Paul Harnden started out as a shoemaker, more than 25 years ago. He’s all about handcrafted items and an old school style of manufacturing. The first time I visited Dover Street Market (a ‘department store’ by Comme Des Garçons in London. www.doverstreetmarket.com) I saw a pair of shoes, brilliant in style and making, I would have loved to buy them, even if only for looking at, like pieces of art. Laced up, old-fashioned, low booties with wooden heels…I can still picture them. I was so excited, I forgot to write down the name on the label, but I am quiet sure they were of the collaborated collection of Paul Harnden and Comme des Garçons…

Some time later, I visited my friend, who works in a designer store and showed me the new brand the store was selling; Paul Harnden Shoemakers. She told me, the designer used to be a shoemaker, who now also created a clothing division. The clothes silenced me completely, brilliant, beautiful, phenomenal, genius… The level of craftmanship is beyond compare!

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Pictures above from:    (http://le-21eme.com/category/designers/paul-harnden/#/page/1)

In an interview in 2010, John Galliano said: ‘He’s an English boy… he’s very Greta Garbo. He does rough kind of tweed and stuff. I buy all my stuff from him. I believe he lives in England by the sea.’

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By now more is known about Paul Harnden. He was born in Canada, lives in Brighton, England and is pretty willfully obscure. His company, Paul Harnden Shoemakers ltd’ sells to a tiny, elite, culty group of stores, like Dover Street Market in London, Envoy of  Belfast in Ireland, If in Soho, L’Eclaireur in Paris and Van Ravenstein in Amsterdam. His aesthetic is very wrinkly, fantastically well-made clothes and handmade shoes inspired by Civil War, pre-Industrial Revolution  /English country and Amish.

In 2000 he started his clothing division, Paul Harnden Clothiers with co-founder Elena Dawson, she was an instrumental part of the design, concept and business until 2006, when she started an independent clothing and shoe label. www.elenadawson.co.uk

Lately Paul Harnden is ‘getting out there’ a bit, like at the release party of Some/things magazine chapter005 at Dover Street Market  november last year, where he presented his super 8 film ‘Pattern mill’. He gave his first ever interview to Derek Thomson and talked about the pattern mill & its director, Gordon Hawley. In the interview comes very clear his passion and admiration for craftmanship…

