by Sixty-nine-year-old Charles Gordon-Lennox, the 11th Duke of Richmond, is known for cutting a dapper silhouette. “I’m not a big fan of men’s casual gear,” he admits. “I don’t think it looks great. I don’t love a pair of trainers, let’s put it that way…”
I’m speaking to His Grace (dressed in a stunning 20-year-old suit) ahead of the first ever “Future of Vintage” summit, which he will be hosting at home on the Goodwood Estate this week, having invited notaries and your influencers. The likes of Paula Sutton from Hill House Vintage and Henry McNeill-Njoku from Known Source and Theo El-Kattan to join him to discuss fashion that was much appreciated. The agenda includes topics including authentication, availability and investment, as well as the barriers the industry faces and what can be done to help overcome them.
The summit comes at an interesting time for vintage fashion. During awards season, archival pieces were everywhere on the red carpet: Sydney Sweeney wore Angelina Jolie’s Marc Bouwer dress from 2004 at the Vanity Fair Oscars After Party, and Jennifer Lawrence co-opted a Givenchy dress by John Galliano once worn by Kate Moss the same. departure Even the high priestess of fashion, Dame Anna Wintour, has given her seal of approval to the movement through the next Met Gala theme, “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion”, which will see scores of celebrities wearing vintage pieces from the likes of Balenciaga and Dior. . And while most of us don’t usually have access to Yves Saint Laurent from the 1970s, that’s not to say there aren’t some great pieces available to buy second-hand.
For Duke it’s about vintage repositioning. It’s no longer something that smells a little off and has been left unloved in a charity shop. Rather, it’s well-designed pieces made to last. “Vintage clothing has to be of high quality if it’s going to last that long,” says the Duke. “I have some clothes that are 30 years old. It’s about self-expression, rather than ‘dressing up’, and there’s great joy in something that has history and stories to tell.”
Fellow Summit attendee Paula Sutton, who has become a social media star thanks to her penchant for vintage, agrees: “I’ve got jackets that are 30, 40, 50, 60 years old and not a single seam is out of place, yes the shape is intact,” she says. “Buttons can always be redone, but look for durable fabrics like tweed and wool, and check for stains and things that can’t be repaired as easily.”
Of course, the sustainability argument comes into it too – a big concern for Gen Z in particular. “It is an intelligent choice as much as it is a priestly choice,” agrees His Grace. “Second hand is a good thing now. It’s a cool thing, a responsible thing.”
“Encouraging people to buy more is very damaging,” says Sutton. “It’s so important to learn how to make sustainable choices, as well as normalizing that you can reuse and recycle.”
Although more closely associated with racing, the Duke’s promotion of vintage fashion makes a lot of sense. In 1998, he relaunched the Goodwood Motor Circuit with Revival, 32 years after the last engines had arrived under his grandfather. When someone suggested that the event – which focused on vintage cars from the day of the festival in 1948-1966 – should encourage guests to dress appropriately, some people were not immediately convinced.
“A lot of people thought it was a bad idea,” Duke says. “But it’s amazing. I remember the first few years we did it, people didn’t want to go home. They didn’t want to go back over the threshold and experience the real world, they wanted to stay in this little bubble.”
The Duke admits that they were lucky to have some of the biggest fashion trends of the 1940s-1960s. “That moment in the ’50s when everything started to get a little more serious, music started to play more of a part, men’s clothing became a little brighter – that was a great time,” he says. “Women’s dresses and men’s suits from that post-war period made everyone look amazing. I found a couple of suits made from vintage 1950s fabric.”
His daily uniform is a suit and if he could wear the fashions of any other era now, it would be the 18th century – although he admits to being a fashion fanatic growing up. “Now I wear a suit every day, it’s the most comfortable thing for me,” he explains. “Very high trousers, so nothing is tight around your waist, and it’s very hot.”
It’s also about supporting traditional trades. “If you’re lucky enough to have something made for you it feels completely different and looks very elegant,” he says. “I have three sons and they all enjoy doing something. It’s such a special experience, the amount of craft that goes into it and all those things are dying and we have to keep them going. I would love to be able to make shoes, or cut a suit myself. The skill to do that is an incredible skill.”
Growing up, Duke’s mother Susan was an avid dressmaker (“she had a lot of those Butterick paper patterns”) and knitted, although she didn’t make him clothes. One of his earliest fashion memories is of his grandmother: “For my eighth birthday she gave me a very grown-up cream silk shirt and cashmere cardigan from a children’s shop on Bond Street. I felt like I was 21, not 8.”
But it is a piece once owned by his grandfather, the ninth Duke, and perhaps the most valuable. “I have a little scarf that my grandfather used to race in,” he shares. “He wore white overalls with a white shirt, a tie, a pin, and then the whole thing was pulled together with a rather rough belt. He looked pretty strong. To finish everything he wore the Gordon family tartan on a printed silk scarf. It’s basically in shreds now but I still have it.” In fact, he was so inspired by the scarf that he asked Italian designer E.Marinella, who he says makes the best ties (“I’m actually wearing one now”), to recreate it for the anniversary of the Renaissance. He also had a number of jackets made for him, based on 1950s designs.
Now, his three grown sons, Charles, William and Frederick, raid his wardrobe. “My eldest son wears all my father’s shoes too,” he laughs. “That’s the joy of handmade menswear, you can alter them to death, so if you’re on the bigger side your kids can wear them.” Meanwhile his wife, the Honorable Janet Astor, is lucky enough to have inherited dresses from her mother, Bronwen, who was Pierre Balmain’s muse in the 1950s. “She had a wonderful collection of vintage equipment,” says the Duke. “We have some of that and my wife spends some of it at the Revival.”
When I ask the Duke about his legacy, and whether he would like to encourage a more sustainable way of life, he is modest. “The sustainability argument we are making is a big one,” he concludes. “The vision is that we can be a platform for people who really support this sustainable way of dressing and I think that’s a very positive thing.”
