This will be a long winded email so before I begin, let me tell you some immediate news. The design a silk scarf competition is now open with entries closing off September 1st.
Have you ever wanted to see your art as a piece of wearable silk? Now is the time to get cracking. And we will send you one of your scarves once printed along with 1000 aud to wired to your account. You can wear it as a scarf in a myriad of ways, you can use it as a top (I suggest for ladies), as headwear, as a face mask in snow and dust. Or, you can frame it as I sometimes do and mount it to the wall. The choices are yours.
The criteria, anything you want to submit by design but the artwork needs to be 90 x 90cm and loaded into a PDF, AI or PSD file for us to be able to print it. And when it comes to PSD we will have to assess the file quality - some of you will be able to produce therefore in Procreate or Adobe Fresco but do some research before you begin.
When I started this business I had wanted to be like Chateau Mouton Rothschild, supporting artists each year with collaborations, but over the years it wasn’t really possible for us to produce something akin to a wine label so instead we have run portrait competitions and now we move to designing silk scarves. I love to support and collaborate with artists. I have a limited view of the world and we have so many customers from around the world and have collaborated with illustrators around the world too. Like Clementine Chambon who, when I met her, was working for Marc Newson in Paris (designer of the much debated Ferrari Luce) and subsequently went out on her own.
It has been such a pleasure to collaborate with artists and illustrators and to see the wonderful portraits that have been submitted.
In other news, I just arrived back from Broome in Western Australia. The tidal terrain of red and rich earth and sea was a real eye opener, plus seeing the sun set over the ocean instead of rising as on the East Coast. It is wild there, I didn’t see a crocodile but there were plenty of sharks from tigers to reef and though I didn’t see a croc they were around, so leaving the boat when mud crabbing in the creeks was a no no. The town seems to be booming despite the rest of the country going belly up. It is a fascinating town where everyone seems to have an SUV, a trailer and a boat. Never seen so many and as the sun set on Cable Beach seeing so many vehicles decamp on the beach for an evening drink and watching the sunset was a real treat.
Then I have said as much on my Instagram, I am saddened to hear that Charvet has been bought by Chanel. This is to my mind the most historically significant menswear brand in the world and one of those independents that wasn’t answering to shareholders, that hadn’t succumbed to globalisation and a store in every major city. My pattern still sits there and I fondly recall when sitting with Jean-Claude in his office overlooking the Place Vendome and the Ritz Carlton opposite his fine honey timber walls, statues of jaguars, his coffee table and his book of designs here his hand had sketched meticulous designs. And, I recall the visit to his workroom on the 6th floor, the wall of whites in the shirting department and the general mist in my eyes when I glimpsed his window displays each time.
SEE MY FIRST FITTING HERE
The last time we met two Januaries ago for lunch he scolded me as we walked out the door for lunch, I had posted a photo of him he didn’t like, but we smoothed it over and he bought me lunch and we spoke of how small my business was but that I enjoyed what I did and that was enough for me. Maybe one day I will be a Charvet, but for the moment, given where everything is at, maybe not. I am on the wrong side of the world but I feel it has it’s advantages, rents are lower and there is less pressure and more creative freedom to some extent. I often sent him samples of new products I made and most often received a lovely email back such as I got when I sent him some of my worry beads when I first started making them.
I doubt very much when the Wertheimers take over that it will look and feel like the old guard that it was, will they try to place a store in Ginza, in Manhattan ? I hope not. The pilgrimage of the visit to the Place Vendome was half the joy of it all. A world of silk, a world of shirting. The first bespoke shirt I have from them was when I was a fat boy, so it is baggy now, but I have come to love that, a club collar, a white self polka dot, a particular turned back cuff with mother of pearl buttons after I asked Jean Claude to find me his most unique cuff. May it last my whole life.
Do you know what the funny thing is, I first learned the word of nipple in French, teton, whilst I was having that first fitting with my friend Corinne De Conti filming it all. I will hopefully post that up on Instagram if I can find the videos. Sad sad sad. The end of an era.
At least there might be some synergies as Coco Chanel used to be enamoured with Boy Capel’s Charvet perfume and shirts, so much so that she fashioned the Chanel No 5 bottle of it after Capel’s untimely death and, so it is said, her obsession with smelling his perfume to preserve his memory, but feel free to fact check me.
So, I have lost a hero, someone to aspire to be, a legacy I may never achieve. But thanks to you guys, I have made it to where I am so far, and maybe I will have a future. I don’t presume to know what will become of me. But, even if I don’t make it, I have, or I feel I have, achieved a lot so far.
Talk soon.
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