Biba’s Brand New London Store Showcases Center Stage at the City Fashion & Textile Museum
by “You could eat, sleep and breathe Biba – you inhabit the world. You never had to leave the store,” says curator Martin Pel, head of fashion and textiles at the Royal Pavilion & Museums in Brighton, England, who worked closely with Hulanicki on the show.
Customers left – eventually – but kept coming back. Among them were Princess Anne, Twiggy, Brigitte Bardot, Julie Christie and Sonny and Cher. Mick Jagger was a fan of the Biba style, and even Keith Richards was known to wear Biba jackets on stage.
Pel has been engaged to Biba for a long time. In 2012 he was curator of “Biba and Beyond: Barbara Hulanicki” at Brighton Museum and Art Gallery. In 2014, he co-authored the book “The Biba Years 1963-1974,” with Hulanicki.
The exhibition, which runs until September 8, marks the 60th the anniversary of the first Biba store, which Hulanicki founded with her husband, Stephen Fitz-Simon. It focuses on Biba’s 11 years in business and Hulanicki’s pioneering approach to retail.
Democracy – and inclusivity – has always been on the lookout, from the first full cosmetic range for Black skin to the advertisements for Biba in the ascendant gay press (homosexuality was decriminalized in England in 1967) to the establishment of nurseries (day nurseries) Hulanicki. to her mostly female team, known as “Biba Girls.”
“The philosophy was egalitarian, and 95 per cent of the staff were women. There were a few van drivers who were in the way, but that’s it,” says Pel.
Hulanicki’s 360-degree approach extended beyond the store, with Biba selling diaries that included recommendations for restaurants, night spots, places to visit and suggestions on how to live the “Biba” lifestyle.
Fashion was at the heart of the story. Hulanicki began her career as a fashion illustrator, working for publications including Women’s Wear Daily, Vogue and Tatler, and began selling her stylish designs through catalogues, which will also be on display at the London show.
Photographers including Helmut Newton and Sara Moon shot images for Biba’s catalogues, and the graphics were distinctive. Hulanicki treated the catalogs like the pages of a fashion magazine, styling an entire look for her customers.
The clothes – in the catalogs and in the shops – were not only visible but they were cheap. Pel points out that if Mary Quant’s prices were around 30 pounds, Biba’s prices were 3 pounds.
“Schoolgirls could go in, buy these amazing clothes, and I feel like they’ve changed. They could walk down the street feeling like a movie star. That’s never happened before, and that’s what Barbara had in mind,” he says.
Pel also talks about Biba’s famous silhouette, with its tight sleeves and high collars. “People would say you couldn’t really do anything while wearing a bib. You couldn’t even open a window,” he says.
Pel believes the sleek lines came from Hulanicki’s background as a fashion designer. “She understood the impact of bold silhouettes without fussy details around the edges,” he says.
People were thinner in those days too. There was rationing in the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1954, which means that 16-year-olds were not going through the door of the first, tiny Biba shop on Abingdon Road in Kensington used to eat much.
Many of these thin clothes were made in the UK, in factories in the East End of London and with textiles sourced from mills in the north of England. Pel says Hulanicki used the best fabric she could, and the early Biba clothes didn’t even have labels as part of her efforts to keep costs down.
The show also traces the evolution of Biba’s style through the stores, which moved from Abingdon Road to Church Street and, finally, Kensington High Street, where the mood was a mix of Art Deco, Victoriana and Hollywood glam.
While Hulanicki’s first big hit was a simple shift in pink gingham with a cut-out back and matching headscarf, Biba eventually became synonymous with a more baroque style, and with saturated colors like aubergine, rust and gold, which were considered being unusual at the time.
Eye shadow and lipstick came in dark jewel tones, and full black.
The Big Biba store had a similar mystique. The windows were tinted and the shop fittings were created by stage set designers. Racks and shelves overflow with bow-tie blouses, piles of platform heels, and floppy hats. “It was retail as a theater — and a one-woman vision,” says Pel.
Stephen Jones, who worked with Pel on the “Stephen Jones Hats” exhibition at the Royal Pavilion in 2019, says shopping at Big Biba was otherworldly — like stepping into a Theda Bara film.
The miller remembers visiting the shop with his older sister and feeling overwhelmed. He was a young school boy then, and he remembers seeing printed fabric shoes with large toe loops.
“They were like Mickey Mouse shoes. Until then, I only knew school shoes — I didn’t know they could come in different shapes,” says Jones, adding that when he returned to the store years later, ” I felt like the most sophisticated person in the world.”
Hulanicki wanted everyone to feel that way.
In the exhibition catalogue, written by Pel and published by Yale University Press, there is a quote from Hulanicki from 1970. In it, she says that her aim was to “create an atmosphere of excitement. I think people just need somewhere to go, somewhere that isn’t ‘the land.’ They don’t have to buy, they feel happier for it.”
Retail therapy, ahead of its time.
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