[…DEREK THOMSON / HOW ABOUT YOUR CLOTHES, WHERE ARE THEY MADE?
PAUL HARNDEN / THERE ARE THESE SMALL MILLS IN ENGLAND WE WORK WITH. THEY DO TEST WEAVING BASICALLY. WE COME UP WITH AN IDEA, A DESIGN, & WE GO TO OUR WOOLEN MILL & THEY GO TO THE PATTERN MILL TO HAVE IT WOVEN UP, ON A VERY NARROW LOOM. THEY’LL DO A SAMPLE OF JUST A COUPLE OF YARDS. I’LL SAY ‘I WANT TO DO A HERRINGBONE WITH THESE PURPLE & BROWN COLOURS, & WE WANT TO RUN A STRIPE OF RED THROUGH IT. I WANT TO SEE IT IN A FEW VARIATIONS ON THAT THEME.’ THEY’LL RUN A FEW DIFFERENT COLOURS THROUGH A TEST PIECE OF CLOTH THAT THEY PUT ON THE LOOM— IT’S CALLED A BLANKET, A PATTERN BLANKET. IT’S A SINGLE PIECE OF CLOTH WITH 12 DIFFERENT COLOURWAYS. DID I SHOW YOU one WHEN YOU CAME IN HERE?
DT / YES. IT WAS A DARK GREY WORSTED. IT WAS FASCINATING. SOME OF THE SHADES I COULD BARELY TELL THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN. BUT I IMAGINE WHEN YOU LOOK AT IT, ONE JUST FEELS RIGHT OR NOT.
PH / YOU GET A FEELING, AN INTUITION. IT’S LIKE ALCHEMY, BECAUSE WHEN YOU CHANGE one SHADE, OR one WEAVE, IT CHANGES IT COMPLETELY. I FEEL AS IF I SHOULD HAVE DONE A DEGREE IN WEAVING & FABRIC TECHNOLOGY, BECAUSE I’M TRYING TO DESIGN CLOTH & IT’S GOING THROUGH A DESIGNER AT THE WOOL MILL, WHO THEN GOES TO A PATTERN MILL, & THE IDEAS CAN SOMETIMES MISS, & SOMETHING COMES BACK & IT’S COMPLETELY DIFFERENT. IT’S VERY UNPREDICTABLE. YOU CAN’T IMAGINE & PREDICT HOW THE CLOTH IS GOING TO TURN OUT REALLY. I MEAN, YOU CAN TO A CERTAIN EXTENT, BUT IT’S STILL A LARGE MEASURE OF CHANCE & ALCHEMY. ANYWAY, IT’S A VERY LONG STORY ISN’T IT, THE YARN & EVERYTHING… IT’S TERRIBLE BECAUSE THE WOOL MILLS ARE RELYING ON THE YARN MILLS & THE YARN MILLS ARE RELYING ON THE FARMERS & THE SHEEP & EVERYTHING. IT’S A WHOLE CHAIN, ALL INTERCONNECTED, & IF one OF THE LINKS FALLS OUT, IF THE YARN DYERS OR THE PRODUCERS STOP, THEN THE MILLS ARE UP A CREEK. IT’S ALL GONE TO CHINA. IT’S BEEN DEVASTATED. THE DEVASTATION STARTED AFTER THE second WORLD WAR; IT JUST STARTED GOING DOWN AFTER THAT. IT’S JUST A MIRACLE SOME ARE STILL GOING.
  WE’RE PRODUCING A FILM ABOUT THE PATTERN MILL & ITS DIRECTOR, GORDON HAWLEY. IT’S JUST AMAZING THAT IT’S STILL HAPPENING LIKE THAT IN 2011. I MEAN, IT COULD BE A HUNDRED YEARS AGO, COULDN’T IT? THE MACHINES ARE ANCIENT. THEY’VE GOT ABOUT 40 LOOMS GOING AT ONCE. THERE ARE MILLIONS OF MOVING PARTS ON JUST one OF THESE LOOMS. IF JUST one COTTER PIN BREAKS, YOU CAN IMAGINE— WHEN IT GOES WRONG, IT REALLY GOES WRONG. & ALL IT TAKES IS A HEALTH & SAFETY GUY TO COME IN & SAY ‘WE’RE CLOSING IT DOWN, IT’S TOO NUTS’ & IT’S OVER. WE’RE MAKING THE FILM TO RECORD IT FOR POSTERITY. IT’S PART OF OUR HERITAGE. THESE THINGS TAKE GENERATIONS TO DEVELOP, & THEY’RE GONE IN A SECOND AREN’T THEY? I’M REALLY PROUD OF THE WAY THEY’RE WORKING THERE. I JUST WANT TO RECORD IT. THEY’RE NOT MAKING THAT MUCH MONEY, IT’S ON A WING & A PRAYER, YOU KNOW. & WHEN GORDON RETIRES, THE HISTORY IS GONE. THIS IS THE LAST PATTERN MILL IN THE WORLD…]
  www.someslashthings.com

Pete Cunningham commented on Paul Harnden Shoemakers post October 13, 2013

Just read your very interesting article on Paul Harnden…………..I worked with him, and Helena, in 2005 and 2006 when he was doing specially commissioned fabrics with Fox Bros of Wellington (Somerset), where I was Designer at that time.       He liked to go through the archive books (some dating back to 1779), looking for his ‘inspirations…..and he really could ‘tweak’ original new concepts from those old swatches….we made some amazing fabrics for him during those years.       The other thing that stands out for me, is that he used to take the fabric from us straight from the loom (unwashed!!!, unfinished!!!) which was almost unheard of because it is during finishing that fine woollen / worsted fabrics transform from a raw, rough commodity to a thing of beauty!! — not for him though, he explained to us that he would “bury the cloth underground for several weeks and let nature do the finishing work”!!! — which is how the fabrics achieve his ‘antique’ appearance.

Finally, I left Fox Bros myself in 2007, after six VERY interesting years, (so I don’t know if they are still doing fabrics for Paul) and I am now based in Yorkshire, near Huddersfield, where the old pattern weaving mill is located…….Gordon Hawley is now retired, but the mill is still going strong – now run by a very nice guy called Adrian (sorry his surname escapes me)……..in fact they are weaving some of the blankets I design for my current employer, Lassiere Mills, of Bradford.

Hope this info is of some interest, Pete Cunningham.

Paul Harnden

A while ago my friend asked me to join him to go to The Battle of Les Sapeurs. I didn’t know what to expect and he had to convince me to come. I am so glad he did, because it was a fantastic spectacle.

