t have the charisma or the personality that Mrs Thatcher had. He was a nice little man, but his, his department was trade and industry, and I did not look upon fashion as being either a trade or an industry; for me it was an art, which was the way we considered fashion in France, and... But here it definitely was a trade, and an industry, which has been a very successful one.

And how, how did Mrs Thatcher, or Lady, Lady Margaret, how did she contact you? Was it through an intermediary, or...?

She, no, she asked me to contact her, so I did, I wrote to her at Downing Street and, she eventually asked me to come along, and, we had a few meetings, and... And I Percy Savage Page 187 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15) explained what I was doing, and organising exhibitions, and... And she didn’t think that they were sufficiently important for her to be involved. But, eventually she did agree. We shared a common date of birth, I was born the 12th of October and she’s on the 13th of October, so we used to, when she came, we always had our exhibitions in October, and when she came to one of the exhibitions we had a big birthday...a small birthday cake for her, and, lots of people came to it.

And how...and how, how did she respond to that?

Oh no, she was, she was very, very charming, very... No, I always had great, great affection and admiration for her. Lovely, lovely, a very lovely person, great admirer.

So, so when she turned you down, it was in a nice way, rather than an autocratic way?

Well yes... Well no, she did, she definitely thought it was not... She said she didn’t want to be looked upon as a woman, and she thought fashion was a woman’s business, and not necessarily, it was, it was, didn’t...she wanted to be a Prime Minister and not regarded as a woman coming to a woman’s fashion show. Well I understood it. But eventually she did turn round, and she did come along.

And, what sort of...well what did you think of her, of her dress sense?

I thought it was quite adequate for the position she had. I mean it was, she did have a, a fashion stylist, who eventually took her along to Aquascutum where she bought a lot of clothes. She didn’t have a great many clothes made to measure, she was a...she did dress in department stores, and, she was not an haute couture lady. Because there was basically no haute couture industry here to suit her. If she had been living in France, obviously she would have been dressing in one of the haute couture houses. But that didn’t exist in England.

And, and, why do you think she didn’t dress in French couture?

Percy Savage Page 188 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15)

I think she was too patriotic. (laughs) No, I think, obviously in France, if she’d been the wife of a, the President, or if she’d been the President, I mean, all the women in France believed and dressed in made-to-measure, in a couture house. But that sort of industry had existed here before the war, and had existed eventually after the war, but by the Seventies there were really no haute couture houses left in...apart from Hartnell, and... No, Hartnell had already disappeared, no, it was...what was the one who was left? It was Hardy Amies, Sir Hardy Amies, in Savile Row. And his couture house was, was perhaps adequate for the Royal Family, but not, not sufficiently important for Mrs Thatcher. No, she dressed very well, in very good, high quality, British ready-to-wear.

So how did you go about organising that, that event at 10 Downing Street?

I just supplied lists of people I thought should be invited, people who were basically leading ready-to-wear designers in London, and a few manufacturers, and a few of the press, and overseas press, it was, it was basically to promote British fashion, so they wanted the overseas press to be invited very much indeed. And overseas buyers too, because after all they were the, the reason for having an exhibition in London was to sell, so we had overseas buyers from American department stores, and American, and European press people, and buyers, and, Galerie Lafayette, or Bon Marché and Printemps and, so on, they were the, they were the sort of people we invited. Which we did through the buying offices in London, because all those visiting buyers had offices here in London that I would work through.

And, were you aware of, or what kind of fallout, if that’s not a pun, was there from Katharine Hamnett’s T-shirt?

Oh that caused great scandal, that got colossal publicity. I don’t think it was a... I mean it was rather a shocking thing as far as I was concerned, but it did, did have I think quite a good effect. (laughs) And I don’t think Mrs Thatcher was too shocked about it, I don’t...I think she could stand up to more than that. (laughs)

But who was it good for?

Percy Savage Page 189 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15)

I think it was good for Katharine Hamnett. (laughs) And still, still well remembered and spoken about, yes, it was...

Do you think she was aware that it would cause that furore?

Oh I think so, yes. No, she was, she was a very canny lady. And she’s still quite successful, she went on to become, in addition to doing her fashion, she went on to do home furnishings and things like that, which is still very successful. She has a shop I think still in, in, just off Bond Street, she has an office there. And she sells, she still sells well.

And, can you remember whether it actually caused a furore that evening?

That particularly evening? Yes. I mean, there were a great many press outside of Downing Street, all of whom...and she posed very conveniently for them, and, very obligingly, and she had tremendous publicity worldwide.

And what did...did the other designers who were at the, at the dinner make any comment?

I, I think they were just, surprised and amused, but I mean, it wasn’t...it was not... No no, the others all turned up in reasonably respectable sort of clothes, and, party clothes. But I mean, no, she did, she did stand out quite, quite amazingly. No, she’s a very nice lady, Katharine Hamnett, and a very successful one, and jolly good luck to her, I mean she was...

So did you have any other particular memories of working with Margaret Thatcher?

We had a few other meeting...I mean, parties, to which she invited people, but none of them was quite as memorable as the one with Katharine Hamnett. It became, it became a sort of, seasonal, or annual event, I think it was more an annual event, I think once a year she used to invite people to Downing Street. But that was... It was a great effort, I mean it was quite a good thing for fashion. More than any of the subsequent Prime Ministers have done. Mr Major did nothing, I mean, Mrs Major, Percy Savage Page 190 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15)

Norma, came along to open up fashion shows, but without any sort of great success. She did not have a great personality. And Cherie Blair has had nothing to do with fashion at all since she, since Tony was in power, nothing whatsoever.

What... Why do you think Margaret Thatcher changed her mind though, towards the end of the Eighties, and did agree to open a fashion show?

I think basically because she saw that the, the effort that was being made for British fashion in London was well organised, and well attended, and because, she probably had a reasonably good report from Norman Lamont about what was done. And then as I said, the Princess of Wales accepted to do it with tremendous effect, and subsequent publicity, and I think she came along, I think she was curious about it, and I think she decided to do it. And she did get very good publicity out of it personally, she got good publicity out of it, on television and radio and, and in the, in the press, both national and overseas.

And, Princess Diana, what memories do you have of her?

Well we met quite soon after she was married, and, I remember there was a Bill... Bruce Oldfield gave a fashion show at Grosvenor House for Save the Children Fund, the president was Princess Anne, but, Lady Diana came along for the, that evening. And I remembered that there was a sort of, protocol where it was agreed that she would, during the evening she would dance with just three people, and one of them was Bruce Oldfield and another one was a friend called John Gerdner who worked at Charles Jourdan where she used to buy her shoes. And the third person was myself. So I danced with the Princess of Wales.

And was she a good dancer?

Divine dancer. (laughs) And I was a very good dancer too. No, that was a wonderful evening. And we saw each other a few times in other subsequent charity events, and, so on. She was a very lovely lady.

So do you think that... Percy Savage Page 191 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15)

And a great fashion icon too. She dressed in many, many, many, many of the top fashion houses here, and also abroad. She was not averse to going to a foreign fashion house and getting clothes.

Because I wondered what you thought her effect on, you know, raising the level of sort of, fashion in Britain was.

I think she was very important in raising the level of British fashion, but I mean, she was very conscious of fashion, and she loved, she loved clothes. And she was, had a marvellous figure, she was...in every way, she had... And she was very good.

But do you think that that, that in a way also, not her personal appearance, but do you think that also helped, or persuaded somebody like Margaret Thatcher to realise that it was an important business?

I don’t...I don’t think she was really influencing Margaret Thatcher on dressing, because Margaret Thatcher stayed loyal as I said to Aquascutum and department stores. But I think she was a, she was a... No, she was on a totally different level from Margaret Thatcher. I mean she was a very young, beautiful woman; Margaret Thatcher was a mature and imposing presidential lady.

No, I meant in making, in making the Government realise that, that fashion was an important industry.

Only a little bit. I don’t think the British Government has helped fashion here much at all frankly.

Ever?

Not ever, no. No, I think that they have, they have helped finance exhibitions abroad, where there have been exhibitions possibly in France or in Germany or in America or in Japan, and they will take space for exhibitions and the Government will help fund somebody, the Government will pay fifty per cent perhaps of the exhibition space or Percy Savage Page 192 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15) expenses going to an exhibition abroad. And they still do that. And I’m sure that’s a very good thing, but none of those exhibitions are of vast importance really. I mean they are really for the trade and not for high fashion. And not many of the British designers go to those exhibitions. It’s the big manufacturers that go to those exhibitions, who are obviously important, but I mean they’re not, they’re not high fashion.

And, did you actually tell Margaret Thatcher that you thought fashion was an art and not a trade?

Oh absolutely, yes. Oh yes, yes.

And what was her...what...

I stood up for my beliefs, and... No, I mean they would help people like, you know, the big cashmere people, and, Burberry’s who in those days were just a sort of trade, but now, Burberry’s have entered the high fashion element in London, now. They’re one of the big exhibitors and they’ve gone up and up and up and up in price, they’ve gone up and up and up in volume. But, thirty, you know, twenty, thirty, forty years ago Burberry’s were not a, a great name in fashion, they were just a good trade in raincoats.

So how...

As were Pringle, as I said, the cashmere people were, you know, one of the big exhibitors abroad, but for me they’re not high fashion at all.

So, how did you feel about coming to live in London?

Well when I, when I did decide to come back and live after having worked for St Laurent for a few years, it was basically three different fashion editors who persuaded me to come here, one was Prudence Glynn, who was the fashion editor of the Times; another was Ernestine Carter, who was the fashion editor of the Sunday Times; and the third was Beatrix Miller, who was the editor of British Vogue. And they took me Percy Savage Page 193 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15) to lunch one day and said, ‘You’ve done such a lot for the French for the last twenty years, and especially St Laurent in London, and we think it’s about time, you know, something was done about British fashion. We think you should try and help there.’ And they suggested I should try and organise exhibitions in London to draw the buyers and international press here, as happened in France and Italy. So I set about starting that, and started off with a designer called John Bates, another designer called Bill Gibb, and another called Yuki, and another called Jean Muir. And together we did fashion shows, and I invited the press and a few came, and a few buyers came. And then I decided to have an exhibition, so I started with the Intercontinental Hotel which had just been built. And I knew the PR there who had been the PR at Harrods. And we hired the banqueting rooms at the Intercontinental Hotel, and I set up stands, I bought the necessary material to build stands, and hired a designer called Julie Hodges, and had a very beautiful exhibition, and hired the rooms, the space out to the different designers and sent out, advertised in various papers abroad. And the buyers, sent out thousands of invitations and the buyers came, and the press came, and, it all went on wonderfully well for years. And was a great success.

And, could I ask you why you selected those particular designers?

Well they were the best in London. I did ask a few other designers to, to come who basically said no. But eventually came along. Zandra Rhodes did not want to be one of the first ones to come along, she was already established and said no, but eventually when she saw that the exhibition was successful, she did come along and she did take a small amount of space, and basically showed her accessories. But by that time she already had her own shop. But, it was, it was, it was a very good thing for the young designers who, many of whom were just coming out of school and just starting off in their business.

And what sort of, what was their...what were the sort of mechanics of the sort of, of the arrangements, I suppose, were you...who was in, who was in charge of what?

Well we had a company organising this, the company was called Fashion Promotions.

And that was your, your...that was a separate company? Percy Savage Page 194 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15)

Well, basically my company, yes, I was the director of it. And there were a couple of other directors, one was an American called Casey Tolar, and, we...she knew the American fashion market very very well, she understood promotions very well. And we had an office in Wellington Street in Covent Garden. And, we used to approach different designers and they would sign a contract, and they would pay in three instalments, one on the day of signing, the second a couple of months later, and then the third, the final instalment, six months later. And, basically most of the people we worked with were reasonably correct and honest, but sometimes we had little disasters and, lost a bit of money. Somebody might come along and said they had no money for the final payment and, and sometimes they would exhibit, and, sadly sometimes they would go out of business. So, I mean there were various people would go bankrupt and then be back in business three months later.

Designers?

Designers. Oh yes, there were quite a few designers. Jean Muir was notorious for going bankrupt. (laughs)

Really?

She went bankrupt many times during her life in London. But always carried on, with the same premises in Bruton Street, and the same name. So I mean, it was...she kept the name Jean Muir but I think she practised her fashion business under another name.

And was that something new to you, or had that situation arisen in Paris?

It was new, it was new to me, because that didn’t happen in France, no. But I got used to it in London.

And, what’s your explanation for why, for why things like that happened?

Just bad business acumen. And also, the fact that there are some clients you work with when you’re a fashion designer, you sell to a store, and you find the store doesn’t Percy Savage Page 195 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15) pay up, you know, they’re supposed to pay within thirty days but sometimes after three months they haven’t paid, and some store you work with in America don’t pay for six months, and consequently they, the designer in London has manufactured things, sent them out and haven’t been paid for six months, and they just can’t continue. That does happen, sadly.

And how, how would you cope with that? It’s a sort of knock-on effect isn’t it?

Oh it does, it does affect everybody, yes. It also affects the other people that the designer works with. They have to buy their fabrics and they have to pay their staff. So that sort of thing does happen, yes.

Did it make you want to go back to Paris?

(laughs) No, no. It... I think Paris is a safer place to work, yes.

But you weren’t tempted to go back?

No no no, I was here for too long, and I...no, I love London now. But since I’ve left Paris, more and more and more English designers have started working in Paris, and, and John Galliano was one of the great examples, and then Alexander McQueen is another one. And then the latest one to work in France is Oswald Boeteng, who is a designer in Savile Row in London, he’s just been named the most recent designer for Givenchy. He’s just showed two or three days ago.

But that is...that is in charge of women’s, womenswear.

No, he’s in menswear, they’ve just shown the men’s collections in Paris, but I think he is also going to work in women’s collections. He’s just shown his first men’s collection, but he’s going to do the women’s collections also.

What was your impression of the role of PR in London when you arrived here?

Percy Savage Page 196 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15)

I think it was always quite important in individual houses, and also in industry. No, PR was always quite appreciated in London. Well, I mean, from the Fifties on it became an important element. Very important.

[break in recording - telephone]

And what was your impression of how it was organised?

PR in London I think was quite, was quite well organised. I mean PR in, was already well established in, in business, I mean, big, big department stores like Harrods had PR departments with quite a large number of people. As I said, the, the girl who did the PR for the Intercontinental Hotel when we started in ’75 had been the PR for Harrods before, and for years Harrods had had PR people working there whom I knew. The same in other department stores in London, they had good PR people. But also individual, smaller companies and fashion houses had PR people. And the same also in various textile companies, and, silk or cotton or wool, they had PR. The International Wool Secretariat was always quite important here. And London, I mean the International Wool Secretariat was on a worldwide basis, they had offices in Paris, in Rome, and in New York and in London, promoting wool through fashion houses or, essentially through fashion houses.

Because, I don’t, I don’t...does it still exist, the...?

International Wool Secretariat?

Mm.

Yes, but on a much, much, much smaller basis. I think they’re more or less closed down. They still have an office in London down in the, down in the Carlton House Terrace.

So, why, why has it sort of, decreased in its size?

Percy Savage Page 197 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side A (part 15)

I think because, wool has...(laughs)...I mean, has sunk in production frankly. I mean, not production so much, in...there’s still plenty of sheep farmers, but I don’t think there’s, that wool prices have been maintained, and I don’t think that wool has become a... I mean wool has been replaced by many artificial fibres, and, polyesters and mixes of wool and every...something else.

[End of Tape 9 Side A] Percy Savage Page 198 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

Tape 9 Side B [part 16]

Where did you live when you first came to London?

Well for many years I had, whilst I was living in France I had a flat in Beauchamp Place, in Knightsbridge, I had a flat there, just opposite San Lorenzo, the restaurant. And I used to pay £3 a month rent for ten years, right through until 1963. And eventually I gave that up and I came to London and I then, the first flat I had was down in King’s Road, New King’s Road, down near Parson’s Green. And then I moved back to Knightsbridge, and stayed there for years, and then I eventually moved here, into Camden.

And, could you describe... Well which of, which of all those places did you... You know, how important is, is the idea of home to you?

Well I enjoyed Knightsbridge, Knightsbridge was very convenient from a transport point of view, and was very...it was in Montpelier Square, which is a very nice area. But, I’m very happy in Camden, I like Camden Town very much as an area. I like this whole area, I like Regent’s Park, and it’s like... No, I like being, frankly being north of the park. I mean I used to like the idea of living in Chelsea, but I never did live there but it was very nice, very beautiful houses and lots of friends living there, but, I quite, I’m very happy up in this part of the world.

So what do you like about Camden?

It’s, it’s very lively, it’s very young, very... And beautiful streets, I mean the... Mornington Terrace is a nice street, but next door is Albert Street which is a very beautiful street, wide, big trees, and, amusing people living there, and... It’s... No, it’s a nice area. And nice restaurants, very good for shopping. And very convenient so far as transport is concerned, and very close to another area I like which is, Fitzrovia over in Charlotte Street and Fitzroy Square which I like.

So, to go back to...I’d like to go back to the Rive Gauche...

Percy Savage Page 199 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

Yes.

Would you call it a boutique or a shop?

Well, I would have called it a boutique. But it was definitely a shop, yes. (laughs)

And, and you, you mentioned sort of overseeing its design and everything. So, I wonder whether you could describe, describe it for the tape, describe the boutique.

