Exclusive! Behind the scenes from the BAFTAs!

13.02.12

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Paul Smith joins the Green Carpet Challenge and Lucy Siegle loses all objectivity.

If you’re looking for a dispassionate, even-handed assessment of British designer Paul Smith, look away now. Because, I LOVE him. And please do imagine ‘LOVE’ spelled out as in Paul Smith’s iconic LOVE Too design for the Rug Company. This world famous designer who has the Midas touch (with stripes, rather than gold) is absolutely my cup of tea.

For starters he is a fibre anorak. ‘I mean this merino fibre is so lustrous, so lively!’ he says showing me the beautiful black tuxedo he has just made for Livia Firth to wear for the BAFTA's as part of this year’s Green Carpet Challenge (more in a second). ‘This is the long fibre from under the belly of the sheep. Everything is done as ethically as possible, even the water they use in the dyeing, to the finishing process.’

Photograph by Will Whipple 

Yes, in this age of  super-fast fashion where the UK wardrobe in particular has been swamped by a tidal wave of high street fashion ‘values’ that involve consuming at speed, slavishly pursuing micro-trends and putting low cost above all other factors, it is liberating to hear a designer talk so passionately about fashion basics.

CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL PAUL SMITH GALLERY

‘I’m old school,’ he says without apology, ‘I’m probably rare in the industry now in that I know what a barathea, a gabardine or a twill is.’ (Don’t worry, I did have to ‘Google’ barathea too). He credits his wife, Pauline for his sane and sustainable take on fashion, ‘She studied at the RCA in the 1960's, one of the last to study fashion design from the couture age. She taught me. I mean, she was my teacher!’ Oh Really? I sense some scandalous teacher-student liaison back in the 1960's, ‘er, no not in an official college sense!’ he laughs. ‘I mean, she taught me how to make clothes beautifully and the importance of setting a standard. When I met her I went to night school and studied tailoring’.

Photograph by Will Whipple

And my goodness, this man loves tailoring. ‘Just pop that black jacket hanging behind your head in here will you, my darling?’ he calls out to one of many young, beautifully (but casually) attired members of staff who sit next door. She duly pops in another black jacket. Yes very nice. It hangs beautifully. But a black jacket non-the-less. ‘But look at this,’ says Paul flipping up the lapel for the Big Reveal. ‘Pad stitching. As you stitch the lapel you pull the stitches tighter, to give the lapel a little roll’. And there they are - neat little rows of tiny white stitches secretly doing their work behind the scenes of this perfect jacket. They look like little jewels. And in the days when this effect is usually badly replicated by cheap, glued-on interlining, they are just as precious.

Photograph by Will Whipple.

‘You know it’s so funny now,’ he says looking around his office where stacks of books grow from every surface, topped off by  colourful trinkets and a full sized felt bicycle leans against the wall, ‘but when I was 15 and went to work in a Nottingham clothing warehouse (he left school on the Friday and began work on the Monday) I thought my boss was a fool. He used to give you a right telling off if the lights were left on in an empty room and when you got a parcel in, you weren’t allowed to cut the string. You had to carefully un-knot it so it could be used again. Now I find myself using him as an example of how to conserve resources and do things right.’ Indeed his devotion to recycling verges on the religious and as he gives me a whistle-stop tour around Paul Smith HQ – technically this man is a pensioner, but never has age been so irrelevant given that I have to jog to keep up with him – I spot lots of little note pads constructed of piles of ‘waste’ paper.

CICK HERE FOR THE STORY ON LIVIA'S ARMANI GOWN AT THE GOLDEN GLOBES.

All of which brings us back to the Green Carpet Challenge where Paul Smith was a natural collaborator. Working to GCC criteria, he was able to source the right ethical wool from an Italian mill that he has worked with on a daily basis for many years, ‘They’re an Italian mill that’s very conscious of the world, climate change and ecology,’ he says, ‘They just have a good attitude.’

Photography by Will Whipple.

For Livia to wear to the BAFTA's he elected to make a dress suit, showcasing the famed tailoring skills of his brand. ‘It’s such a beautiful contrast to the more Cinderella gowns I’ve been wearing,’ said Livia as she tries on the very sophisticated and beautifully cut tapered trousers and tuxedo in an ante room. Tom (a young trouser cutter trained on Savile Row who now works for Smith) stands back and briefly allows himself to admire his handiwork. ‘Oh, my goodness, the button’s fallen off!’ he exclaims, before chasing the offending fastener under a chair. ‘I can sew that back on,’ says Livia, ‘where’s the needle and thread?’ ‘Oh, no no. Let me do it,’ says Tom who is rather famed for stitching. At least half a dozen others including Paul Smith volunteer too. ‘I’ll do it!’. ‘No I can!’ And so it goes on. We had found the one room in London where everybody loves sewing.

CLICK HERE FOR ALL THE GREEN CARPET CHALLENGE STORIES.

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