The battle was between dressed up and  overdressed  flamboyant black man showing of their outfits. They didn’t even bother to take of the price tags, or rather show of the price tags and  the labels inside the clothes. Lots of Dries van Noten, like the man in the pink suit, Gucci, Cavalli, Yohji Yamamoto and Prada. One of the Sapeurs must have been inspired by John Galliano’s look… It was a hysterical and funny event. I wanted to know more about this phenomenon.

In 1922, G.A. Matsoua returned from Paris to Congo with a suitcase filled with French clothes and became the first known Sapeur. But the SAPE cult of style movement, Société des Ambianceurs et Personal Élégants, got really popular in the 1960s and 70s thanks to musician and singer Papa Wemba, who traveled multiple times to Paris to buy French fashion and developed an exaggerated and flamboyant style of dressing.

A Sapeur is a non-violent person and stands for an exquisite morality. They represent an illusion, supported by the government itself, trying to normalize a post-war situation. The SAPE interrupted its activities from 1997 till 2002, because of the civil war.

Sapeurs hold to European Haute Couture as religion, which is practised in absolute serious. Old school Sapeurs saved up years to be able to afford outfits. They often started out renting or borrowing suits. The younger generation doesn’t want to wait that long and aren’t fussy when it comes to a source of income.

Being a Sapeur is very expensive, so the dark side of this movement is the length some Sapeurs go to get their expansive clothes. Some have resorted to illegal means to obtain their suits and even have spent time in jail. Papa Wemba himself has spent time in jail, because he illegally smuggled Congolese man and women into Europe for a shopping spree, disguised as members of his band.

Within the SAPE movement are rivalries and affiliations, Paris versus Brussels, Brazzaville versus Kinshasa and Bacongo versus Mungali. This expresses into total fashion warfare… The Brazzaville Sapeurs follow a three colours rule and in Kinshasa it’s all about  going overboard. It was at one of these battles, I got introduced to Les Sapeurs.

 Sapeurs consider themselves artists and are respected and admired. They get invited to events such as weddings to add a touch of elegance. Being a sapeur is not only about dressing impeccable, it is about style and gestures too. The cigar is the ultimate symbol for the Sapeur, although some Sapeurs never smoke their cigars.

Ofcourse there is a contradiction between the poverty in Congo and the eccentricity and extravagance of the Sapeurs, but in this post I look at the SAPE movement from a fashion point of view. To read more about the political and cultural background go to

www.soulsafari.wordpress.com/tag/les-sapeurs/

Book

‘Gentlemen of Bacongo’ ,with a introduction written by Paul Smith.

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to order :   http://www.amazon.com/Gentlemen-Bacongo-Daniele-Tamagni/dp/190456383X

Kirsten Owen has been my favorite model, since the first picture I saw of her. I am pretty sure it’s the picture above, by Peter Lindbergh, for Vogue Italia. What makes her so special to me is difficult to explain, but I’ll try..

She started her modeling career at the age of 17 , when she almost immediately appeared on 3 different covers of ELLE magazine at the same time, in Italy, France and Spain. Something unheard of for a newcomer in the business. Photographers love her for her eyes and androgynous appeal and designers for her ability to add something extra to the clothes, a quality not many models have… she is not just a pretty woman.

I like her, because she has a punky glamour, naturel beauty and  mystique in her face. When showing Haute Couture, she makes it look more ‘wearable’. In portraits she captures my eyes and makes me wonder what on her mind. She can make basics look like high fashion and high fashion less extraordinary…

I just want to show some of her work, because I admire her beauty.

Two years ago, I travelled to Japan for the first time and fell in love with this country. Not only for its beauty, but also because of the incredible inspiration you sense everywhere around. During my stay in Tokyo, I went to the Mori Art Museum and in the museum shop I found a dvd that triggered me. The pictures on the cover are mystique and somehow I felt, I needed to buy it. Later, back home, I googled the dvd (I couldn’t read the Japanese text on the cover) and it is called: An Offering To Heaven. The two documentaries (2 discs) are such an inspiration!

The main person in the two documentaries is Kazuo Ohno, one of the most famous dancers of Japan and inspirator/developer of the dance style butoh, a dance with very slow movements. He studied athletics at university, started working as a sport-teacher and kept on teaching till he was 86 years old. After he saw a performance of Spanish dancer La Argentina in 1926, he also started studying modern dance. In 1949 Ohno opened his first dance studio and worked together with Tatsumi Hijikata,with whom he developed the butoh dance style. In 1977 Ohno travelled the world, performing solo ‘La Argentina Sho’,a butoh classic.