Yes, well when St Laurent started his boutiques in Paris, he started off on the Left Bank, and Rive Gauche was his love, he adored that part of the world, and he started in the rue de Tournon, and the first boutique he had had a huge, larger-than-life portrait from floor to ceiling of Yves St Laurent himself painted by Andy Warhol on the wall, it was a big painting. And then they started their second shop, which was in the Place St Suplice, in 1969, and they had a designer called Andrée Putman, who was a French woman who designed their shops. And when the contract was signed with Clare Rendlesham for the shop in London, they wanted her to do the design, Andrée Putman to do the designs for the shop. And they’d just done the one in Paris with what they call Mirrorlon, which was a paper thin wallpaper in silver, it looked like glass, it looked like mirror. And they wanted to use that in London, but it was, in order to apply this to the wall you had to have a, a mirror-smooth finish on the wall, and they used to just, were worried that they would not be able to get that particular sort of surface in London. They asked me to come over and supervise the building, not only of the shop itself but also the components, the counters in chrome and, and glass, and crystal. And, so, St Laurent paid me to come over and be in London. And Clare Rendlesham, the owner, was delighted because she knew the success I had with international press, and she knew that I would be able to help with the promotion of the shop in London. So the first shop was, eventually was a success, although we had to bring in some French workmen for one or two things. And then, they did the second shop in Knightsbridge.

So, the first shop was the Bond Street shop.

Percy Savage Page 200 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

First shop was 113 Bond Street, which had been the Bazaar, Mary Quant’s shop. The second one was in Knightsbridge, just opposite Harrods. And then... And that was for men. And then they started another shop in London, in Bond Street, New Bond Street, for men. And then the second shop...third shop...the fourth shop rather, back in Knightsbridge, up near the Knightsbridge, up near Harvey Nichols. And today there are just two shops, there’s one in Bond Street and there’s one in Sloane Street. But they have merged and the men and women sell in the same shop.

And what, what...can you remember what sort of things the French workmen had to come over to do?

Oh it was basically this problem of polishing the walls. That was the main problem.

And did Andrée Putman come over?

Oh yes, definitely she came over, yes, very definitely. She came over for the opening, as did Yves St Laurent himself, and as did, Lord Snowdon came to the opening. But they were quite grand, we had...Lord Snowdon and Princess Margaret came to the opening in London. They were very grand openings, very successful. And the shops got off to a great start.

And would you have been responsible for, for organising the opening of that?

Well, Clare Rendlesham was mainly responsible for that. She, you know, she knew London society very well, and knew how to basically be very difficult. (laughs) Once you’re very difficult, everybody wants it. (laughs)

Yes, because I was going to ask you, what sort of person she was.

She was small, and very dynamic, and, she had been fashion...well she had been a fashion model originally. And then she went to work at Vogue as a fashion editor. And she worked with all the young bright...well she found David Bailey and promoted him, and then she left Vogue and she went to work for Queen magazine, which belonged to Jocelyn Stevens. And then she had a fight with Jocelyn Stevens Percy Savage Page 201 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16) and left, and that’s why she was working freelance doing promotion which was how she got into the organisation of the, of the St Laurent shops.

But I mean her personality, what...?

She was a great art lover, she collected, and she had Francis Bacons and various other good painters, and so on. She was, her husband, Lord Rendlesham, was an antique dealer and had a shop down in King’s Road, just down near World’s End, and she had four children. I was the godfather of one of them. She had a boy, and Charles William was the eldest, and then there was Sarah, then there was Antonia and then there was Jacquemine the youngest daughter. And when eventually she died, she left the entire shop, empire and fortune, she left it to her youngest daughter. And they’re no longer connected with St Laurent. Fortunately, they did not continue in their mother’s footsteps, and didn’t do a good job. So the St Laurent organisation decided they didn’t want to continue and did not renew the contract with them, and they took over, and the St Laurent shops are now run by Paris. But they’re still quite successful. And indeed St Laurent in Paris doesn’t belong to St Laurent any more, he sold it to Gucci. So it’s run by the Italians now. But they do a very good job.

How do you feel about all these sort of conglomerates like LVMH and...?

I think LVMH is doing a very, very, very, very good job. Very good job. And in addition to owning the shops that they own, like Christian Dior and Givenchy, they also have, they own a great many of the duty free shops all over the world, which is not important so far as the fashion business is concerned, because they don’t sell clothes there very much, but, it’s vital to all the cosmetics and perfumes. So they have, they own the shops that sell the cosmetics and perfumes, and they own the outlets, many of them major outlets all over the world, not only in this country but all over the world.

And could you, you know, looking back, could you see that kind of, you know, sort of shift in the way in which fashion companies organise themselves? Could you see that coming?

Percy Savage Page 202 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

Well I think, I think Christian Dior saw that sort of thing coming, because I know that Christian Dior, from very, from the time he first started up in the fashion business, he was already planning, in the very first days he was planning on putting his name on to foods and things, he believed very much in drinks and food, because they were things that are vital to everybody all over the world. And he was already planning to do that in the food business. And that is exactly what LVMH have done, I mean, they own champagnes and they own foods and pâtés . And it’s the same thing that Pierre Cardin has done. You can...Pierre Cardin has, he bought Maxim’s in Paris, and he bought...and he bought, he created his own champagnes, he created his own foodstuffs, and I think that’s...I think it’s a natural evolution.

But how...but personally, how do you feel about it?

I think...well I mean I’m not involved with it any more, but I think it’s, it’s a very good business organisation. I just wish I was part of it. (laughs) Wish I had my name on foodstuffs. I’d like people to be buying Savage cheeses and Savage sardines and Savage salmons, and... Oh no it’s...

But were you ever tempted to go into production?

No, not in the least, no no no no. It was... No, I wasn’t, I didn’t have the same business acumen for that as I had for other things.

So, was there any other kind of fashion that wasn’t sort of, attached to individual houses? Was there any other kind of, more general fashion PR happening in London when you arrived here?

It was generally accepted here, but I think I gave it a good boost, I think I brought in, the sort of overseas element, an extension of it, because they did not have great contacts, you know, with overseas people, they didn’t have the same contacts with the American press and publications, or the Italians or the French. But I did bring that element in to England, I think that was a very good thing that I managed to achieve here.

Percy Savage Page 203 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

And...

Which was good for the whole nation, for the whole industry.

And, was the British Fashion Council already set up?

Yes, the British Fashion Council existed here long before I arrived, and that was, as I said, the British Fashion Council were the people who...and in those days they were installed in Sackville Street just off Piccadilly, just off Savile Row, behind Savile Row, near Regent’s Street. And... But they were the ones who were involved in the, helping British industry, and trade, as Mrs Thatcher insisted on calling it, to exhibit abroad. So when there was a trade exhibition in France, or in America, or in Germany, in Düsseldorf, or in Rome, they would take space in an exhibition hall, and subsequently invite British industries to go and exhibit there, like as I said, Frank Usher was a big exhibitor there, and there were the sort of, good, well-established trade houses. So they would go and exhibit there, and they would pay, and the British Fashion Council, through the Government, would pay fifty per cent of the costs. So they did...they did a good job on a trade level, you know, on a middle, lower class level. But the top class designers did not go and participate there.

So for how long...

Because the wrong clients came to that sort of exhibition.

So, so how, for how many years were you organising shows at the Intercontinental?

That went on for twelve years at the Intercontinental. And then after that we moved to Olympia. And then after a while, Birmingham Exhibition Centre was created, and more or less all the industry decided to move to Birmingham. So London lost out. And Birmingham still does a, quite a big important fashion exhibition twice a year.

Had you ever been to Birmingham before?

Percy Savage Page 204 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

Oh yes, I went constantly, yes indeed. They do a very good job. Did a very good job. It’s a very good exhibition hall.

How did it compare with Olympia?

Far superior.

In what way?

Oh they were, they were beautifully built halls, and they had, in every way they had... And, Olympia was not... The people who ran Olympia didn’t do a very good job frankly. It was, just not a very nice... I mean, part... One hall in Olympia is a very beautiful hall, but the exhibition stands they had in Olympia were not very nice. And access to Olympia was not easy frankly. It’s a lot easier than Birmingham, but I mean, frankly, now, I mean people go to Birmingham on a train, you’re there in a couple of hours, and you can stay up there for a couple of days, and, see an exhibition, do a very good job in Birmingham.

So, at what point would you say, did you realise that you were sort of, here to stay, that you weren’t going to go back to Paris?

Oh I think from the mid-Fifties I was very happily installed in London, and very happy...being very successful with the exhibitions, and, enjoying it.

Mid-Sixties you mean?

Mm?

Do you mean the mid-Sixties?

No...

The mid-Fifties?

Percy Savage Page 205 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

...I didn’t come here until 1969.

Mhm.

For St Laurent. And I didn’t really move in London until 1974, and started the first exhibition in 1975.

Yes, no, sorry, that’s why...what I mean. When did you realise that, you know, you were in London to stay?

Oh I think from 1975 on, yes. Once I’d done with, worked with St Laurent here and started doing the exhibitions, then I was stuck with it, and enjoyed it. That didn’t stop me travelling, I still continued to travel quite a lot.

And where did you go?

Well I continued to go back to America, which was, I think vital for business; continued to go to France obviously. And also I was the first in, as I said, in...I’d already been to China a few times to Canton trade fairs, and, then I went to Peking in 1979, which was the year I met Mrs Thatcher, and, I’ve been back to Peking twice, and Shanghai. And I continued to go back to Russia, I went to Leningrad for, you know, St Petersburg, but it was then called Leningrad, for the international trade fairs for fur. No, I travelled quite a bit.

And, were you able to, to sort of travel around sort of, China, at all?

No, because China, although one thinks of China as being a huge, one country, it was actually divided into many different provinces. So when I first went to Canton, invited by the Chinese to go to the Canton trade fair, I immediately wanted to go to Shanghai, but it was in a different province and you had to get a different visa. It was like having a visa to go to France but not being allowed to go to Denmark, or having a visa to go to London but not being allowed to go to Germany. So you had to have different visas for different, different provinces. And that was much more of a problem. But eventually, I did manage to get around. And China’s a fascinating Percy Savage Page 206 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16) country. And now today, Shanghai is one of the most extraordinary cities in the world. You know that the department store in London, Fortnum & Mason’s, are now opening in Shanghai. It’s such a luxurious centre that Fortnum & Mason’s are going to be one of the major attractions in Shanghai.

So, so, how do hear about all these things, given...?

You mean about Fortnum & Mason’s?

Yes, things that are going on right now.

(laughs) Well that I, that I know through people who are in business with Fortnum & Mason’s, selling to Fortnum & Mason’s. So they’ve now got another outlet. I can understand it, and one can...when I say, I can understand, it’s, it’s easier to understand that perhaps it can open in Hong Kong, but, because I know Hong Kong, I’ve known Hong Kong for many many years, but Shanghai, that Shanghai and mainland China should also be on a par with Hong Kong, and be considered to be a luxury city good enough for Fortnum & Mason’s to open a big store there, you can see to what extent China is changing.

Do you think PR work has changed?

I’m sure there must be PR work in Shanghai. I know one of the, one Chinaman who I know who works in Shanghai is a man called David Tang, who originally comes from Hong Kong.

[break in recording - telephone]

.....originally from Hong Kong, has a shop in London, in Sloane Street, making clothes, but he also has a big, big interest in Shanghai. And he understands PR brilliantly, and he’s Chinese. He has what is called the China Club in Hong Kong, which is, I think, $10,000 to join as a member, just to be a member of a club.

Are you referring also to his shop, Shanghai Tang? Percy Savage Page 207 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

Shanghai Tang in Sloane Street, yes. Which is men’s and womenswear. And he’s married to an English girl.

But I...do you think that... I mean if you were starting out now as a, as a, you know, in PR, do you...you know, what changes do you think have taken place in your sort of...

In the fashion business?

In the fashion business over, say, the last thirty years or so?

I think it’s increased enormously. I mean, especially as the advertising budgets have been cut in order to help promote the PR business, you can get far more space, far more promotion through PR than you can get through just plain advertising. So I think PR will always go on more and more in the fashion business, always.

And what about the type of people who are involved in PR, has there been any change in, in them?

No, you get forward-looking men and women. I think language is quite important, I think it’s very important to be able to speak one or two foreign languages. And, you find, you know, there are very, very good people in it, all over the world actually. You get far more awareness of foreign languages in France than you do in England, I don’t think the English are very good at learning many overseas languages, and I think they have to...

So can I ask you about your, the portraits that you, that you’ve had painted. There’s the one by Patrick Procktor.

Yes.

Was that the first one after the Cocteau...?

Cocteau, the first...the Cocteau that I have here was the earliest one. Percy Savage Page 208 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

Could you describe that actually for the tape?

Yes, it’s, it was, it was done in the late Forties, early Fifties, either it was ’49 or, ’49 or ’50. And, it was...I was spending the weekend with Cocteau out in the country, out near Fontainebleau where he had a country house, and, I had been, I had been out walking in the morning, came back and went to have a shower, and I came back from the shower into the kitchen with a towel draped around my waist and sat down at the kitchen table where he was with a couple of other friends. And I took the towel off and draped it over my head, and he took out a pen and paper and began to sketch. So the actual, as you can see by the portrait, it looks rather like a Virgin Mary with a veil over her head. And held up in front of my face is my hand with only three fingers; as you know I lost a finger. And inscribed in pencil at the bottom is a little sentence in French saying that, ‘Vérité, the truth, hides behind the three fingers.’

What did he, what did he mean by that?

Aha! (laughs) No, but I...he used to call me his angel, ‘mon ange,’ which is a very ordinary sort of term in French, like saying, ‘mon cherie’, ‘my honey’ or something like that. And ‘mon ange’ is a very normal sort of term of endearment, so he would... ‘The angel,’ he said, ‘The angel hides the truth behind his three fingers.’

And what truth were you hiding?

Ah. (laughter) Well, I have no idea. And then the one behind me is by a girl called Adrienne Tanner, who was an American painter living in London. Her husband was Yann Tanner, who was a Yugoslavian, and who owned the Brent Football Club and he came from, he played England, he played in England from, as a footballer, and defected from Yugoslavia, and then he made his way to Canada, and from Canada he made his way to Hollywood. And when in Hollywood he met Adrienne, who is an American, and they got married, and then he came back to England, and continued to make films. And she’s quite a well known, good, successful painter.

And what are you...you’re wearing a rather striking jumper. Percy Savage Page 209 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

Jumper, pullover, yes. It was a hand-knitted one in black and white, not squares but little triangles, yes. Black and white triangles, yes, there was a hand-knitted pullover. Exactly made by one of the designers I had exhibiting, by some young lady. A nice pullover.

And what do you, when you look at these portraits, these particular two, the Cocteau and the Tanner, what do you see, what do you think of yourself?

Well, I don’t think the Cocteau is what I would call a likeness of me by any means. I think the Adrienne Tanner is a likeness of me, and it was, not too bad, and the one, the Patrick Procktor is also a sort of likeness of me, not too bad, pleasant.

Did you enjoy sitting?

Yes. Mm. Adrienne Tanner took, oh I think it took, at least three or four sittings over a period of a few weeks to do, whereas the Procktor was done just in a couple of hours, it was dashed off in watercolour very quick. And the Cocteau was done very quickly, just sort of a quick sketch. And then afterwards he did a lithograph from it. But, no, it was, it’s, it’s nice. I’ve always enjoyed the art world, and painters, and...

Do you have a lithograph as well?

The Cocteau is a lithograph.

Oh right, right.

It’s not a painting, it’s a lithograph. So there must, I think there were about 150 of those printed; where the others are, I have no idea. But I actually bought that in London, I found that in a gallery in London, in Cork Street, the Redfern Gallery. It is also where Patrick Procktor shows, at the, at the Redfern Gallery.

Yes, how did you meet Procktor?

Percy Savage Page 210 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

I met him through the, through the Redfern Gallery. Which is one of London’s top galleries in, well Cork Street is one of London’s top streets for the art world, and, the Redfern has been there for well over fifty years. I personally exhibited at the Redfern myself over fifty years ago, not in a one-man show but I had a few paintings exhibited there, when I was living in France. And, I know the people at the Redfern very well, I go there constantly and see the exhibitions, they have, it’s a very good, very good gallery.

Did you give up painting completely?

I stopped painting in the early Sixties when my daughter was born in Paris, because my wife didn’t like the smell of turpentine, thought it was not good for, for the family atmosphere, so I stopped painting using turps, and, and oils, and, but continued to draw, and I used to continue doing pen and ink drawings or charcoal drawings or pencil drawings.

Of what?

Oh, people, landscapes, buildings. But I stopped doing any oil painting. And also I had exhibited for about twenty years in France and abroad, and never earned a great deal of money from it, and, you know, I didn’t put a lot of time into it, but, I enjoyed it as a pastime, and as work. But I never earned a great deal of money from it, I always earned far more money working in the fashion business. So I didn’t particularly mind my wife being, having objections to it, and so I just stopped.

And do you, you didn’t, you just stopped completely?

No, later on I continued drawing and painting a little bit, but, frankly, the other work that I was doing was much more time-consuming, and, I just, well I just didn’t continue with it. As I said, it wasn’t bringing in much in the way of revenue, and I frankly enjoyed buying other people’s paintings rather than hang... I don’t have any of my own paintings any more whatsoever.

So when did you begin to...would you say, would you call it collecting? Percy Savage Page 211 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

Yes, I...back in the very early, my very early days in France, the, the painting on the wall over there of the pears in the basket, that was the first one I bought in France, and which I bought from a, a Mexican painter called Alfonso Michel, and he was a great friend, and I bought that painting from him. I think about 1949, and I’ve kept it ever since. So, fifty-five years ago.

