If you were jetting of for a sun filled weekend in the 1960’s there was no better place to jet off to than the Hotel St Georges in Beirut. Home away from home for the rich and famous, also home to the best bikinis on the Mediterranean, this was the place to be. So sit back and enjoy the sun, sea and savoir faire!
Paul Poiret born in 1879 went on to become the driving force behind Parisian fashion in the early 20th Century. He trained with Jacques Doucet (another arbiter of savoir faire and style) and then left there for Worth (the doyenne of the haute mode), finally opening on his own in 1903. Throwing all the rules out the window of his Rue Arbor premises, he freed women from the restraints of the corset creating directoire style dresses with brilliant uses of colour, fabric and texture. Inspired by Leon Bakst and the Ballets Russe, Poiret’s style was a riot of orientalism and exoticism. Nothing was left untried. His sense of colour and texture were unrivalled, and the exotic was hunted out to try and then be unleashed on an unsuspecting public. Although appearing extremely complicated and extravagant the cut was on the other hand extremely simple, with dresses created from rectangles of fabric being draped on the body.
From abolishing the corset he went further with hobble skirts, "harem" pantaloons, and "lampshade" tunics, using the fabulous soirées he threw in his garden to promote such whimsies. His most famous soirée was The Thousand and Second Night party he threw in 1911 with himself playing the part of a sultan with his wife Denise dressed in a tunic dress playing his favourite slave girl. Apperntly she was carried into the party encased in a gilded cage, and then set free by her husband. In cases in which guests attended improperly attired, they were requested to either outfit themselves in some of Poiret's 'Persian' outfits, or leave.
His wife played a major part in his success, by being his muse, and modelling his creations.
Poiret’s aim was not only to influence fashion! He wanted to tell you how to live! Poiret's house expanded to encompass furniture, decor, and fragrance in addition to clothing. In 1911, he established the company Parfums de Rosine, named for his eldest daughter. Poiret's name was never linked to the company, but it was effectively the first fragrance launched by a designer.
He launched the Ecole Martine, named for his second daughter, to provide artistically inclined, working-class girls with trade skills and income. Martine provided furniture, wallpapers, rugs and every other decorating item for the complete Poiret look.
Unfortunately post war Europe and the public were not akin or sympathetic to Poiret’s style. New designers like Chanel (curse her) sounded the death knell for this fertile mind. Chanel designed smart functional clothes which women preferred. Poiret referred to her style as “poverty deluxe”. Legend has it that Chanel, dressed in black, once met Poiret and he asked: “Madame, for whom do you mourn?” She replied: “Why monsieur, I mourn for you!”
Poiret was out of fashion, in debt, and lacking support from his business partners, and he soon left his fashion house. In 1929, the house itself was closed, and its leftover clothes were sold by the kilogram as rags. When Poiret died in 1944, his genius had been forgotten. Luckily through a recent exhibition in New York we had the good fortune of looking upon a lost and forgotten empire.
As a footnote, one of my most prized possessions is a first edition copy of one his auto biographical works, “My First 50 Years”.
His style which was very austere and severe and almost brutal at times ended up being an integral part of modernist architecture in England during the 1920’s and 1930’s. His buildings and designs contrasted dramatically with the surroundings in which they were located in. In the setting of old London and other areas his designs stood alone and thus demanded to be looked at and studied for their own merits and then as to how they related to their surroundings. Even right through to the late 1960’s Goldfinger was there, and England is dotted to testaments of his legacy, like the Trellick Tower in London, one of the landmark attempts of high-rise residential living.
The façade of the Georgian mansion he updated for Helena Rubinstein’s new London salon on Grafton Street in 1925. was a triumph of modernist design. The salon was located in chic Mayfair. Goldfinger's original design included Madame’s name illuminated in lights, repeated four times down the side of the building, which Madame vetoed as she thought it bad taste. Goldfinger resented Rubinstein as being overbearing- an adjective often used to describe himself, however in retrospect, he could see how interesting she was. Stubbornly, Goldfinger forced through the starkly modern design which was to the taste of neither Madame or of her customers, nor indeed of the builders who tried to add decorative touches to Goldfinger's drawings in the belief that he must have accidentally forgotten them. Although he struggled even to be paid for the project, Goldfinger succeeded in building 'the first modern shop in London' with a fully glazed façade which is today's standard treatment.
The interior of the beauty salon was designed in a minimal way, with chrome and glass fittings faintly reminiscent of hospital interiors.
Sadly destroyed during World War II, Madame’s London Salon was redone in a totally different style. As usual Madame, had a knack for sourcing hitherto unknown talent and paving the way for their success.
Fast forward to 2003, where Sydney furniture designer, Johnny Charmaki, has used this series of paintings as inspiration to design a chair! This is art evolving and changing as how art should. Take something or an image that we are all familiar with and turn it into something else, while maintaining the original focus of the original work. Look at paintings and chair individually and that is what they are painting and chair, however put both together, and we have an evolving piece of work that spans 60 years. The parts of the chair carefully relate to Nolan’s paintings and Kelly’s gun battle scenes. For example there are three holes in the seat that relate to bullet holes in Kelly’s armour. The arms represent guns ready to fire.
True to the savoir faire style, I will have one please!
For all the wealth and privilege she was born into, she developed a true sense of self and ended up devoting her life to helping others, on somewhat reduced circumstances. During the Second World War in Greece, she worked for the Red Cross organization, helped organize soup kitchens for the starving populace and flew to Sweden to bring back medical supplies on the pretext of visiting her sister, Louise who was married to the Crown Prince. She organised two shelters for orphaned and stray children, and a nursing circuit for poor neighborhoods, and founded a nursing order of Greek Orthodox nuns, the Christian Sisterhood of Martha and Mary. Because of her actions, she was a puzzling enigma to her family with her mother the Marchioness of Milford Haven once saying, "What can you say of a nun who smokes like a chimney and plays canasta?"
When she died she left no possessions, having given everything away. Before she died she had expressed her wish to be buried at the Convent of Saint Mary Magdalene in Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem (near to her aunt Grand Duchess Elizabeth Fyodorovna, a Russian Orthodox saint). When her daughter, Princess George of Hanover, complained that it would be too far away for them to visit her grave, Princess Andrew jested, "Nonsense, there's a perfectly good bus service!" Her wish was finally realized on 3 August 1988 when her remains were transferred to her final resting place in a crypt below the church.
One retailer stands alone in the Strand and that is Aesop’s new flagship boutique. This is an incredibly stark modern space; however it goes far beyond that. Walk in from the highly ornate space that is the Strand, right into the 21st Century. However this is the 21st century with intimacy. You have to look beyond the overall design to see the subtle details that make this a warm and inviting place, which fits in perfectly with Aesop’s design aesthetic.
Forgoing decoration of any sort, the product itself is the decoration. Line upon line of product on curved shelves creates a piece of art which is constantly changing when product is removed or added by customers and employees. The wall of product has rhythmic quality that although very linear draws the eye in. The subdued lighting softens the hard white porcelain of the sinks and makes them extremely personal.
So next time I am back in Sydney, I know where I am headed, for a visit.