He stayed devoted to dance, even in his late nineties. Although he could no longer dance with his legs, he kept on dancing with his upper body, sitting on a chair or supported by an assistant. The first dvd ‘Flower’ contains footage of Ohno’s last performance in 2001 (he was 95 years old). A most touching performance…

On the second disc a documentary filmed in 2002, based around the life and work as  Ikebana master (Japanese art in flower arrangements)  Yukio Nakagawa, like Ohno a genius in his art, who devoted his life to flowers. Being kindred spirits, Ohno and Nakagawa collaborated numerous times. Both man were outsiders in their art and only in their later years did they get recognition. When, in the documentary, both men met again at a performance of Ohno, it’s moving to see the geniuses meet and feel so humble in each others presence…

Their last collaboration is a breathtaking performance in open air in  May 2002 on the Shinano riverbed, where Nakagawa builds a dream with millions of multi-coloured tulips, thrown out of a helicopter, as the wheelchair bound Ohno dances under the swirling shower of petals in the rain…

When I bought the album ‘The Crying Light’ by Antony and the Johnsons, I did not only love the music, but also the black&white picture on the cover. Later, when I was preparing for this post, I dicovered it’s a portrait of Kazuo Ohno on the cover of the album. Anhony Hegarty (singer-songwriter of Antony and the Johnsons) says Kazuo Ohno is his largest source of inspiration in  life and work. Spring 2010, a few months before Ohno died, Hegarty visited Ohno and his son Yoshito, a master dancer too, in their studio and gave a concert in Tokyo in honor of Kazuo Ohno, in collaboration with Yoshito…

 ‘An Offering To Heaven’ inspires me very much!!!  You can order it at:  www.kazuoohnodancestudio.com

Being a hopeless romantic, I love stories and movies about the Marie Antoinette period in history. Not only because they lived in castles and dined at candlelight, but also because (the rich) people  were beautifully overdressed and overcoiffed. Reading a lot about those days and their habits, rudely disturb my dream of life during those days…. To write a post about the famous hairdo’s, I had to dig into the way these hairdo’s were made and stayed well for days or weeks..

The specific hairdo I love is called ‘Á la Belle Poule’, which means an exact replica of a ship called Belle Poule was placed on top of an already ridiculously high hairdo. It was designed by Léon-Michel Guignace, as a tribute to the victory of this French ship over an English ship.

To create this hairstyle, a woman’s long hair was pulled up over a frame or a bundle of horsehair and topped of with the replica of Belle Poule. Other toppings were flowers, birds, houses or whatever was in fashion. To keep the hairdo in shape, it was necessary to use large amounts of hair pomade, made of beef fat (!!) and then covered with powder, usually from wheat or white rice, sometimes scented and dyed blue, pink or violet.

You can imagine what was happening inside these masses of hair, beef fat and flour, which of course couldn’t be washed and cleaned. Lice and other little insects had a ball in there. The men, who were also wearing large wigs, shaved their heads and could take of the wigs, which were than often cleaned by baking them in the oven! But the women preserved their hairdo’s for months and were therefore hosts for lots of lice and other pesticides. At diner tables often long-handled silver claws were laid out with the silverware, so guests could scratch the itches inside their coiffure!

But this was not the biggest problem of the French court… In those days there was a huge shortage of food and peasants could barely afford a loaf of bread, while at court, the hairdo’s of nobleman and women were dusted by servants with enormous quantities of flour. The poor, already angry about the extravagant lifestyle of the wealthy, finely exploded with anger about the waste of perfectly good food and started the French Revolution (1789-99).

Beautiful and inspiring movies about this period are Marie Antoinette by Sofia Coppola and Madame Pompadour, The Kings Favourite, but the best is Il Casanova by Federico Fellini. In this movie the costumes are even more lavishing and over the top, with fantastic details!

A few years ago, I was asked to do hair and make-up by a photo shoot for ELLE. The theme was Sailor Girl and for the portrait I painted a little wooden ship white and attached a white ribbon. My interpretation of á la belle poule….

Last year, the photographer got an email from a design academy student, who summoned her to take the portret of the girl with the boat on her hair of the internet, because she had stolen the idea from this student, who also made a photograph of a girl with a boat on her hair…!? The student claimed the idea and therefore had the right to tell the photographer to remove her picture…. Sweety, our picture was taken years before and the only person to claim the idea is Léon-Michel Guignace, who is long gone and buried!