And, and what, what particularly attracted you to that one?

Oh, it happened to be one of the paintings he had available, and I liked him, and I just wanted to have one of his paintings, so I...it was, it was...that was... Then I bought other paintings from other people, and, sadly when I moved from house to house, I lost various ones, I bought various paintings of people I liked. I lived, was a neighbour of Marie Laurencin in Paris in the street where I lived in the rue Vaneau, on the Left Bank, and I found when I was in Jersey, I found a Marie Laurencin painting called Marie-Laure Noailles, that was Marie-Laure, the Vicomte and Vicomtesse de Noailles in Paris, the l’Orge[???] of the Noailles at the Paris Opera House, and sitting in the l’Orge[???] with them was the Comtesse Marie-Blanche de Polignac, so I found that lithograph and bought that in Jersey, and took it back to France, and, sadly when I moved my house once, that was one of the ones that disappeared or got lost. But, no I’ve always collected paintings. I like paintings.

So how did you feel when, when you lose one though?

Well, it’s a big disappointment, but... (laughs) No no, it’s...that’s, it’s annoying, but still.

And, and, are there...because the whole wall is covered, isn’t it.

Yes, there are...

Is there any other particular ones that you’d like to...?

Percy Savage Page 212 C1046/09 Tape 9 Side B (part 16)

Well up there is a little one by a lady called Yolanda Sonnabend, the one in the dark frame. And, there, she’s a lady who does a lot of work for the Royal Opera House. She’s been a teacher at the Slade, and she’s a well-known painter, and, lives over at St John’s Wood, and she’s done my portrait.

[End of Tape 9 Side B] Percy Savage Page 213 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17)

Tape 7 Side A [part 17]

[electronic time]

4.36, mm.

OK, sorry, you were telling me about the Luciana Arrighi.

Yes, that’s Luciana Arrighi, who is a costume designer and sets designer, again for the theatre and films, and she, in that particular portrait she was painted by somebody called Elizabeth Fenn, who was a...that’s when she was actually living and working in Paris, and she was then a model girl at Yves St Laurent. Then she went on to marry, and had children, and I’m the godfather to a son called Aaron. And, she’s a, done many many many many many films and, I think the last one she did was The Gathering Storm which was the life of Churchill, the last film she did.

And could I ask you about Yolanda Sonnabend. How did you meet her?

I met her, again through the theatre, through the...she’s done a lot of work for Covent Garden, and, the ballet, the Royal Opera House.

So have you continued your interest in...in...

In the art world?

...theatre?

Oh yes, indeed, yes, mm. Very much.

And, could you describe your, the portrait that she has done of you?

It’s just a head, it’s a, it’s something that, it was commissioned by a friend as a, as a present for my daughter in Australia. But I haven’t been to Australia to take it out yet. (laughs) So it’s hanging upstairs in the house, which belongs to a friend. And Percy Savage Page 214 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17) she was the one who commissioned it, it was a present, and she’s the godmother to my daughter.

Hélène Chetwynd?

Hélène Chetwynd, yes, mm. And Hélène, her husband lives six months of the year in London, and they live here during the winter, from October on, till March, and then they have a house down in Limoges, in Poitiers in France, and they move down there and they live in France.

So, to just go back to, to your work in London. Could you just sort of list, or describe, apart from Rive Gauche and the London Fashion Week, you know, who your other clients were.

There was a Japanese designer called Yuki, who was a very well known, very famous designer and still alive and well, and successful. Then there was a lovely lady called Kanga, Lady Tryon, who was a very good friend, and, sadly she died. She had a shop in Beauchamp Place. And, then, I did quite a lot of work for Zandra Rhodes, for years and, off and on, off and on, off and on, doing projects and things for her.

What...could you just describe what sort of projects you would work on with her?

Well Zandra would, you know, be doing, organising an event, or organising an exhibition, I helped her with the opening of her museum recently, she has the Museum of Textiles and Fashion over in Bermondsey Street. And I helped her with that quite a lot.

And what sort of things would you do for her?

Well she has, she has quite a lot of different people who come along and hire the museum for, not exactly, well she has people who hire it for exhibitions, but I haven’t done that. But she has people who come and organise lectures and talks there.

But what would you...what would your role be? Percy Savage Page 215 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17)

Well, I introduce people to her, and then, suggest the people that should be invited, or, invite one or two press, or get somebody from the television to come along, and, do a...cover it for television, or write about it for the Telegraph or the Times or something.

And is it...

Then I helped Andrew Logan, I helped him for his very first exhibition years ago when he was a student at Oxford, and he had an exhibition of his work down in Oxford, and I helped him with his very first exhibition. I helped him from time to time with other exhibitions.

And, are people grateful, when you help them?

Oh I think so. I mean, we stay friends, and, yes, and, we organise, and I say perhaps there’s a fee of £1,000, or, whatever the... You know, it depends on who the person is, how much money they have, and whether they’ve got, whether, you know, if I want to work with them, I’m quite happy to do it for a small fee, or, it depends on how long the work is going to last, if it’s only a month’s, couple of months’ work, and then it’s not a very big fee, but if it’s a year’s work then it’s a little bit more.

And what do you think are the qualities that you actually need that have made you so successful, you know, the personal qualities?

I think you need imagination, you need to have ideas, you need to be able to see what can be achieved out of an event, and how, how the event should be promoted, how the event should be projected. I think, how, if you are having an exhibition somewhere, you need to, perhaps you need to have a, perhaps involve musicians, or involve some of the spectators, or some of the presentators[sic]. It depends on how it’s... If you’re having an exhibition of photography, or an exhibition...launch of a book, or something, it’s, see how it can be done.

So, do you think that, that being a good PR is something that actually can be taught? Percy Savage Page 216 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17)

There are certain schools, when I say schools, certain, there’s an American university in London, in Marylebone Lane, called, I think it’s called the American University in London, and I personally used to lecture and give talks on PR and fashion journalism, and, fashion show production and so on. It can be taught, yes. Oh yes, definitely it can be taught.

Did you carry on doing talks at the Royal College once you’d moved over here?

A little bit. I mean they never paid very much, I mean they used to pay my fare from France to London, and, I stayed in my own flat in London, as I said, I had a flat in London, and, in Beauchamp Place, I used to stay there, but they never paid very much. But I used to be asked to lecture in America, the Kent State University in Cincinnati, I have gone and lectured there, and they pay well. America, America pays well.

And to whom would you be lecturing at Kent State?

Oh the students at the college, about 400 people. I would take a roll, a few reels of slides, and show slides and just talk.

And what would the slides be of?

Fashion, shots or designers, or fashion shows, or...

And would...

I have thousands and thousands and thousands of slides.

Have you? And who took the slides?

Various photographers. I mean they would, you know, I mean, well just ask them, you know, give them to me, or, sell them to me if there’s...

Percy Savage Page 217 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17)

Are you, are you a good archivist?

I think I was, yes, I do have quite, you know, I’ve got quite a number of books with slides and things in there. I’ve got many many many many things that formed the subject of many many good talks, yup. Or I would have a small film and show a film and then talk about it.

Can you remember what sort of things you might have said?

Well, there was a, an event called Fashion Forums in London which I helped organise with a friend who was basically doing that for students in England. And bus loads of students would come from all over the country to London and stay in cheap hotels, and have a three-day event in London, and we used to hire a cinema in Leicester Square in the mornings, when the cinemas weren’t open to the public. And we’d have four or five hundred students in there, and, a forum of various, half a dozen different people who would talk about this or talk about that, or show a film and talk about various aspects of fashion. And then when the students, in the afternoons they would go and see museums; the next morning they’d come back for another lecture. I did that for quite a few years when I was living and working in London. And then the same group, we took...I suggested and organised that we go to America, so we went to America and did it in New York, and then the same thing we went to France, and did it in Paris. And the last one I did was a couple of years ago and we went to Disneyland for a couple of days and did it in Disneyland.

And who...you mean in one of the hotels in Disneyland?

Yes, they took over one of the hotels, and, I think they have about four or five different hotels there of different, different levels, I think they stayed in one hotel, the cheapest hotel for the students, and I stayed in another hotel along with the other lecturers, and then we all ate in different hotels, and, then during the day they would go to Paris and visit the exhibitions, the trade exhibitions in Paris and see fashion, and then come back and have lectures in the evening.

And who were the other people that you were, your fellow lecturers? Percy Savage Page 218 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17)

From, I think they had a couple more from London, but they also had a couple from Paris who came from Paris out to Disneyland. And, we just talked about different aspects of fashion.

And you can’t remember particularly any, any, where any of them came from?

Well one I know was this American lady from London called Casey Tolar, and she came over from London; and they had a, a PR girl from one of the fashion houses in Paris who came out and talked. [rustling sound]

Sorry, could I ask you to move your arm?

Sorry. And, and then they had somebody from the French silk industry came out and talked, and I think there’d been an exhibition of Hermès’ scarves, all sponsored by the silk industry, or silk promotion money came from China, because that is the big, big, big, big producer of silk, so, one of the big promoters of textile, of fibre, as opposed to wool or cotton.

And who would, who was with you at the early, the first sort of set of fashion forums?

Well we had people from all over the world, we had this wonderful woman in America called Eleanor Lambert, who was interviewed recently in a film that they’re doing about me, and she sadly died, but she was 101, so it was, everyone was expecting her to die. But I’d known Eleanor Lambert for about, a good sixty years, and she came from America regularly, so, she was always over here on business herself, because she had a PR company in America, and she came over and she would talk about her life in fashion, her life in PR, various people she worked for. One of her clients in America was Tiffany, another American [inaudible] manufacturate[???] and, she worked for American designers, like Oscar de la Renta, who was a young, came from Santo Domingo, and has his own company in America, on Seventh Avenue.

And, the people who came to the ones in London, the early ones... Percy Savage Page 219 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17)

The audience?

The audience.

They were all students from schools all over England. And they would come in on coaches, buses, from all over the country, from Newcastle, from Edinburgh, from Brighton, they would all come to London and stay in hotels, and then go back to their schools. And they would all pay a, you know, a small amount to come to the lectures.

And, can you...what decade would this have been, roughly?

Mm?

When would this have been roughly?

Oh that was all through the Seventies and the Eighties. For a good twenty years, I mean that happened in London, I... It wasn’t always on the same, you know, every year, because, I mean I don’t think students want to...some of the students would come two or three years running, and I think we would always find different people from different houses or different organisations, or, fashion editors or, writers or publishers, you know, people who illustrated books or wrote books or, a fashion editor from the Times, or a fashion editor from the Telegraph, or a fashion editor from Vogue or something like that.

Were you ever tempted to write a book yourself?

Not really, no. (laughs) I think I, I, if I’d had the, if I’d had the financial inducement, I think if a publisher had talked to me seriously and said, ‘Right, here’s £10,000, get yourself a secretary and sit down and write, we’re going to do a book in a year’s time and start work,’ I think I would have. I didn’t sort of set about trying to find that, and it’s never happened.

Percy Savage Page 220 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17)

You... One of the things we didn’t actually do on tape was a story of how you lost your finger. You told me over lunch, but we haven’t actually recorded it.

Yes, well that happened when I was working on the farm with my father in Australia, and he was away, and I was, it was during the monsoon season in February, it was about 1942 I think it was, and, when I was sixteen. And, because of the bad weather and the rain it was impossible to use the hoe, and get the weeds out, and they were growing like mad. So I had to work by hand, so I went out just wearing a pair of shorts, and boots, hobnail boots in the mud. And I was pulling the weeds out by hand, and throwing them in a pile behind me because, with the rain, they would just begin to grow again, so if you put them in a pile you could come along a week later with a fork and toss them over and, they would eventually start, eventually wither and die in the sun. And, whilst I was doing this, I happened to disturb...down in the weeds on the ground there was a snake, called a death adder, which bit me on the little finger, and hung on. So when I was able to see it, I pulled it off and killed it. Went into the shed nearby, and couldn’t find a knife or anything, and the only thing to do with death adders is to... So I took what was called a grubber, and with the sharp edge of it just chopped the finger off. Put the little finger in my pocket, grabbed the snake behind the head and set off to, back to the house. And when I arrived at the house I passed out and fainted on the lawn, and my mother came out and found me there. And, I was taken to hospital, and I was unconscious for three days, but eventually they found a hospital, because this was during the war in Australia and all the hospitals were full of American servicemen. And, they took off what remained of the finger and I survived.

And how long did it take you to recover?

Oh only about a week. Oh no, I was in hospital for, I was unconscious for three days and then I think I probably went home a couple of days after that.

And, what was your sort of family’s response to what you’d done?

Well, I know I was a sort of nine-day wonder, and I know that when I got home, I found the little finger in my pocket and I went to the fridge and put it in the ice tray, with the idea that eventually I’d take, pick it and take all the flesh off it and wear it on Percy Savage Page 221 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17) a leather thong around my neck. But, sadly that weekend some friends from town came out to visit us and look at the nine-day wonder and, somebody went to the fridge and poured some beer, and somebody else poured a whiskey and soda, with ice blocks in it, and my...(laughs)...the person, the visitor who had the ice, the glass of whiskey with the ice block, saw the little finger in it. And then spoke to my father, who was so horrified he took the whole glass and threw the glass and its contents with my finger out into the bush. And it disappeared forever. (laughs) Never got it back.

Oh how, how did you feel about, about losing it?

I, well I was, I was looking forward to having my little finger round my neck. (laughs) No it was very sad. But they are very very very very... I mean the idea that somebody could be bitten by a death adder and die is not news, but, the idea you can be bitten by a death adder and survive, that was news, and that happened during the war in 1942, and not only did it make front-page news in all the papers in Australia, it was actually published in the Times, because we received little clippings from friends in England, who sent us, you know, the fact that this had happened, and the person bitten by a death adder had survived, that was the big news, was that somebody had survived the, the bite of a death adder. At the expense of losing a finger, mm.

You also mentioned to me something that had happened to the twins who lived nearby.

Oh that’s right. Well our neighbours, you see I mean, I knew that the death adder was quite fatal because we had neighbours who had twin boys who had both been bitten by the same death adder, one boy had been bitten, and the other boy grabbed the snake from him and he was bitten. So that, there was enough poison in this, in the death adder to kill first one and then the second person. The only person I knew who had survived was actually bitten on the hand, and he put a shotgun to his wrist and blew his hand off. Because I mean, it was quite a normal thing for people to be bitten by a death adder and just die. It was normal. I had no, I had no hesitation about chopping the finger off, that was...and I didn’t have a shotgun. (laughs)

So have you always been brave, do you think? Percy Savage Page 222 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17)

I don’t think it’s bravery, I think it’s just, acting on the impulse, and you know you have to do something, you do it. I think, bravery is different from that, I think, you know, you have to do all sorts of other things, brave. (laughs) I wouldn’t call that bravery. It might be courage, yes, in a way, yes, perhaps.

I wanted to ask you about being involved in the Best Dressed List.

That was organised in America by this friend, I mentioned her name, Eleanor Lambert, who came to London and lectured in these fashion forums. And she was a great PR, and she had taken over... During the war the custom in France, they had the élégance parades, and because of the German occupation, the American buyers didn’t go to France any more to buy from the French fashion houses. And this had all been supported in France by the French fashion houses, and was sponsored by the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture. She came to Paris in the early days of the war and suggested that she would continue to do it in America, and mention the French fashion houses, and so on. But at the same time she’d mentioned the American fashion houses, so, the Best Dressed List in America then, she would have people dressed by Christian Dior, actually Christian Dior wasn’t alive, or at least his house didn’t exist in those days, but Lanvin, and Lucien Lelong and people like that did, and Balenciaga. And then she also included various American fashion designers.

[break in recording - telephone]

So during the war Eleanor Lambert continued to promote the Best Dressed List in America, and also including American fashion designers, and then at the end of the war, when American designers were able, American manufacturers were able to come back to France and continued to buy from the French couturiers, she had done such a good job in America that it continued. And she then asked various designers in France and personalities in France such as myself to be judges on the, and contribute names and so on. So, we received information from her with suggestions from her of the various people she thought should be included on the list, and would ask us to include people who we wanted to promote and put on the list. So that went on for Percy Savage Page 223 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17) years and years and years and years, and now she’s died, the list is being continued by the editor of Vanity Fair, the American fashion magazine.

So what sort of people would you have put on the list?

Well basically, it was a very useful way of getting the designers’ names promoted, and also to get our particular clients promoted. So if we had particular clients whom we thought were worthy of noting, I mean young, young French, or, not only French, but international clients who came to dress at, in Paris, at Lanvin or in other houses, we would suggest them, and, so on. I mean, obviously the well-established clients whom we had were put on the list and so on. But it helped in fashion, it helped fashion in general.

And can you remember any particular person that, that you might have recommended?

Oh yes, I remember a lovely young lady who was Princess Paola, who went on to marry Prince Albert and who’s now the Queen of Belgium. Then there was a lovely lady called Gloria Guinness who was the wife of, an American, a Russian American banker, and she was a very very beautiful lady. [inaudible]. Princess Diana was obviously on the list from the minute she was married; before she was married, nobody knew her, but from the minute she was married, she was obviously on the list. And before that various, you know, various other people.

And what about...well what would be your criteria for selecting somebody, apart from their sort of profile?

Well, their looks, their natural elegance, and also, preferably they would dress in the French couture, I mean, preferably. But... I can’t think of... I think Juliette Greco was one of the ones who dressed a little bit in the French couture, I mean she didn’t dress much in the French couture, I think she...but she was one of the ones whom I recommended and who was a very attractive woman and well known.

Percy Savage Page 224 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17)

Was there ever anybody that anybody else put forward that you thought wasn’t a good representative?

Oh there were people I put forward who weren’t included. (laughs)

What about the other way round, other...people...

Oh there were many, yes, I was, I mean I was one of perhaps, let’s say there might have been about 100 people in France who were considered by Eleanor Lambert who asked, you know, to put names forward, including people like Christian Dior himself, and the designers, Madame, the Comtesse de Polignac was also on the list, I was on the list, there were various people in various fashion houses. Essentially people connected with the fashion industry were on the list. And people who were also fashion journalists or fashion editors in France would be on lists. I mean the, the great fashion editor in America, Eugenia Sheppard, she was obviously on the list, and her various correspondents in France would be on the list also.

And where would you meet to decide on the list?

If you were around at the time, you would meet in Eleanor Lambert’s apartment in New York, she lived on Fifth Avenue on the corner of 86th Street, just opposite Central Park. Almost next door to Alistair Cooke, the man who wrote Letter from America, and just up the road from Jackie Kennedy who lived at, ten streets down, on 72nd Street, just opposite the Metropolitan Museum. So Jackie Kennedy was obviously on the list of people, the best dressed, and... And they had what they called the Hall of Fame, so once they were there for a couple of years or so they did not vote for them any more, because they’d already been voted for, so they wanted new people to come along and new people to come along and... You know, Tina Turner was one of the ones that was on the list, I mean, it was always very contemporary, they had many, many many many people coming up every year, you would get new people coming on. I mean, I’m sure that, what’s the name, David Beckham’s wife.

Victoria.

Percy Savage Page 225 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17)

Posh. Mm. I’m sure she’s on the list too. But I haven’t done it now for a few years. But, it’s...there are still people in London who receive it, people who are fashion editors and people in the fashion business.

And apart from you and Eleanor, who else was selecting when you were selecting?

Oh as I said, there were about 100 different people in France at least who were...

But doing the actual choosing?

Yes, well, if you, if you were, as I said, if you were in America at the time, and rang her up and she said, ‘Right, well we’re having a meeting tomorrow, come along,’ she might have had about fifty people, and they would be American fashion editors, or, American fashion editors or American fashion designers, people who were there. She would have a sort of cocktail party with about fifty people, and, decide who’s who.

And...

To get the 100 best, you know.

And, did you notice any kind of shifts throughout the years of the type of people who were selected, in terms of their backgrounds or, or...?

Yes, as I’ve said, you know, recently Tina Turner was one of the, one of the ones that... They always had connections with the theatre or the stage or, not just society, or, idle, social ladies, I mean they had professional people too.

And, would, would the couture, ready-to-wear have influenced the sort of choices that were made? I mean, was it only ever sort of, linked to couture or, or not?

Mostly, yes, I mean, well I mean, obviously the women had to dress somewhere, so I mean, most of those people, the professionals and successful in business all stayed, I mean they mostly had, would have money, and they would, probably most of them would have a connection with the couture or the ready-to-wear, mm. Percy Savage Page 226 C1046/09 Tape 10 Side A (part 17)

Have you... Oh I’ll just turn it over.

[End of Tape 10 Side A] Percy Savage Page 227 C1046/09 Tap1 10 Side B (part 18)

Tape 10 Side B [part 18]

.....had any dealings with, with putting on exhibitions in museums?

I helped a little bit, well quite a lot actually, when there was an exhibition at the Victoria and Albert of fashion, which was basically organised by the V&A and Cecil Beaton. And it was an organisation, it was an exhibition where basically he approached people who, all over the world, who had been clients of the French couture, and, it was all French, and, he asked them if they would lend certain dresses that they had bought from either Lanvin or Balenciaga or Christian Dior and so on. So I helped there quite a bit from France, helped the V&A and Cecil Beaton whom I knew quite well. And various others, yes, I mean the last one I helped with in London at the V&A was an exhibition of Ossie Clark.

Recently?

That was just a couple of...yes, just a couple of years ago.

Yes, what was Ossie Clark like? You’ve mentioned meeting him as a student.

As a student, yes, he was at the Royal College when I first went to lecture there. Well I knew him quite well, I mean I knew him when he came to France, and started manufacturing, designing in London but also getting manufacturing in France. And then when I came back to London, many other people knew that I knew him and many people would approach me and ask me if I could get an interview with him, and he used to tell people I was his PR but I really wasn’t his PR. But he liked to say that I was. (laughs)

Did you mind?

Not, not in the least. I mean I...I mean, if I hadn’t liked him I would have, I mean...but I mean, by all means, I was very happy to help him. No, he couldn’t have, he couldn’t have afforded any PR, he never, never had the money, I mean he was... But I was very fond of him, he was a nice, great fun person. Percy Savage Page 228 C1046/09 Tap1 10 Side B (part 18)

And I mean...

And then I helped...

...he had the tragic sort of, tragic end.

Yes, sadly, yes, he was killed by his lover, and, yes, it was very sad.

And, what, what do you think about sort of, that whole sort of, drug and sort of sex...?

Well he just shouldn’t have been mixed up with drugs for a start, and he shouldn’t have been mixed up with people, that sort of, you know... But I suppose he didn’t realise. I mean, you can go to bed with anybody and wake up with a knife in your heart, but I mean it’s... No, it was very sad.

But was...was...

But he was, he as heavily into drugs.

And was, was drugs something that you were aware of in the fashion world?

Oh Lord! yes. I mean there were drugs in France, there were drugs in America, I mean Studio 54 in America was a, rife with drugs when, during the Sixties when I went there, it was... But I mean that was... You’d find drugs in France, it was... And you’d find, you’d find it in, and still find it again today in England, in London. You find it in Camden, you know, you... It’s not just Brixton, you find it in Camden, here.

But, but...

But it’s never been part of my world, or...and when I say never, very, very rarely has it been part of my world.

Percy Savage Page 229 C1046/09 Tap1 10 Side B (part 18)

And do you...but do you...are the reasons for people taking sort of, drugs in, in Paris, the same as they are in London? I mean, you know, is it about, is it about escapism, or...?

I think it’s just getting kicks out, extra kicks out of life, yes, I mean... The first time I had cocaine in France was just purely and simply for social reasons; other people were taking it, and offered me a little bit, so I took a little bit of cocaine. And then I tried LSD in France, when the LSD came around, and, I think I was out for about three days, and then didn’t particularly try it again, didn’t particularly want to. But it’s...it does happen, and it happens in every...nothing specially to do with the fashion business, I mean, it can happen with anybody in any form of life. And I think it’s very bad for anybody, or very sad, you know, for anybody to become addicted to any form of drugs like that, whether it’s alcohol or, whatever.

But was it, was it sort of more prominent in France or in England, or more or less the same, would you say?

It wasn’t particularly prominent in the fashion business in France. Not really, no. I think there’s just as much drug in France as there is in England, yes, but not specially in the fashion business. No I don’t think it’s particularly prevalent in the fashion business here either. Don’t think so. I know very few people in the fashion business here who are sort of hooked on drugs. Apart from as I said, Ossie Clark was, and I mean... But then it wasn’t particularly because he’s in the fashion business, I think it was, he had a group of friends and so on who were into that, and that was his, that was his way of life.

Do you think that, well it’s sort of speculative I suppose, but, when you met that sort of group at the RCA, you know, Mary Quant, Bill Gibb, Zandra Rhodes...

Yes.

...all that group, could you tell that they were going to be stars?

Percy Savage Page 230 C1046/09 Tap1 10 Side B (part 18)

I’ve always had a great respect for Mary Quant, she was outstanding. And then, Bill Gibb came along later, although they were all at school, at the Royal College, Mary Quant was one of the first to become an outstanding, yes, one of the first, in ready-to- wear design. And Zandra Rhodes also, I mean, but she was... Zandra Rhodes was essentially, she studied textile design at the Royal College, not so much fashion, and she used to design textiles and get other, hopefully other people, as Ossie Clark was married to a girl called Celia Birtwell, who was a textile designer, and very good, but, Zandra used to try and sell her fabrics, and she finally, she used to design and make her own clothes herself, and she used to basically cut out the shapes of her dresses, and then print onto that shape, and then cut around the fabric, so that she was basically printing for certain shapes, she wasn’t just printing cloth that would be cut and sewn by just anybody. She worked on a totally different principle, which was a very, you know, very personal way of doing it. But there were many many many many many good textile designers came out of the Royal College also, just classical textile designers who went on and became great names all over the world.

[end of session]

[End of Tape 10 Side B] Percy Savage Page 231 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side A (part 19)

Tape 11 Side A [part 19]

We’re in Camden Town, it’s Friday morning, half-past ten.

Oh.

[break in recording]

Had you...how had you first met Cecil Beaton?

I met him in the mid-Fifties when he came to Paris to work with Leslie Caron on the film called Gigi, and he was a great friend of Castillo, the designer, and the Comtesse the Polignac, and also a great friend of Christian Dior also, I mean, he fitted in immediately into all his old friends in Paris, and we automatically met frequently. And we knew each other from then on, very, saw a lot of each other. When I came to London on the odd occasion I stayed at his home, which was in Pelham Place, and just opposite the home of Lady Rendlesham, who was the person who was fashion editor on Queen magazine, and later the one who ran the Yves St Laurent shops. So we had many many, many contacts in common.

And, what, what sort of person was he?

He was a lovely, had a lovely cynical sense of humour, and, I mean, when I met him, it wasn’t so much in his capacity as a photographer, although he was best known as a photographer, more in his capacity as a theatre, costume designer. And then of course later on he did My Fair Lady with the, where he designed all the sets and costumes which were stunning. All in black and white.

And what was his, his house in Pelham Place like?

It was on, about three floors, and basement. And, he, I remember, he had standard lamps designed by Giacometti, the brother of the, the sculptor, brother of the man who became much more famous as a painter and sculptor.

Percy Savage Page 232 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side A (part 19)

And what were they like?

They were, made of bronze, and very slender and stalk-like, and, no, they were, just standard lamps about six feet high, and, but they were very distinctive though. Very lovely.

Did you ever meet Giacometti, the sculptor, in Paris?

The sculptor? Yes, I met him a few times in Paris, yes. Mm.

And what sort of, kind of situations?

Well, I just met lots of different painters in...I went to his studio, and, went to his exhibitions, and, knew him through other, through the various salons that, the artistic salons of, I think I spoke to you about the, Marie-Blanche de Polignac and, especially also Marie-Laure de Noailles was a great favourite of his, and she was a great client of his too.

And what would the, the routine be when you stayed at Cecil Beaton’s house?

Well I’d be over for various different reasons, sometimes I came over on business, sometimes I just came over on, for pleasure, and, he’d have a little dinner party or we’d both be invited to parties, given by a mutual friend or something like that. And he knew the woman opposite, he knew Clare Rendlesham very well, and, they’d pop across the road to each other’s homes and, give dinner parties and drinks parties.

Can you remember what sort of food you might have had?

Not especially, no, I don’t think that there was any great culinary effort made. (laughs) He...he had a manservant who, I think did the cooking and serving at table. Whereas across the road Clare Rendlesham did all the cooking herself, she was a great little cook. She had a nanny, she didn’t...the only servant she had was a nanny for her children.

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And was that unusual do you think that she, she cooked?

I think it was really, I think, you know, it was...

In London I mean.

In London, yes, I think, other people I knew had cooks, and, as I said, the kitchens would be down in the basement, and, there would be a dumbwaiter to bring food up to the first floor or wherever the dining room was. And, other people had cooks, whereas Cecil Beaton had a manservant who did everything, cooking and valet and everything, cleaning.

And, what would you say when you came over in, to London, was the difference between British food and French food?

In France, I think, restaurants were far far far far superior to British restaurants in those days, far superior, and there was still rationing in the Fifties in England. And you could go to certain restaurants where you would get very good food, I mean like the Mirabelle is still an important restaurant in Mayfair, and Mirabelle in those days was considered to be one of the best, and the Caprice was also a very good restaurant. But, the majority of restaurants in London were pretty abysmal. Whereas in France they were all very good, from the small bistros to the very grand restaurants, they were all very good.

And what about people’s homes?

I think in France at home they, the, the French also ate better, I think. (laughs) They, I think they probably, because they had a better supply of food in the shops, I think you could buy a bigger range of vegetables and meats and, pâtés, and so on, I mean they, I think the French did eat better, both at home and in restaurants. But I think now, today in, I don’t eat often in people’s homes in London, I go to restaurants, more often, but I think that it has vastly improved here, the restaurants are all very very good restaurants, and, and I think at home, on the odd occasion... I know that when I Percy Savage Page 234 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side A (part 19) dine with my landlady upstairs, Hélène Chetwynd, she is a wonderful cook, but then, of course she was born in France, and, she’s just a wonderful cook.

And what sort of places would you go out to now?

I go to one or two in Knightsbridge, a famous one like San Lorenzo in Montpeliano, both Italian. And then I go to local ones here, one of my favourites is Daphne in Bayham Street, which is a Greek Cypriot restaurant. And then occasionally I go to, you know, rather grand hotels where you can get good...the Savoy or, the, what’s it called now, the Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park, also is a place I go to occasionally. And then the Lanesborough on the corner of Hyde Park Corner is another very good restaurant. The restaurant is in...it used...the hotel used to be St George’s Hospital, and I think the restaurant is, which is very grand, with a high atrium, it was I believe in the hospital days, was the morgue. But it’s very beautiful as a restaurant, and very good food.

Does it, it doesn’t bother you that it was the morgue?

No, no, I think they’ve probably changed the kitchen. (laughs) Serve up different foods.

So how would you describe your taste in food?

Well much as I was fond of French food, I don’t know many good French restaurants in London, I think I go far more to Italian restaurants. As I said, San Lorenzo is another one, then in Belgravia, Elizabeth Street, there’s another one I like very much called Mimmo d’Ischia, which is another Italian. And so, I know quite a few Italians. There’s one in Camden I go to called Luca’s, which is also Italian, but they have a variety of foods, it’s not especially Italian. Then also I like the good old-fashioned Pizza Express restaurants, the...but only the Pizza Express, the others are not so good. But the Pizza Express is very good.

And, when you, when you and Cecil Beaton sort of went over to Lady Rendlesham’s, would you, would you...I mean would it be formal, or informal, would you say? Percy Savage Page 235 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side A (part 19)

No, no, basically informal, oh yes. She didn’t do black tie dinners at home, no. And her husband wouldn’t always wear a tie either, so... No, very informal.

And what would you wear?

I think I was more formal, and, I mean when I say more formal, I usually wore a tie.

And why do you think you were more formal?

Well I think simply because, that was more the life I led in Paris, working in a couture house and working where Lanvin had not only the couture house but they also had the menswear department which, where I dressed a lot, and had very fine clothes, and I was just used to wearing shirts and ties. I rarely wore a shirt without a tie, it just didn’t seem right wear, unless I was playing tennis or something like that.

And, what sort of things would you and Cecil Beaton sort of talk about? You know, would he gossip?

Oh people, or, yes, the people he knew, the people I knew, we had a lot of mutual friends all over the world, and, when I say all over the world, he had many friends in America whom I knew but only because they came to Paris; I hadn’t been to America yet in the Fifties, it was not till late, not until 1960 that I went to America, and then met many of his friends, but... He had worked a lot for Condé Nast, the American publication group, and who owned British Vogue and owned French Vogue, so he used to work for French Vogue, and he used to work for British Vogue occasionally in fashion. And that was the basic, the basis of the very last exhibition that he had in London of his photography, which was when I was organising the fashion exhibitions, and I organised in a gallery at the Park Lane Hotel, we organised an exhibition of his past work and also the recent...he’d done a whole portfolio of about twenty pages for French Vogue of French fashion. So the French Vogue people blew up the photos to picture size for exhibiting, and we framed them in London, and they were part of the exhibition we had, and it was a very, it was a lovely, a very moving exhibition, for Percy Savage Page 236 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side A (part 19) him and his old friends, and Tony Snowdon came along, and all the other photographers, David Bailey, because they were all, had a great admiration for him.

Did you ever use him as a photographer?

No, no I... (laughs) I never worked with him on any photo shoots.

Why not?

Well, frankly because I was living and working in France, and I think we, we had French photographers whom we used, who were probably less expensive than Cecil Beaton. He had a reputation for being quite an over-priced man.

Do you think he ever felt aggrieved that you hadn’t asked him?

I don’t think so, no, no, no. I think he realised that, he was out of my league. (laughs) But, no, he knew all the fashion designers in Paris, and would occasionally photograph their works for whoever, whichever publication had commissioned him, but the, the fashion houses didn’t actually ask him to do any work.

So could you describe, you know, your involvement in his exhibition, the fashion anthology, which I think, that was in 1971 at the V&A.

At the V&A. Well, he had been asked by the V&A to curate this exhibition of fashion, and he...basically, they had, the V&A had in their own collection, they had a, quite a large number of clothes from Paris, and not so many contemporary clothes. And I think they wanted to show contemporary French fashion. I mean they didn’t go back and show the old clothes from Worth or Paquin or Piguet, or the early Lanvins; they were showing the ones from 1940 on, including the Christian Diors and the house of Lanvin where I was working, and the Balenciaga. So he’d basically asked his friends who shopped there if they would lend their clothes, and many of them actually did make donations of the clothes to the V&A, and I believe they’re still there in their permanent exhibition. So I knew, I helped Beaton by telling him who had bought clothes, and ringing up and helping ask, can we borrow this dress from you, Percy Savage Page 237 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side A (part 19) and, so on. So I helped him get a few of the clothes for the exhibition, and helped there during the week when it was all being set up, and, they had various dresses and fitters and seamstresses to make sure that clothes all hung properly, and were stuffed out with paper to make the billowing skirts really full skirts and so on. No it was a lovely, lovely experience working with him. And it was great fun.

Because, what was he like as a, as a curator I suppose you would call what he was doing?

I mean very knowledgeable, I mean he did, he did have... And he was a great, he had a great sense of theatre, which was why he was involved with films like Gigi and My Fair Lady, he did have a great sense of stage production and theatre and lighting, which was vital, lighting an exhibition is very important.

So how did he actually choose the garments, or was that something you advised him on?

Well he would, he personally knew certain women who had bought clothes, and he had seen them wear it, and he just asked, ‘Could I borrow that black evening dress?’ or, the ball gown you have, or that little dress you wore to Ascot last week, and so on. Or last week, perhaps last year. And, they would lend the clothes, and as I said, some of the clothes were actually donated to the V&A.

So, but I just wondered whether he had chosen, whether he had an idea of what he wanted, or whether it was more sort of...

Well I think, you see, instead of actually asking fashion houses to lend clothes or give clothes, I think he wanted to show the clothes that had actually been chosen by the clients, who actually wore the clothes, that these were clothes that actually had been designed in France, and, but were actually being worn by people all over the world, whether it was in America or South America or France or England, I mean these clothes actually were being worn by people. Which was a very good, original point of view.

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Well can you remember any particular garment that you or...or more than one garment?

I remember two, two dresses from Lanvin which were there, which were very similar, and one was black and one was white, and they were both ball gowns with puffball skirts, one in black with white dots and the other in white with black dots. And, those two dresses had been in the Lanvin collection, and they had both been ordered by different clients, and, each of the different clients agreed to lend them. And then I remember distinctly, a very beautiful Balenciaga with a, was at the entrance to the exhibition, and the model had an arm outstretched, and, I think they used the, the models were, some of the models were especially created by Adel Rootstein, who was the very famous designer, manufacturer of mannequins in London. And some of them were actually designed especially for them with, in conjunction with Beaton, he said, this is what he wanted. So it was quite a, quite an exciting... It was quite a long process of getting it all together. But he did a very, magnificent job.

So did he select the poses that he wanted the mannequins to adopt?

Yes I think, yes, I mean he went along to the Adel Rootstein factory which was off King’s Road, and, in their showroom, and saw all the models, and he said he’d like that one or that one, and then suggested perhaps they make one or two more for him. So they, they did actually manufacture models, mannequins designed by him, in certain poses. And of course once they’d been produced by Adel Rootstein, and once they were being used by Cecil Beaton in the V&A, they immediately became best- sellers to shops like Harvey Nichols or Fortnum & Mason’s and Liberty’s, they then had their windows promoting the new mannequins from Adel Rootstein, showing their... It was, it was a big influence on fashion in London, that exhibition.

Did you ever meet Adel Rootstein?

Oh I knew her very well, yes, indeed.

What was she like, for you?

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She was great fun, and, she used to, every year she would have a new range of mannequins she would bring out of men and women, and, she would always make them a present of a mannequin that had been made from there, posing for her. And every year it was quite an event for her to present her new collection, and she would have them dressed by, some stylist would make clothes especially for the mannequins, and, or she might borrow clothes from one of the, two of the designers, and, she would have a reception in her showroom off King’s Road. And the factory was actually down near Hammersmith, and, and that’s where they were made. But the showroom was in King’s Road, in central London.

Did you meet any of her other...

I did, but I don’t really remember the other people who were working there, I mean they... Not, not really, that was all such a long time ago. (laughs) And then she died, sadly, and I haven’t had much to do with the company since then. Although it still exists and they still produce, but there are other rival companies producing mannequins, some of which are also quite, you know... There is a fashion in everything, there’s a fashion in mannequins, shop windows, and, so on, and so you get different ones.

Did you ever meet her husband?

I did meet him but I don’t really remember him, to tell you the truth. I mean she was, she was the vital key in the establishment.

What did you actually think of the exhibition?

The exhibition...?

The, the Cecil Beaton fashion...

Cecil Beaton? It was... Well for me it was, I think at the time it was the best fashion exhibition I’d seen for years and years and years. Later, the better exhibitions that I remember were those that I saw in America at the Metropolitan Museum, those Percy Savage Page 240 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side A (part 19) especially organised by Diana Vreeland, with Yves St Laurent and, people like that, and she did a, a big exhibition on Jackie Kennedy and her wardrobe also, which, they were, they were magnificent exhibitions.

So why do you think they were better?

I think because, she, Diana Vreeland, had the power to again get people to do what she wanted. She’d been the editor of Harper’s Bazaar and she’d been the editor of American Vogue, and then she left, and, the first thing she did was to produce an exhibition at the, at the Metropolitan. And of course that attracted people from all over the world to go and see it, and that was in the Sixties, and it was quite extraordinary.

But, but what do you think, apart from sort of...you seem to be saying it’s the garments that she was able to, to command.

Yes.

But what else do you think might have made it a better exhibition? Was it the setting, or the design, or...?

I think the, the displaying of them, and also I think each time they produced catalogues which were luxury productions, which eventually has happened also in, in London, exhibitions in London at the V&A have, have gone on and become... I mean, one of the last that they’ve had, I think the current one is the Vivienne Westwood exhibition if I remember correctly, and the one I remember before that was the Ossie Clark one, which was very, very very good. And then before that I remember the one they had was of Gianni Versace, which was a fine exhibition also. But, they, they bounce off each other, I mean the Metropolitan will do a good exhibition, a year later the V&A will do one that’s outstanding. But I think also, the best Vivienne Westwood one I saw was at the Museum of London, which was with Lady, what’s her name, Mac..

McAlpine. Percy Savage Page 241 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side A (part 19)

McAlpine, yes, McAlpine. And it was her personal wardrobe from Vivienne Westwood which was on display, and that was a very very good exhibition at the Museum of London, which is not my favourite museum. I mean it does a good job, but, the fact that they did a fashion exhibition was notable, but the fact they did such a good one was very, very very good.

But there was, I don’t know whether you heard about it, but there was controversy over the, was it MOMA? No, the Guggenheim, exhibiting Armani.

Armani. Yes. I think there was a lot of jealousy over that. (laughs) I saw that exhibition, it was a very good exhibition. And later they, the same clothes came to London, were shown at the Royal Academy, but, not with the same effect, I think the exhibition at the Guggenheim was far far better, much much better. And the Guggenheim got a lot of money out of it, and why shouldn’t they? The Guggenheim needs money. And Armani has the money, it’s a highly successful fashion house, very successful.

So, how much influence do you think the architecture has on, of the building on the success of, of an exhibition?

The Guggenheim in itself is such an extraordinary building, I mean it’s one of Frank Lloyd Wright’s outstanding masterpieces, and it’s also, the Guggenheim is now, rather like the Tate in London, which is having offsprings, like little mushrooms, and down in St Ives and up in Liverpool, and two Tates in London, the Guggenheim is having the same sort of effect and having little baby Guggenheims. There’s a Guggenheim in, where is it, Bilbao I think, there’s one, and I think they’re doing another one somewhere else, I can’t remember where but, I believe there’s another Guggenheim in progress.

Mm.

Which is a very good idea; rather like a fashion house licensing its name from manufacturing stockings or underwear or perfume, museums are licensing their name Percy Savage Page 242 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side A (part 19) to produce, and... No, it’s an excellent, excellent thing. The Liverpool Tate’s a very good one.

So, what did you go to see there?

I don’t remember, it was just a general exhibition; I didn’t particularly go for the, for the Tate, I went up there for another reason and just went to the Tate to see it. But the one, the one I do like as a building is the Tate in St Ives, the building I like very much, and they have a lot of Barbara Hepworth’s work there, but then she has her own museum in St Ives so it’s much, very much a shrine to Barbara Hepworth, the whole of St Ives. But the little Tate Gallery is very nice, and beautiful, and beautifully designed architecturally.

So who would you have gone to visit in St Ives?

I just went down there to spend a weekend with friends. That was just about a year ago I was down there, and...

Are they part of the artists’ community down at St Ives?

They...yes, it was a young, a young lady who is a painter, and who actually has bought a house down there. She was born in England but she actually has moved, and actually lives in St Ives, and exhibits in London, and exhibits in St Ives also. And continues to paint, a very prolific painter, and very successful. She lives by painting, which is very nice.

And what’s her name?

Catherine... Oh I can’t remember, Catherine something or other. But she, she shows in Cork Street, at No. 27, where she hires the gallery for a week, and, at around four to five thousand pounds for the week, and she makes money, she does very very well. It’s a gallery I know because many other people I know have hired the gallery, not with necessarily the same success, but I mean it’s, it’s a good gallery, which is for hire. There are two galleries owned by the same woman, No. 27, No. 28, and they’re Percy Savage Page 243 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side A (part 19) the only sort of, how shall I say, independent galleries that are not run by the owners as a gallery, so I mean she just rents the space out to somebody. And you’ve really got to book about two years in advance in order to get space there.

And what are Catherine’s paintings of, what’s her subject?

Catherine’s? She does lots of sunflowers, which she sells very successfully. Lots of, lots of flowers, and landscapes, landscapes and flowers. Not people, I don’t...hasn’t[???] painted people, but she does flowers and landscapes.

And what do you do when you go away to visit somebody for a weekend, what do you like doing?

You mean down in St Ives?

Yes... Yes.

Well we were four people, we were two men who shared...I went with my friend, painter, Marcus Grey, the one I went, go to India with, and he and I shared a flat in, or rather a room in a boarding house. And we went down with a couple of friends, a Belgian girl and, called Anne-Sophie, and a Danish girl called Birgitta who works in an art gallery. So we were all basically in the art world, and we went down there, basically to see the Tate, and just to spend a weekend. We spent about five days down there. And just went out and found good restaurants, went to see this friend Catherine, and, eat in good restaurants, and spend a nice week’s holiday.

So, if I could just go back to Cecil Beaton for a moment. I don’t know whether anybody has read to you, or whether you’ve heard any sort of sections of his diaries, The Unexpurgated Diaries. Has anybody read them to you?

No, no, I do have a couple of the books that he wrote, which, on the shelves, but I haven’t read them for years, but they were all good fun reading, but I haven’t heard about his diaries, but I’m sure they must be fascinating. (laughs)

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Yes, because I was wondering, what you said about his, his sort of caustic wit.

Oh yes, he was very...

Which is very in evidence.

...he was very witty, very, very caustic, very, very... (laughs) It’s cruel to be kind, yes. (laughs)

But he was a friend of Eleanor Lambert’s.

Oh yes, he would have known Eleanor Lambert very well, yes. Indeed. Well I think when he went to New York for work or, or pleasure, mainly for work, he would be, you know, the toast of the town for a week or ten days, and she was very important in the whole of the fashion world, and knew, she was one of the great PRs in fashion. And he will have obviously been, you know, one of her prize showpieces. She’s certainly been giving parties for him.

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Tape 11 Side B [part 20]

And did he flirt?

He was, I...yes, I believe he, he was supposed to have had a lifelong love for Greta Garbo, and, certainly... He was...no he was quite a flirtatious person, and it’s, it’s part of social grace to be flirtatious I think. Oh yes he as very flirtatious. And very gallant, and, and amusing, he was a, a great guest at a dinner party, great fun.

So how did you hear about his, his death?

It was just, I heard about it from people ringing me up and saying, as it happens, people ring up and say, you know... And then reading the obituaries to me.

And did you feel...what did you feel about the obituaries, you know, how he was portrayed in them?

Well, I thought most of them were fairly, fairly, fairly honest, fairly, fairly good, yes. I mean, I think, he was certainly, in his time he was certainly one of the great photographers, and, I have a few of his photographs which I bought in a sale at Sotheby’s back in the Seventies, one of them is a portrait of Lady Diana Manners who became Lady Diana Duff Cooper; and, then I have another one of a Chanel mannequin wearing a Chanel suit; and then I have another one of a patch of wild strawberries, which is very beautiful. And also I have another portrait he did of Madame Grès, one of the great fashion designers in Paris, but I didn’t buy that at Sotheby’s, that was one that Madame Grès gave to me, years ago. But that’s also signed by Beaton on the back, which is, helps for the value of it if I ever need to sell them, I mean, having signed Beatons is a lot better than just having a portrait, photograph by Beaton.

So, what was the occasion of Madame Grès giving you that photograph?

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Well he, he had actually done her portrait, which she then used as part of her press kit. If somebody came along and wanted to write an article about her, she would give them a photograph of herself done by Cecil Beaton.

So did you write about her?

I did write about her, yes, in, in the past, yes, mm.

I mean what...can...can you remember what, what you wrote?

Oh, I wrote, I wrote about, basically wrote about her as a sculptor and a, and her problems in life with her husband, and, I can’t remember what her name was, but she chose the name Grès after... I think before the war she had a fashion house called Madame Alix, a-l-i-x, and then after the war she went bankrupt, and her husband had left her, and she chose his name, Serg, he was Russian, and she just wrote Serg back to front, and, s-e-r-g became g-r-e-s. Or, it was an anagram of, of her husband’s name. And that’s where she got the name Madame Grès from. And she was really a great, one of the great designers. Very beautiful. Very classical clothes, and very...she did a lot of pleating, fluted dresses, floor length dresses, and one-shoulder dresses, Grecian drapes. Very lovely.

So, did you actually work for her, was she one of your clients?

No no, I never, no I never, never actually worked for her, but I just knew her, and, would occasionally go and see her collections and occasionally write about them.

And how did she show her collections?

Much the same as everybody else. She had little gold chairs in a salon, and, and sofas. I have a photograph of myself somewhere sitting alongside Paloma Picasso at a Madame Grès show. And, I think I was on a sofa then, with Paloma. Sofas were kept for the very important people. Little gold chairs were for the other people. But most of the fashion houses were renowned for their little gold chairs, little gold sort of Percy Savage Page 247 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side B (part 20) bamboo chairs, and, later they were copied in metal, and, but originally they were in real bamboo, and, painted gold and cane surface with little cushions on them.

And had you known Paloma since she was a child?

Since she was a child, yes, I knew her mother and, knew her as a baby, and then... I haven’t seen her now for four or five years, but she was a very lovely person, a very beautiful woman, and a very, very fine businesswoman too, both, in, both designing jewellery and also in producing and launching her perfumes, which are good sellers, very beautifully packaged and very good perfumes.

Can I just ask you one more thing about Madame Grès. What sort of, what was her personality like?

She for years had worn a turban, because I don’t think she had very much hair left on her head, I mean she always wore a turban. And she was a sculptor originally before she became a fashion designer, she used to do sculpture, and then she did some theatre work, and then she went into designing clothes. But she was a very austere little lady, but very very, very much respected by everybody in the fashion world.

Was there a, was there a difference for you in the way that women designers approached their work to the way in which male designers...?

The men. Yes, I don’t...I... I would imagine so, I mean, the great women designers, I think probably, Madame Lanvin was one of the first famous women designers, and then after Madame Lanvin of course there was Chanel, and... There weren’t many great women designers. There were a lot of women designers, but they weren’t, not many of them were really great, as Madame Grès was, a great designer, and so was Schiaparelli, I mean, she was a great joke designer really, I mean, she was a very successful designer. I think more in accessories in the things she did, collections of knitwear which were very successful, and she befriended many of the fun people in life, like Jean Cocteau and Salvador Dali, who designed buttons for her, and Jean Cocteau designed jewellery. Chanel also had a wonderful collection of jewellery, but Chanel’s jewellery basically was copied from Russian jewellery, she employed lots of Percy Savage Page 248 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side B (part 20) the, when the White Russians left and came to Paris, husbands became taxi drivers, or worked in nightclubs as bouncers, or guitarists or balalaika players, and the ladies in the house, the princesses, worked for Chanel, and she copied their jewellery in paste and, had a...they knew the right sort of clients who could come in and order from them. So they were... Chanel was really one of the, one of the great designers in women clothes. But there weren’t many other great ones. There as one of the very famous ones in Paris called Mademoiselle Carven, who was born in Russia, and created a, a line for young teenage girls, which nobody ever thought were very important as dresses, they were simple, lovely little day dresses, beach dresses and so on. But Carven built an empire of perfume, which was very very, very very very successful. And then Carven also had a manufacturing business, and they were the people who basically made a lot of the uniforms for Air France and people like that, until Christian Dior came along, and Christian Dior was such a great name that Air France immediately went to Christian Dior to have uniforms made, for both men and women. But Mademoiselle Carven was not a great designer, but she was a very successful fashion house, in the fact that, in so far as her perfume was enormous. Even if she didn’t sell an enormous number of dresses, the perfume was very very successful.

Because, when...when was it do you think that this realisation that perfume was actually, you know, made good, good business sense? When did that become part of it?

Well I think, two or three hundred years ago, perfume was already a, a trade in itself. You had perfumers who made perfumes. When Catherine de’ Medici came to France, she brought her glove maker and perfumer with her, he made, one glove maker made all her gloves, and the perfumer made all her perfumes and her poisons. And, perfume stayed as a separate business for many, many years, and it was only in the, basically in the late nineteenth century that the fashion houses, and I think probably Worth must have been the first perfume, first fashion house to do perfume, and then the other fashion houses began to do perfume. And they all began to get a second income from that. And then they eventually began to, later in the Fifties, after the Second World War, they then began extending their name and putting their name on other products like stockings or cosmetics or, lingerie or handbags, and, scarves and Percy Savage Page 249 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side B (part 20) gloves and things like that. Which is where most of their money comes from today. They don’t sell many clothes any more, they’re basically selling all their licensed products.

But when you were at Lanvin and Ricci, how important was the perfume?

Oh very important. Lanvin perfume was very very very very important indeed. And the Ricci perfume was very important; Ricci had two perfumes that were worldwide sellers, and one was called l’Air du Temps, and the bottle was designed by Lalique, and it showed two doves in flight, and which was the stopper. And then another one that they had was called Fleur de Fleur, and, that was another very famous one. And when I was in London, in the Seventies and Eighties, I worked with a lady called Lady Margot Buckinghamshire, the wife of the Earl of Buckinghamshire, and she was the agent in London for Nina Ricci’s ready-to-wear collection, which was sold I think in just two shops, one in Bond Street and one in Knightsbridge. And the perfume was very successful in London, and she organised a Fleur de Fleur luncheon at the Dorchester every year, to show Ascot hats, and everybody had to come along and wear a hat, and, she would bring over the Nina Ricci collection of hats from Paris, and some of the Nina Ricci ready-to-wear clothes, and, which helped promote the two shops in London selling the clothes. And then she would show hats from other people in London also, various milliners, like Freddie Fox and so on, who would... And eventually also when he became the rage of London, Philip Treacy, the, today’s king of the hat world. She did a great deal for fashion. And then... So she had her Fleur de Fleur luncheons every year, just before Ascot, and then she also had what she called the White Dove Ball, which was the l’Air du Temps perfume, and that was held at the Savoy. So she had two events every year, both of them promoting Ricci, which was a very clever PR promotion.

And had you met her when you were working for Ricci in Paris?

No, I met her when I was working for Lanvin in Paris, because, she came to London from Australia as Margot McCrae, the widow of a doctor in Melbourne, and she had been a hat designer in Melbourne, and, he died, so she then got a job as a journalist working for an Australian magazine, I think it was called Woman’s Own. And she Percy Savage Page 250 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side B (part 20) came to London, came to see me at Lanvin in Paris, to do a story about fashion and so on. And so I immediately sold her a white evening coat in satin from the Lanvin collection, which was in the sale room, and, a bargain, and it looked wonderful on her. And took her round, and introduced her to various people. And she then came to London. She then lived...well she came to London before she came to Paris actually, and had her flat in, in Mayfair, she had a flat in Park Lane. And, came to Paris every season to cover the collections, and then married, and became Lady Buckinghamshire. And, continued in her career as a PR fashion promoter, and journalist. She was a lovely person. Sadly she’s died now, but, she was a great great chum.

Yes, because what... You know, I was just sort of thinking about your life, and, and all the people you know.

Yes.

And how...how does one make close friendships as opposed to, you know, lots of friends?

Just acquaintances.

Mm.

Mm. I think when you find you’ve got a lot in common, and, it’s nice to be able to have a few special friends.

And who, who were they for you, or who, you know...?

Not always people in the fashion world, I mean they, sometimes they’re...one or two of the fashion ed...one or two of the fashion editors became very good friends.

Like...?

Prudence Glynn, the lady who worked on the Times, she became a very close friend. And then there was Ernestine Carter, who was the fashion editor for the Sunday Percy Savage Page 251 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side B (part 20)

Times. And the Observer had a fashion editor called Alison Settle, who had been an editor of British Vogue, and was a lovely, lovely little lady, not at all chic like Ernestine Carter, but a very, very good writer, and, a very good fashion editor. But, there were various other, there was, one of the most elegant of the British fashion editors was Iris Ashley, who was the fashion editor for the Daily Mail, which wasn’t as big a paper in the Fifties as it is today; and another one was Joy Matthews, who was the fashion editor for the Express, which was a big paper in the Fifties, much bigger and much more important than the, than the Mail. So many of those became friends, and, sadly not, not many of them are around any more. Ernestine Carter has died, so has Prudence Glynn, so has Alison Settle. And some of the more recent ones are, are good friends, and...but, there are many many many many more of them around today than there were then. But, no, I’ve still got a wide circle of friends and acquaintances.

So what do you think drew you...because, all the people, all those, all the ladies you’ve listed are all journalists. What...

Yes, they were, they were the journalists. Well I was thinking of one journalist, made me think of another journalist. Well then all... Mary Quant was a, a long-time friend and still is, she’s a very lovely friend, and, she’s a fashion designer but fashion designer who then became a beautician, and she’s basically made a, a fortune in cosmetics. Other cosmetic queens that I’ve known have been Helena Rubinstein in America, who was a wonderful person, and, her great rival was Elizabeth Arden. And then along came the one to crown them all, was Estée Lauder, whom I also knew quite well.

And how do those, how do women in, those three women, very powerful women, compare to, you know, as personalities with, with women in the fashion world?

Well they, they were, they became important names in the beauty world, and cosmetics, without necessarily having much to do with fashion. Although Elizabeth Arden did have a, she had a salon on Fifth Avenue, with its famous little red door, every Elizabeth Arden salon all over the world had a little red door, and in the boutique of her establishment she had a fashion department, and basically selling Percy Savage Page 252 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side B (part 20) lingerie and beachwear and, but not ball gowns and Ascot dresses. But she employed the man who became the designer at Lanvin, she employed Antonio Canovas del Castillo as a designer before he came to work at Lanvin. And then later she employed a man called Oscar de la Renta, who had been working at Lanvin as an assistant designer, and then he went to America, and he worked for Elizabeth Arden, then established his own house. But Rubinstein never had any fashion connections, and, neither did, neither did Estée Lauder, although she did call one of her famous products, I think it was called White Chiffon, which is, after all is a fashion term.

But would they, would they sort of, attend fashion events, were they part of the fashion world?

Oh yes, indeed. Very much indeed. They liked to attend fashion events, first of all because they bought their clothes in couture houses, and also because, very often when they attended fashion events they would be able to see lots of people whom they wanted to see, who would be useful to them in their promotions of their own personal products. They would see the fashion editors from America, or for England or France. And as their products were being sold internationally it was important for them to be able to get mentions in the beauty pages of the glossy magazines, or Elle magazine, and, help promote the sale of their products. Oh yes, they...very much, very very, very desirous of attending all the fashion shows in Paris. And apart from the fact that they were also good clients, because Estée Lauder bought a lot of clothes from Lanvin in Paris, but she also bought from other fashion houses. Rubinstein, essentially, Helena Rubinstein used to buy from Balenciaga, and, she would then, I think, come to London with her clothes where, she had a house in London in, where the French Embassy was, up, just opposite the Victoria Barracks, or the barracks...not the Victoria Barracks, the barracks in Knightsbridge.

Kensington.

In Kensington. And she had a house there, and she used to have a little seamstress, lady, in Beauchamp Place, down in the cellars, which is now part of San Lorenzo’s restaurant, and she would take along her Balenciagas and have them copied, stitch for Percy Savage Page 253 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side B (part 20) stitch and sequin for sequin. So that she had a copy which she left in London, and then, the original she would keep in Paris, or take back to New York, or...

And do you know how Balenciaga felt about that?

Oh as long as she bought from him every season, I don’t think he... I think a lot of, a lot of different clients did that, a lot of different customers did that. They had their little dressmaker who could copy, very faithfully, all sorts of good things that were ten times the price at Balenciaga, so that they were... But she came back regularly, and ordered regularly. And I don’t think that they ever met, I mean Balenciaga did not meet many of his clients. It was his salesladies who handled all that, the sale. So, Rubinstein would ring up and ask if she could come and see the collection, the saleslady would give her an appointment, she’d come along, and sit along with a few other people and watch the collection, and then she’d sit down and order one, two, three or four pieces. So, Balenciaga was happy that the salesladies took that responsibility off his shoulders. He did know a few of his clients, but not many. He, basically he preferred to know the South American or Spanish clientele that he had, because he, his English wasn’t very good, and his French wasn’t very good, and he preferred to speak in Spanish to his preferred ladies. And he had a wonderful clientele, wonderful women. One of his famous ones was Gloria Guinness, who was originally Mexican and had married a banker, nothing to do with the Guinness family in Ireland, they were Russian Guinnesses, and, she was a wonderful client, and he saw a lot of Gloria Guinness. And she would invite, you know, give a dinner party and Balenciaga would be one of her guests, and so on.

When you attended functions, you know, whatever they might be, dinners or fashion shows or whatever, when you know so many people, how, how do you decide, you know, how to, who to greet first, sort of thing? (laughs)

(laughs) Well, well I mean, it depends... When you come into a room, obviously you say hello to your hostess first of all, and then you see who’s there, you case the, case the joint, do a bit of networking and see who you want to meet and be introduced to. You might know, recognise somebody you don’t know, and go up and speak to the person she is talking to, so that you can be introduced to somebody. It just depends Percy Savage Page 254 C1046/09 Tape 11 Side B (part 20) on the occasion, and who’s there. Might, you might walk into a room and see people you saw the day before, or at lunch time, the night before, at the theatre, so you don’t necessarily want to talk to them immediately, you want to speak to other people perhaps. It’s just a question of good networking.

We were talking earlier about, about Cecil Beaton’s obituary, and, I just wondered whether you had ever thought about your own.

No, not yet. (laughs) No, I suppose if, I suppose I should write one and put it aside in case somebody wants to get the facts right, and have the notes right, yes, it could be, could happen some day soon.

But do you, do you, you know...

After all I’ll be eighty this year, and, I may have another five or ten years to go, but, lots of my friends have been popping off recently. Peter Ustinov died not so long ago, and, Eleanor Lambert died just a couple, a few months ago, and she was just over 100. Peter Ustinov I think was ninety-five. Estée Lauder was just recently knocked off her perch also, so I mean, it could happen to me in another five or ten years.

And do you think about it ever?

Not really, no, not yet. No.

And when you say sort of, you know, getting, getting the obituary details correct, what sort of, what sort of things... I mean do you feel that we’ve recorded some of those things?

I would think you’ve covered it very well, yes, I think you’ve covered most of the important events that have happened in my life. I mean, most of them I think. I mean it’s, it’s been a long life. (laughs)

So are there, are there things that you think we should cover that we haven’t?

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[pause] Well the last big things that I did in London were all connected with the fashion industry, and that is what has now developed into what is called London Fashion Week, which was what I started back in the early Seventies, with the exhibitions at the Intercontinental Hotel, the Park Lane Hotel and so on, and that was, that has now developed into very professional exhibitions which are held in marquees, now currently at the Duke of York’s Barracks in King’s Road. And before that they were held at the, in the forecourt of the National History Museum, again in marquees, which were very professional. And they had big tents where they would do fashion shows, and other fashion shows were held all over London, so they had a fleet of cars which would, and buses which would ferry the journalists and the buyers from one fashion show to another, and then back again, and... No, it’s, it’s very professionally done now in London. Far more so than it was before. But then they’re very professional in France, and they have to be very professional here. And since France and Milan, or Paris, Milan and London do it, now New York has their fashion week, and people, lots and lots of people go to New York to show.

But in what way was it unprofessional before, do you think?

In London?

Mm.

Well, when I first started doing it in London, they were showing either at Earls Court or Olympia, and principally at Earls Court, and it was very very very very badly organised, and very badly done. And then after I stopped doing it at the Intercontinental Hotel, and we did it for a short time at Olympia, then the Birmingham Exhibition Halls opened and the fashion world was invited to exhibit up there, and lots of them went to exhibit in Birmingham, which is very professionally done. But, people who go to exhibit in London do not necessarily go to exhibit in Birmingham, it’s a different category of people; they’re more, the big manufacturers go to Birmingham.

I’m still, I don’t think I still understand. Actually I’m just going to get another tape.

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[End of Tape 11 Side B] Percy Savage Page 257 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21)

Tape 12 Side A [part 21]

It’s the second tape is it?

Yes.

Mm.

I don’t think I understand entirely what is professional in setting up the shows, and what would be unprofessional, you know, in terms of an example.

Well, as I said, Earls Court wasn’t very professional, I mean they just didn’t have any respect for the fashion industry as an industry, or an art. And, they didn’t have...their exhibition stands were not very attractive in any way whatsoever. Whereas what we did at the exhibitions in London, we made very beautiful stands, and produced fashion shows that were of a high quality, which was why our exhibition was a very very very successful exhibition, and many people wanted to come and exhibit there, and many people wanted to come and see it. Which is why it was successful.

So, I hadn’t realised that the actual stands were provided by the sites.

That’s right, the exhibitors provided the stands, and then it’s up to the exhibitors, each exhibitor. I mean the exhibition organisers provide the stands, space, and perhaps a table and a couple of chairs, and a rail to hang the clothes on; then it’s up to each individual designer, each individual exhibitor, to if necessary decorate the stand to his own taste.

And so the quality of things was better in Birmingham, quality....?

Oh today, far far far better, yes. The stands themselves are well designed, well put together, and the, the whole organisation in Birmingham is very well done. No no, I’ve got a lot of admiration for what Birmingham has done in the last ten years.

And, what did you think about sort of, the move to the Natural History Museum? Percy Savage Page 258 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21)

Oh it was very good, very...very central. And, they had beautiful quality tents on two levels, a ground floor and first floor, where the exhibition stands were. And, very well, very well decorated, and very well, very well organised. And they produced a good sort of magazine catalogue for the show, as they still do today down in the King’s Road. But they moved to King’s Road because they had far more space. They can do a bigger exhibition there than they could in the forecourts of the Natural History Museum.

Because I, I...it surprised me that that was the museum that they, that the London Fashion Week showed at. I mean were you, do you know why...?

Well I think, it’s very hard to find space. (laughs) It’s very hard to find the space where you can put up marquees in central London. And, you know, Knightsbridge, South Kensington is a fashionable part of London. I think they have tried, in the past they’ve tried to do exhibitions for small groups of people down in Brick Lane and other, East End, but it’s not a very fashionable part of London for...it’s not an easy place to get to. And, it’s never been very successful.

Yes, because I’ve, I hadn’t thought about the space, but, in a way, the V&A would have been a more appropriate place.

Yes, but the V&A doesn’t have space, except inside the V&A, and the V&A inside is, exhibitions, exhibitions of other things, not fashion. No no, that’s... No the V&A... Well the V&A is a very prestigious name, very prestigious exhibition building, but... They didn’t use the inside of the Natural History, they put these marquees up in the forecourts outside, they’re in the open gardens. And that’s where the space was. So you have to find a place, you know, sort of parks or gardens or lawns where you can fit marquees in between trees, and, get space, and you can’t find that very easily.

Could I ask you about when, when you began to lose your sight, you know, when did you realise that your sight was going?

Percy Savage Page 259 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21)

Well it all happened very quickly. I was in London just before Christmas, still used to buying three or four papers every day, and doing the crossword puzzles before lunch. And I went away for Christmas, and when I came back from my Christmas holidays, I’d been to Gozo, near Malta, and when I came back I couldn’t read the television screens in the airport to see where my flight left from. I suddenly realised I couldn’t see. It happened very quickly. So I came back to London, I went to see my GP, who said, go and see your optimist[sic]. And so I went to see the optician, who examined me and said, ‘This is a matter of days, not weeks. It’s very urgent, and, go immediately to the Middlesex,’ and so on. So I went to the Middlesex and saw six different doctors there in one afternoon. And then I went to the Moorfield and saw two different doctors, and they both said it’s called macular degeneration, and it’s irreparable and irreversible. It happened very quickly, it happened within, just a couple of weeks. Very very quickly.

So when was this?

About, nearly six years ago. And of course it’s a big handicap. It prevents me from being able to read a lot of things, and prevents me from being able to see television properly. So I sort of listen to the radio, and I listen to television. But, it’s, it is, it’s a big handicap.

And, is there any medication that you take?

No, there is absolutely no, no treatment possible whatsoever. It’s not like glaucoma or a cataract where you can operate, and have laser treatment and repair it; no, this is just... As they said, it is irreversible and untreatable.

And how did you feel when they told you this?

It was a big shock. (laughs) And, I went to the National Institute for the Blind, which was in, in those days was in Great Portland Street, and bought a white cane, and bought a, one of those little Chinese watches that you press a button and it tells you the time. Speaking clock. And I couldn’t live without them.

Percy Savage Page 260 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21)

And who, who told you about the RNIBA and things like that?

Well the doctors, when, at the Middlesex, when they wrote to me, they gave me the address, they said I should register with the RNIB, and I did, and went along to see them, and, registered with them. And basically it was thanks to registering with them that I then began to receive what they call attendance allowance, which is an extra, in addition to my state pension I get an extra £30 a week from the attendance allowance, which helps considerably.

Yes, because have you...have you been sort of, somebody who’s, you know, been saving for a pension throughout your life?

Oh, I had, from when I first started working in London, I had been contributing to the state pension, and then, also I started contributing to something else which was recommended by the accountant we had, Price Waterhouse was a very good accounting company, and they recommended that I should start a pension with what’s called Equitable Life, which I did. And, when I first started receiving that pension from Equitable Life, it was about £240 a month, and now because of the problems Equitable Life has, it’s down to less than £130 a month. So it wasn’t a very good recommendation. (laughs) I wouldn’t...I don’t know, it’s, it’s one...a great disappointment.

But do you, do you worry about money, have you worried, sort of, about money in your life?

Only when I haven’t got it, yes. (laughs)

Because thinking back to you working, you know, proof-reading as well as...

Oh yes, when I was...

...working at Lanvin.

Percy Savage Page 261 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21)

Yes. Getting a decent salary, and, from two different directions, yes. No no, I live on a different scale now. But, then I don’t think it’s... No no, I... I miss not having the money I had when I was a lot younger, but I’m...I cope, I manage. And then the, some association for the blind based over in Bermondsey Street in south London, they have arranged for some lovely lady who comes to visit me every second Thursday, and she’ll be coming along next Thursday, she comes every second Thursday to see me, and to help me with my mail, and to help me with correspondence, or various things that need attending to, and she rings up various people for me, and, runs after things, and makes sure that I get my forms filled in, and... So she helps considerably.

How did you find out about them?

I think they just found me. I mean, they just rang up one day and said, you know, ‘We do this and we’d like to send this lady along to see you.’ I don’t know how they found out about me. Might have been through the RNIB, I don’t know. But I’ve been seeing her now for about four years I suppose. Took about a year for them to find me, a year or eighteen months for them to find me.

You mean to, to... You don’t mean to find you literally, do you?

Well I mean, the association for the blind in Bermondsey Street, they didn’t contact me until about eighteen months after I was registered blind. The...I went to see the RNIB on the advice of the Middlesex Hospital about three months after I was registered blind, and then they possibly told this other group.

And does anybody go with you when you, when you have your hospital appointments and things?

No, I manage on my own, yes. Well you know I’ve just had an operation at the Middlesex and I was in there for a week, people came to see me when I was in hospital, but I managed to get to the, managed to get there on public transport, and back again. And I know my way there. The Middlesex is very close, and it’s in a nice part of London. So I, it’s an area that I know very well. It’s in what they call Fitzrovia, and, near Charlotte Street which is a street I like very much, got one or two Percy Savage Page 262 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21) nice restaurants, and one or two art galleries of people I know, so it’s a very nice part of London to visit. And it’s within easy bus ride.

And what do you feel about sort of, you know, the, the care you’ve received at the Middlesex?

Oh the Middlesex is fine. The operation I had, they were wonderful. They said I would go in there for four days, and, after four days they said, ‘No, we’ll keep you for another two days.’ And after another two days they kept me for another two days. But that was because I had a rather bad haemorrhaging problem. And then when it was over they said, ‘No, you can go now,’ so I came home and they gave me a couple of boxes of paracetamol for the pain, which are absolutely zero. And, I had quite a lot of pain for, at least two months, now it’s all, more or less all cleared up. But it was a, it was a complicated operation, and painful. But it’s all cleared up now fortunately.

Sorry, I don’t think you’ve actually said on the tape what it was for.

Oh it was an operation for cancer of the bladder, in the prostate. And it’s not an easy operation. Very painful. That’s all over now.

I was just wondering, because when, you know, one hears all these things about the National Health Service... Or did you go private?

No no no no no, it was on National Health, yes. No no, it was, it was on National Health, and they were quite, you know, quite, I won’t say wonderful, but they were very very caring and very kind and, the food was dreadful, but, other than that... (laughs)

Did you tell them that you thought the food was dreadful?

Oh yes, indeed, yes, no, the only thing I liked of their food was the soup, they had a good soup every day. A good soup for lunch, and a good soup for dinner. But the rest of the food was... Well first of all I couldn’t see it very well, and secondly it didn’t have any taste, so I mean I, basically didn’t eat very much then. Percy Savage Page 263 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21)

And, did...did the sort of, doctors sort of, know about your life at all? I mean, did they take any interest in you and your, your background?

No, I don’t think I told anybody at all, anything I had... All they knew was, I was blind, and, they were quite caring about that, and helping me. But, no I didn’t tell them anything about my past life. (laughs)

And did they comment on your lovely clothes?

Well they didn’t see many of my lovely clothes, because after all I was just wearing... (laughs) Practically naked in bed, and just with a sort of house gown which opened down the back. Which I had to hold, and, you couldn’t tie it so I had to, when I left and had to go to the bathroom, I had to hold, make sure I didn’t shock the nurses. (laughs)

What...well, you mentioned that you, you...again I think this was off tape, that you had bought a radio.

That’s right, a small little Sony, yes, the little portable radio which I took to the hospital.

And, what sort of things do you like listening to?

Well, here at home I constantly listen to Radio 4, BBC Radio 4, or, at the appropriate times I switch over to the news, sometimes I listen to the news in the morning, and always listen to the news at around one o’clock. And then, definitely in the evening the six o’clock news on the BBC, and the seven o’clock news on Channel 4. And then I switch off the television and go back to the radio. Although I believe this evening there’s, the first night of the Proms is on BBC1, so I think I might be listening to that, not...and miss radio and Channel 4 news. Because I believe it’s going to be rather wonderful tonight, the Proms. They’ve got the organ back into commission, which apparently is quite fabulous.

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And have you been interested in...well, apart from your...

Music? Oh yes. Yes, I think, more than most, yes.

And what sort of music?

Well, I knew many of the musicians in France when I was living there, I mean you saw Henri Sauguet, and I knew Francis Poulenc, I knew Georges Auric and Darius Milhaud. I mean I knew quite a few of the contemporary musicians in their time there. And, went regularly to concerts at the Salle Pleyel, the Salle Wagram in Paris, and, used to go to concerts quite regularly. Used to go to the opera quite regularly. And, various visiting opera companies would come to France and I would go and see, always go and see them.

And who would you go with?

Friends, and... And I knew, would always know many of the people in the audience, lots and lots of the personalities. In France they had a rather wonderful system where, they would have a, a first night, and what they would call the répétition générale, where they would invite lots and lots and lots of people to come along, but for free, and you would be invited to come along to that particular performance. Then they used to have what they would call la couturière, which was an evening where the designer, the couturier who, very often the couture houses did the costumes and clothes for a play, and the couturier would invite the, whatever it was, 1,000 people to come along to see his free evening. And I was very quickly put on lists like this for first night shows where I was invited for free to go along to the theatre. And consequently I would know half the audience, on either night, and so on. And, night after night after night I would be going out and, without necessarily having to buy tickets. And that happened basically with the commercial theatres, not necessarily the Comédie-Française, which was the national theatre for playing Molière or, other French dramas, but...comedies. But, there were many other theatres that did invite me, so I was very very into the culture side of French life.

And do any of those French composers, does anyone particularly stand out for you? Percy Savage Page 265 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21)

Well I knew Henri Sauguet quite well, and I knew Georges Auric quite well, and, Francis Poulenc I knew slightly, and I went to his...there was an opera of his given in London in the early Six...in the mid-Sixties I think, called the Dialogues des Carmelites, which was the story of the French nuns, the Carmelite nuns, and, their subsequent execution, guillotine. And I remember coming over for his, his premier at the Royal Opera House here. I used to come over occasionally to London for things like, to the theatre occasionally when they had...when Callas was singing in London I came over for her, and...

Was this when you were working for her?

No, this was before working for her. This was when we just knew each other socially. (laughs) No she was a lovely person to know. And I met her when I first went to Spoleto, the opera season started by Gian Carlo Menotti, who wrote opera himself and he started an opera season outside of Rome every year, we used to go down. It lasted for about a month I think, and, I would go down for about a week with other friends and meet other friends from all over the world.

So when, when did they start?

That was in, in the Fifties. That’s when I first met her, in the mid-Fifties.

Did you ever feel the need, or then, did you ever feel the need for solitude?

Oh I don’t think so, no. No no no. (laughs) No I was far too busy to be... No. And then also I used to come from France to England every year just to go to Glyndebourne, without necessarily coming to London. I used to take the train to Dieppe and then the ferry boat from Dieppe across to Newhaven, and then I’d get a taxi, and change in the taxi into my black tie, and arrive at Glyndebourne just in time for the curtain to go up. And then spend a week staying in Lewes, the little town near Glyndebourne, I would stay in a little place called the Lamb House, where a lot of the chorus used to stay. Because the stars all stayed in big grand hotels. And I would go to Glyndebourne rehearsals in the afternoon and I would go to full performances in Percy Savage Page 266 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21) the evening, and spend the whole week at Glyndebourne, and then go back across the Channel and back to France without coming to London. Or sometimes, or I would have somebody from London who would come down and I would take them to the theatre and, so on, I would sometimes invite somebody there. But prices at Glyndebourne were always rather high, so I didn’t invite too many people.

Do you...do you ever think about having had a career sort of, you know, in, in the theatre and in opera?

Well, I did have a, a slight sort of venture in the opera world already when I was in Australia.

Mm.

Because I worked as an extra in a visiting opera company, and...

That’s why I wondered whether...

Yes. And then again, later I went to the theatre quite a lot in France, but I didn’t actually work much in France, because of the language problem. I did a few plays in France, and I did a bit of radio work in France, I think I... I was the impresario for Sarah Bernhardt, the American impresario for Sarah Bernhardt because I spoke French, but I could speak with an accent, which wasn’t exactly an American accent but was a sufficient accent to be, pass off as a, it was an Anglo accent. But, no, I was too interested in fashion basically. And also I didn’t do a great deal of work in the theatre in France because, as I told you, I used to do a lot of work in the evenings working as a proof-reader, so it was, that clashed with the possibility of going on stage in France in the evenings.

So, you hadn’t mentioned being Sarah Bernhardt’s impresario.

Oh that was for, for the French radio. That was a play for the French radio.

Percy Savage Page 267 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21)

When... So... The other thing I wanted to ask you about was your, you mentioned having met Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia.

Yes, that was in the very early Sixties. I went to Addis Ababa with a friend called Boris Solomon, who was the president of the French fur traders’ association, and he was what they call a peltry, who sold pelts, skins of fur. And he went there with the intention of, he knew that there were, a possibility of finding, in the little villages, in the little mud huts of villages all over the country, they would have been hunting and killing leopards and cheetahs and other animals. So we flew there, and we got a little aeroplane, and flew basically from village to village, and we went around visiting the, the mud huts, and on the walls there would be, nailed up on the walls there would be these skins. And so we would haggle and buy them. And basically bought them for ridiculously low prices. And, they were then wrapped up in rugs and put on the backs of camels and sent off to Mogadishu in Somaliland, and from there they were shipped to, flown up to Italy, where the skins would be dressed and turned into leather. Sometimes you would find that there would be large patches of hair would come off, because the skins on the wall had perhaps been infested with flies that had laid eggs there and the maggots had eaten away at the leather and had eaten the roots away from the hair, so it was...but that wasn’t, didn’t happen very much. But you did have a few losses. But basically, the skins would then be sorted into different categories, first of all size was one important thing, then there was colour, because you would get the... And then there was the size of the spots. I mean the colours would vary from pale yellow through to, sort of orangey colour. And in order to make a coat out of leopard skins you need... [coughing] Basically you need the, the basic colours to be, and spots, size, to be similar. So if you had big spots on a pale ground, and small spots on a dark, orange ground, they couldn’t use them in the same coat. Or you would have, some skins would be so small you could only make a little jacket from it. And edge the jacket in black mink or something like that. But there were a lot of leopard skins used in those days, in the Fifties and Sixties and Seventies, they used lots and lots of leopard. Now today, it’s been banned internationally, and they don’t use so many.

So what, what set Boris Solomon off on the idea of going to Ethiopia in the first place? Percy Savage Page 268 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21)

Well he knew that’s where the skins came from, from Africa. I mean, Ethiopia was one part of Africa you could find them. South Africa was another part you could find them, in South Africa. Just depends where the natives hunted them. And it was always the natives who hunted the, the leopards, because the leopards would come and poach their cattle, so they went out to kill, or poison, they put down poison baits for the leopards to eat. And sometimes they would, consequently they would eat this, and just lie down and die, and, they’d lie down and die and half the skin would be on the ground and the other half facing the sky, and the part under the ground would be rotten, and you would only get half a skin. So that again was a problem, if you had to sort skins, and...

But did you actually see that happening?

Well I, I never, never actually saw them killing a leopard, no. Because when we got there, and we didn’t...we just went from hut to hut in the villages and saw the skins nailed up on the wall.

And who was negotiating with the villagers?

Well, we...Mr Solomon, Boris Solomon took along an Ethiopian guide to accompany him, and do any translating that was necessary.

And what was your role on these, on this trip?

Oh I was just taken along as a friend, I mean, he and I were very close friends in, he loved the theatre and he loved the art world, I mean, he had many friends, painters and artists and... No he was a very cultured man, and loved, loved the art world, and, had a big collection of paintings.

And what did you think when the fashion world sort of... Well I’m not sure it was from the fashion world, but the whole movement against fur, what did you think of that?

Percy Savage Page 269 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21)

Well I think it’s perfectly justified so far as what they call the spotted cats, I mean the tigers and leopards and cheetahs and jaguars and ocelots, I mean, very justified so far as that’s concerned. But not at all justified so far as minks and sables and Persian lambs and, things like that, no. You can’t...

Why... Sorry, could you explain?

And foxes. Well the foxes are all bred for, the minks are all bred for fur. I mean there’s...so they’re, they’re bred for a purpose, of making fur coats. So I’m not at all against fur, but I am against the use of any of the wild animals that are endangered species.

And, did that impact upon sort of, Solomon and your visits at all, or was that...?

Well that hadn’t happened yet, I mean, as I said, we went to Ethiopia in the early Sixties, I mean, anti-fur movement didn’t really get under way until I would say, about the late Seventies, early Eighties, that’s when it really started.

And where did you stay when you were sort of, visiting Ethiopia?

Oh we just stayed in a hotel, I can’t...I think it was the Sheraton Hotel in, in Addis Ababa we stayed in.

I just wondered whether you had stayed in the villages.

No, no no no, because when we visited the villages, as I said, we did that by a little aeroplane, we sort of popped in an aeroplane and flew out to a village and then flew back and then... And that would be, you know, some villages were in the north of Ethiopia, some in the west, and some in the south, I mean we took a little plane every day and went to a different village.

And how did you meet Haile Selassie?

Percy Savage Page 270 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21)

Well we met Haile Selassie through one of his sons who was in the import-export business, and with whom Boris Solomon was doing the business. Because you weren’t able to sort of, do these things unless it went through with a certain amount of official recognition. And, so, it was the sons who invited us to, along to the palace to meet their, meet the Emperor, the King of, what’s it called, the King of the...the King of Judah I think isn’t he called? Mm.

The Lion.

The Lion, yes, the Lion King. Mm.

And what was that like?

He was a nice little man, I mean, a very small little man, and, very jovial, and great fun. And we had tea in the garden, and, visited his private zoo with the animals there. That’s where I saw the little cheetah cubs and that’s when he said I could...he asked me, would I like them? So I came back to Paris with two little cheetah cubs, only about six months old, they were little, little kittens. And I had them for about six years, seven years.

How were they...how did you look after them?

They lived in the apartment with me, and I had collars and chains and took them out for walks in the street, and had to walk everywhere, because it was very difficult to get a taxi with two cheetahs on a leash, (laughs) and I couldn’t get on a bus with them. So basically I had...occasionally I would get a taxi, and take them around with me, occasionally I would get a cab to take them. Or a friend with a car, you know, if I wanted, they would pick me up and we’d go across town from where I was living in Passy, we’d cross down to the St-Germain-des-Prés and park the car and walk up and sit down in the one of the pavement restaurants, at the Café de Flor or the Deux Magots and, be the centre of attention for a few hours, and... (laughs) No no, they’re lovely animals. And very tame, very very very tame, and they’re... Cheetahs have paws like a dog, they do not have, like a cat or a tiger, they do not have what they call retractable claws, so they can’t climb a tree like a cat can, and they can’t...and they Percy Savage Page 271 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side A (part 21) just...and if they hit you like a dog, I mean they can just...there’s no...they don’t scratch you in any way whatsoever. They’re not at all dangerous, and they’re very friendly. They just lie down and purr. They’re very, make a very loud purring noise, like cats.

And did you have any problems bringing them back through customs?

[End of Tape 12 Side A] Percy Savage Page 272 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side B (part 22)

Tape 12 Side B [part 22]

Did you...when the Emperor offered them to you, did you actually have any inkling that he was going to give you, give them to you?

No, it all happened rather spontaneously. I think it happened... I think we met him on about the second day we were in, there, and we were there for about a week, and then we went back, as I said, we were invited back for tea, and had tea in the garden, and then he said, you know, ‘If you would like, you can have...’ I said, ‘Of course, absolutely.’ And they were a gift, I mean he didn’t sort of want to sell them to me, he just gave them to me. And they were put in a nice box and carried the box inside the plane, along with me in the, in the passenger seats.

And, I mean had you thought of owning...?

Never, no. (laughs) And actually at the time, back in Paris I had two dogs, I had two long-haired dachshunds, lovely little animals, one was called Nefernefer and the other was called Nefertis, and, they were about the same size as the cheetah cubs when they came back, so they all got on very well together and played together, there was no problem at all with the dogs, they all became very friendly immediately. And then when the cheetahs grew up, still no problem.

So what happened to the cheetahs?

Well, I eventually, in 1968, when they had the student revolution in France, I was staying with my cheetahs, and a friend in Normandy rang up and said, you know, Paris is in such a state, and, you know, it was just generally considered that it was going to close down, everyone...it was May, and then June, July, August everybody was going on holidays, and a lot of businesses actually did close down, business became very bad. And consequently, this friend rang and suggested I could come and stay down at her chateau in Normandy, but she said I couldn’t bring the animals because of the sheep, she had nowhere to put the cheetahs in a cage. And, so I gave them away to a zoo just outside of Paris, and they, they agreed to take them, I didn’t sell them, I just gave it to them. And then I know that they, eventually they bred, and Percy Savage Page 273 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side B (part 22) had young ones and so on. But that was, you know, that was over twenty years ago, so I imagine they...they’re probably still alive, I mean I think they live for a good twenty years.

And how did you feel about giving them, you know, taking them to the zoo?

Well they hadn’t...they had really become a bit of a problem, both financially and in other ways, you know, I mean, it was a bit of a bind having two cheetahs in Paris, because when I travelled I couldn’t take them with me, I couldn’t bring them to London, I couldn’t...and I was travelling quite a bit for business reasons.

So what did you do when you travelled?

Oh well I, I had a secretary or somebody who would look after them.

What do they eat, what did you feed them?

Oh lots of meat. (laughs) But I used to go to the butcher’s and just get lots of bones and meat and just feed them, and they’d chew on the bones, and...

You’d do[???] that yourself?

Spare ribs, and... No, I used to feed them, yes. But, it was a bit of a bind, so, finally it was, it was almost a relief not to have them as a responsibility any more. Not only that but the, it was only a year after that that I was asked by St Laurent to come to London in 1969 to work for the construction of and building of and the promotion of his shop in London, the Rive Gauche shop with Clare Rendlesham, and I did that, and I spent a lot of time over here and going backwards and forwards to Paris, so it would have been very difficult to have had the cheetahs in Paris and my not being able to look after them. So it was a bit of a relief.

And did you give the cheetahs names?

Yes, one was Jack and one was Jill. (laughs) Yes, they were a pair, male and female. Percy Savage Page 274 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side B (part 22)

And, who...the spaniels’ names, where...what...where did they come from?

The dachshunds?

The dachshunds, sorry.

Teckles. Mm. They, well, in France when, you have the sort of kennel club, you...dogs of good breeding have to be named after a certain letter of the alphabet. For instance, one year would be A, the next year would be B. And the year in which my little puppies were born it was the year N. So I called one Nefernefer, and the other was Nefertis, and they were both Egyptian princesses. And they were beautiful little dogs, and they were two little girls, so they had two little girls’ names. Because, I had a number of friends in Paris who had long-haired dachshunds, all from the same sort of, family of well-bred dogs, and we all did... I still have in France the, a friend who’s called Susan Train who’s the head of Condé Nast in Paris, and she has one called Gogo, obviously born in the year of G, Gogo. The only other Gogo I know was the daughter of Schiaparelli, her daughter was called Gogo.

And what, what memories do you have of Schiaparelli?

She was small, and dumpy, and, not a very elegant woman, but a very very vivacious and very amusing person, and a very hospitable person, and, great great great fun. I remember one particular lunch, I was having lunch with her at the Ritz in Paris, her couture house was on the Place Vendôme, right alongside the Ritz, and she was being taken to lunch by Horst, who was a photographer, and we went to lunch at the Ritz, and whilst we were sitting down at table, Chanel walked through, and Chanel loathed and despised Schiaparelli. And she came over and, without even saying hello to her, she began talking to Horst, who stood up and talked to her and talked to her and talked to her and talked to her. (laughs) And we just sort of sat there and watched these two talking, and Horst squirming, because he didn’t dare sort of sit down. (laughs) And Chanel enjoying every minute of just making Schiaparelli squirm. (laughs) Furious. No, but she was great fun, and she was a very amusing person. And I remember one night we, we were sitting at the same table at a ball given by Percy Savage Page 275 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side B (part 22)

Jacques Fath, the couturier, at his chateau outside of Paris in July, it was in 1956, and, it was the year when France had started a promotion for Egyptian cotton – not Egyptian cotton, I’m sorry, Brazilian cotton. And the Brazilian ambassador called Chateaubriand was at the ball, and we went, everybody sort of had some sort of exotic theme, it was a costume ball, and Schiaparelli had made herself a headdress like a toucan with a great huge long beak coming out over her forehead. And, I was sitting at her table that evening.

And what were you wearing?

I’d made myself a costume of tattered blue jeans and chains. I’d found some, it looked like very heavy chains but they were made of plastic and that manacled to the wrist and my ankles, so, I was... There had been a ballet in Paris called Les...what was it called? It was the story of the prisoners who, escaped prisoners in, in Brazil who sold, caught and sold animals, and the ballet was, there was a great huge centrepiece on stage of a fire, and the dancers came out from the wings and went up and they were... What was it called? Something la lumière, Prisonères de Lumière. And these butterflies or moths came out and leant up against the, the fire, the lamp, and then the prisoners came, the convicts came out and grabbed them and carried them off in order to sell them. So I went like one of those escaped prisoners.

Why do you think you chose that particular...?

Well it was a Brazilian, it was a very Brazilian theme, and it was inexpensive, and easy to make, just, denim, just a little denim jacket without sleeves, and trousers were ragged and looking...and that was it. It was an easy costume.

Do you...what... Because when you describe you life in Paris, it’s very wonderful and glamorous and...

Oh it was, yes.

...you know...

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They were wonderful years, the Fifties and Sixties, yes, mm.

I mean, what...what is the glamour of the sort of, English, London fashion world do you think, in comparison?

In those days that did not exist in London, no way, not at all. They still had their rationing in London, and they did not...they had couture houses, yes, they certainly had fashion houses making made-to-measure clothes, but they couldn’t compare either in style or quality. I mean, yes, in quality they could, they sometimes used the same fabrics that they used in France, but they did not have the same dash, they didn’t have the same...there were very few of the... I mean Hartnell was the best known name in London; Hardy Amies was another well known name. But I think the better designers, the best, I believe, the most famous of all was...now what was his name? He was in Carlos Place.

Michael.

Michael. Yes, just Michael of Carlos Place. And then, the two that I liked most whom I had as friends was, one was called Ronnie Patterson, Ronald Patterson, who was Scottish, and he was in Albemarle Street, and then there was John Cavanagh, who was in Curzon Street. And I thought they were the youngest and most stylish ones of all. But it was Michael who had the best reputation for being the best...he was considered to be the sort of Balenciaga of London, and did very beautiful clothes. But, London could not compare with Paris in any way whatsoever.

So why did you prefer John Cavanagh and...

And Ronnie Patterson?

Yes.

Well I saw them a lot, because when I came to London they were... I saw Michael occasionally, he invited me to his home once, he lived in Rutland Gate, and he invited me to his home once for a dinner party, with a couple of fashion editor friends. But, I Percy Savage Page 277 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side B (part 22) had known John Cavanagh in Paris, because he had worked in Paris, he had worked for Pierre Balmain, and then he was the nephew of Edward Molyneux, Captain Molyneux, the English designer who had a house in Paris in rue Royale. So I had known him in Paris for a few years before he came back and started his own company in London. So we were friends in Paris before he came to London. And then, other friends just introduced me to Patterson because he was a, he and his wife were very good friends of various other fashion editors and so on, and so I saw them a bit.

But I, I was sort of thinking about... Was there a period, or is there, or is it now, I don’t know, where you would use the word ‘glamorous’ to describe the London fashion scene?

Not really, no, I don’t think so. I think probably the...there were model girls who were glamorous, and the photographers like Norman Parkinson or Cecil Beaton would have preferred glamorous model girls and so on, but the, the average image of the British model girl was Jean Shrimpton or Twiggy, which no way could be described as being glamorous, I mean they were silly pretty little girls who were, you know, sort of, David Bailey types of silly photos. But not glamorous, no, they were not glamorous. But there were glamorous, there were glamorous girls, yes. Essentially the slightly older model girls. More Vogue than, than Elle magazine as it were. Vogue I think understood what glamour was, and, and certainly so did Harper’s Queen magazine or Harper’s magazine. And, Queen magazine was also, although they liked David Bailey as a photographer, I mean...and Parkinson, they did have Parkinson also doing photos for them, yes.

Did you ever meet Jocelyn Stevens?

Oh yes, I knew him quite well during the Sixties, yes.

And what did you think of him?

[coughing] He was brilliant, I thought he was great, great fun.

Because you mentioned that Clare Rendlesham had sort of fallen out with him. Percy Savage Page 278 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side B (part 22)

Yes she, they had a fight so she left.

Do you know what the fight was about?

Oh I... (laughs) I’m not sure, I don’t think, I can’t remember why it was, but I mean there was, it all happened when I was living in Paris and she was living, working in London. But all I know is that she was suddenly no longer there. And she just said, ‘He’s impossible.’ (laughs)

Because he has got that reputation, hasn’t he?

Oh yes, well Willie Landels was a one person who was able to stand up to him, Willie Landels was the art director for Queen, and he was... Other people who worked there, after Clare Rendlesham the fashion editor was somebody called Annie Traherne. And more than one person has told me that Jocelyn would sometimes shout, ‘Willie!’ And, after a pause Willie sort of said, ‘Sir?’ (laughs) And, Willie was... And after, eventually it was Willie Landels who negotiated the sale of Queen magazine to somebody called, Oliver something or other. He was a, a paper merchant, he was a man who sold the paper to Queen, and other glossy magazines. And then he eventually, Jocelyn...Willie stayed on as art director there, and it was this man’s wife who became the...Gloria her name was, and she became the fashion editor for Queen and she was zero. And eventually he negotiated the sale of the Queen magazine to Harper’s. And he went on to become the art director of Harper’s and associate editor of Harper’s, for quite a few years, and then he left. But Willie was always doing other things, he designed furniture and he’s designed, painting...he paints and has exhibitions of his paintings which are quite successful. And he’s still alive and well and... Although he’s actually remarried, he was married to a lovely lady called Angela Landels who was a portrait painter, and, did my daughter’s portrait which is next door somewhere. And, Willie is now retired from all of that, and just paints. And he’s remarried.

When did you first start going to India?

Percy Savage Page 279 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side B (part 22)

In the...I went there first in the Sixties, and again in the Seventies. Then, I went there with an Indian manufacturer who made a, who was an exhibitor, he exhibited his clothes collection with us at the London collections. And, he had a company called Phool, p-h-o-o-o-l, and he wanted to put on fashion shows in India and invite press from London to go there, so we got together a... He had a PR man called Tony Porter, who was married to a girl called Beatrix, who was the sister of Biba, the fashion house lady, Barbara Hulanicki. And Bea and Tony Porter did the PR for this man, this Indian chap, and we got together a, about ten different fashion editors, and flew them all out to India, and did a fashion show in Delhi at the Sheraton Hotel, and then we did a fashion show in Udaipur, that white marble palace in the centre of the lake at Udaipur. And then from there we went down to Bombay and did a fashion show at the Sheraton Hotel in Bombay, which is one end of the long, long, long, long bay of Bombay. And then after doing the Sheraton Hotel we then went to the Taj Mahal Hotel at the other end of the long bay, and did fashion shows there. So we were there for just over ten days, and did fashion shows in various parts of India, to promote his clothes in India, but also to promote to British fashion editors and so on who were based back here in England and who wrote about him because he had his collection here in England, selling to shops like Harrods or Harvey Nichols and Liberty’s and so on.

And what was it like working in India?

Well, I’ve always liked India and I’ve been going back many many times ever since. I was there again this year, and I was there last year, and I’m going back again next year. No, I love India, a very colourful country, very lovely people. There are far more people in India speak English than there are in the British Isles. I mean, there are nearly fifty million people in the British isles, fifty or sixty million people, but there are far more than fifty or sixty million people in India who speak English. And many many many people speak English.

And where in India do you go?

Mainly, parts that I like are the Rajasthan area, I like the, Jaipur, this year we were in Jaipur, and then another place called Pushkar. And then another place, we stayed in a Percy Savage Page 280 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side B (part 22) hotel called Castel Bijaipur. And, then, from there we went to an ashram in Brindavan, which is near Agra, and stay in the ashram, which is an ashram where the Beatles all went with George Harrison and John Lennon. There are photographs of them up on the walls of the ashram when they were there.

And what happens in an ashram?

Well the ashram was a big white marble palace, and it’s now an ashram which is a sort of centre for meditation, and people come from all over the world to stay there and meditate and... The whole city is, is a vegetarian city, they don’t eat any meat whatsoever, no chicken, no goat, no meat, no camel, no, anything. And, they, in the ashram neither smoking nor drinking is permitted, although I must say I arrived with my litre of vodka and a carton of cigarettes and, and just, they don’t mind. (laughs) As long as I don’t do it in public.

And how do you meditate?

Well I don’t meditate really, I mean I... They do. I mean I just stay there and... But the people I stay, the people I stay with, they find an apartment for me in the ashram which I share with Marcus, and, we get up in the morning and go out and have, find a little coffee shop and sit and have tea. And, or...I usually have tea with ginger, ginger tea or just tea, lemon tea. And then, go back and have lunch at the ashram, because they have a canteen down on the ground floor of the, of the white marble palace. And the ground floor is a huge ballroom with a theatre stage, and they put on concerts and dancing there, and, so on. It’s very, a very nice area. And the white marble palace has two floors above where people live and work. The man who runs it is, is an Indian who was a professor at Harvard, and who writes books, and the friend I know living there and who enabled me to stay there is a photographer called Robyn Beech, who used to live and work in London, and then she got married to a chap that worked for me, and they now live and work in this ashram.

So, was there a sort of, or did you ever come across any, any sort of racial prejudice in the fashion world or in the sort of, world you’ve moved in?

Percy Savage Page 281 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side B (part 22)

Certainly never in Paris, I never came across any racial prejudice whatsoever, and in London, no, because we, we have designers here who, Bruce Oldfield is a Dr Barnardo’s boy, and he’s black, and there’s never been any racial prejudice so far as he’s concerned, and, no I don’t think so.

Well, is there anything that, that you would like to, to say that I sort of, either haven’t asked you about or that, that you feel you would like to say on tape?

[laughter]

Oh. [pause] I’m sure there are lots and lots and lots and lots of different things that we haven’t touched upon yet. I mean, all I can say is that I’ve been very fortunate to live in Europe during the time I’ve been here, and also to have travelled and seen so much of the world that I’ve seen. I’ve travelled a great deal to many countries. The trips to China were wonderful, the trips to America were wonderful, the trips to Russia were wonderful, and all the little local trips in Europe were wonderful, and it was all, all been a very exciting, very wonderful life, I couldn’t, you know, speak more highly of it, and recommend it to other people, if they want to have fun, get into the fashion world and, either become a designer or become a promoter or, and PR’s a wonderful industry to work in, as is I think the fashion journalism. I don’t think journalism in general is a nice industry, but I mean fashion journalism certainly is.

What nationality do you feel you are?

I still feel very French, because of the long long long long period I spent in France, and the many many many many influences that came into my life in France. The fact that my French is pretty fluent and pretty good. And, I very often think in French, or, automatically start swearing in French, like, dare I say, merde rather than something else. But, no I feel very, beau[???] French really. And then when I go back to Australia I feel very English. (laughs)

And what sort of passport do you have?

Percy Savage Page 282 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side B (part 22)

I still have my Australian passport. It’s a good passport, and there’s no reason why... If I, I could have become, I could have had a British passport many years ago, but, if I were to have a British passport I would now need a visa to go to Australia, and, I don’t think that’s necessary, so, no problem living here with a British passport, no problem in any way whatsoever. I’m a resident of the UK and there’s no problem at all. No no, I intend to keep my British passport. There was a time in France when they did offer me a French, they said I could become French if I wished, and I was thinking very seriously of it, but then I found out that if I did become French I’d have to do my military service, and I didn’t particularly want to do my military service in France. (laughs) So I decided to stay Australian.

So when was that, and when could you have...?

Oh that was in, that was back in the Fifties, when I’d had, already had the various, carte de séjour ordinaire and then the carte de séjour privilégié and so on.

So who suggested it?

Oh, just the French people, the Prefecture, you know. When I went along for my, to renew my cartes de séjour. Because the first one I had was called a carte de séjour temporaire, which meant it was for a year, and then I think I had a carte de séjour, after that a carte de séjour ordinaire. No, a carte de séjour temporaire meant that I could only live in Paris, I couldn’t live or work, essentially work, outside of Paris. And then the carte de séjour ordinaire was for three years; and then after that I got a carte de séjour permanante, and privilégié which meant that I could live or work anywhere. And it was then when I went for the renewal they said, ‘Well if you like you can become French, you know, you’ve been here long enough, you can become French.’ And I thought that was rather fun, but I mean, then when I found out I’d have to do my military service, no no no no no. (laughs)

Just one last question from me really. What has the difference if any been for you between doing the film and doing this recording?

Percy Savage Page 283 C1046/09 Tape 12 Side B (part 22)

Well this is very much a one-to-one person, whereas the film was always involving other people, like, Givenchy and Pierre Cardin and Bernard Trux and Susan Train and Barbara Hulanicki and Eleanor Lambert and Mary Quant and Casey Tolar, various people, where I was involved with them and they were involved with me. So, and I think it’s interesting for the film that other people can give their point of view about me and my life and what I did and what I didn’t do. I’m looking forward very much to seeing the film. It’s supposed to be finished within about ten days. I think it’s... Joanna Lumley is doing the voiceover for it. And she’s doing that on the 28th of July, so, in a very few days it’s going to be over and finished. Then I’m looking forward to listening to it. I won’t be able to see it, but I’ll be able to listen to it. (laughs)

Do you think you’ll listen to these tapes?

I’d love to. I’d love to, yes, indeed. I’d love to know, who else will listen to these tapes and how do they have access to them.

Well I’ll explain that to you.

Yes, because I mean, there might be other tapes of other people that I’d like to go along and listen to if I knew who they were.

[End of Tape 12 Side B]

[End of Interview]