Dame Zandra Rhodes: the fashion legend on living a life in Technicolor

0:05Hello there, welcome to Homing In, the podcast from The Modern House. I'm Matt Gibbard. Today's episode takes us to Bermondsey in South East London to meet the irrepressible fashion and textile designer Dame Zandra Rhodes. Zandra's home is definitely one of the most colourful and downright bonkers living spaces I think I've ever been in. We recorded this podcast just before Christmas, so there was an extra layer of sparkle on top of an already kaleidoscopic space, I must say. Zandra walked me through her incredible life story, So from being born during an air raid in 1940 to being discovered by American Vogue's fashion editor Diana Vreeland and then dressing people like Freddie Mercury and having lunch with Salvador Dali and Andy Warhol.

0:48We discussed why she dyes her hair pink and wears such flamboyant clothing and why she's never seen herself in the mirror without makeup on, which is just so fascinating. She told me about her colourful family history, including a dad she was embarrassed by, a mum who seemed to channel all of her ambition into Zandra, and a grandmother who was murdered. Zandra's in her mid-80s now. A few years ago, she was diagnosed with cancer and given only six months to live. So I must admit, I wasn't quite sure what to expect when we turned up, but I found someone who's so incredibly full of life, who's working as hard as ever, and just who's very, very optimistic about the future.

1:28So here it is. I really hope you enjoy it and happy listening.

1:38Zandra, welcome to Homing In. What a joy. So happy to be here in your flat, your amazing flat here in South East London. I want to start by asking you about your memoir called Iconic because it begins with, my name is Zandra Rhodes and I am a self-confessed hoarder. And I love that. That's just a good opening line. But tell me about that. Have you always been like that since you were a child? I suppose I have, and I've still got all the things that were around me, even the sort of doll that I had then. And of course, as you can see, I have my hoard of stones that's all here. So I sort of like end up collecting things.

2:15And there always seems to be room for one more. It looks like it. And what did you collect then when you were young? What was your first collection? Well, when I started to do the book, I suppose one of the first things is that I've got my doll that I happen to have in a box, rather crumpled because she'd been jammed in with another doll, but she was still there, hidden away. And then bits of old shoe and things. And you think, why did I collect it? But on the other hand, I hadn't got the heart to throw them away. So it was quite interesting when I started to look at my background of myself and think of what was going to go in the book.

2:56It was very interesting from that point of view. Yeah, yeah. So where was home for you? Where did you grow up? Home was Chatham, Kent. Then really a relatively small town, although it was considered a naval town. I mean, the ships were very small battleships that were in an estuary of the Thames. But it was sort of quite interesting from that point of view. Whereas poor old Medway Towns now is quite, you know, it's really a backwater. And what about the bricks and mortar of where you grew up? What was your house like? It was a block of four and we were in the middle of it. So it was four on the top of a big hill.

3:37And it had a parquet floor because my parents were ballroom dancing champions. So they danced on the parquet floor for their rehearsing. and everything. And it had a wonderful view of the downs that you could see from out of the back windows. So it was really quite wonderful. I love that. So is one of your early memories on the sound of dancing? I think my early memory is my mother always at the sewing machine and she did make wonderful frilly dresses. So she'd have been very good in those come dancing films. And they were Kent champions at one point. That's so cool. So tell us about how you came into the world, because it was a bit of an unusual arrival, wasn't it?

4:17It was in the middle of the war. So I was born in 1940 in the middle of an air raid. And apparently my father took my mother down Chatham Hill to the hospital and she lost her shoes on the way. And they had to walk because there was no, you know, it was the middle of an air raid. And so they walked down to the hospital to have me. so it sounds a very amazing adventure. That's incredible, isn't it? Do you remember anything of the war? I mean, so you were 1940, so there were five years. I remember what's called the doodlebugs when they made a funny sound and they went across the sky and then if they stopped making that sound, it meant the bomb was going to drop.

4:57So my mother would hold me up to the sky and let me see that. Not that I can remember much more, but it's something I can always think I remember. Really? Wow. A collective intake of breath, as that sounds. Yeah, wow. So what do we need to know about Zandra the child to understand who you'd become in later life, do you think? Well, our house overlooked the North Downs, and so you had a wonderful view down into the countryside, and then there was even a road with gypsy caravans and things like that. It was very exciting to see all the gypsy caravans. So it was semi-country then. I don't think there's probably any countryside left now.

5:38And what sort of character were you? I always think I was actually quite a boring child. I liked working. My mother used to do my hair in plaits, and I had what were called knockers where they come up and you have big bows on either side of your head. And I liked school, and I didn't mind wearing school uniform. But in the weekend, I loved dressing up in things that my mother had had in the school dress shows. So I'd go along in a pretty little sort of like a straw hat and flowers. And then I'd run through the park because the children would throw stones at me. But apart from that. Did you get, so did you get picked on?

6:16I think I got slightly picked on just because I look different. Yeah, yeah. But my mother would always say sticks and stones will break your bones, but names will never hurt you. Yeah, yeah. So just kept going. Were you okay with being different at that age? well when it came to coming to school and might if there was school open day because my mother was very exotic yeah and she'd come to open day and she'd wear green lizard skin platforms and a wonderful exotic hat and all this makeup and i say mommy please don't come looking different from all the other mothers but she always did because she taught at the art college and she looked wonderful and exotic okay what did you make of that then that sounds like you were you found it a bit much at times but sort of also admired it i grew to admire it later she was sort of a very special person and she was one of the most exotic people at the art college but at the art college i pretended she wasn't my mother because i wanted to be sort of ordinary and getting on with my work i mean she's obviously a huge influence on you your mum and in your memoir you wrote something that really stuck with me.

7:26You said, I am an extension of her ambition. What does that mean? Well, when I think about it, my mother always encouraged me to get on with things. So I was always allowed to just paint and draw and not told that I should go out and get a job or anything in the holidays. I could just sit and draw in my room and my mother didn't mind that at all. And so I was always sort of allowed to get on with different projects. Whereas my sister was great. She went to canning factories and all sorts of places. So what do you think that your mum's ambitions for you were? Well, when later on I said, oh, mummy, you'd have let me leave school if I'd have wanted to.

8:04She said, I wouldn't really. So she was the sort of person who I think she was good at handling the puppet and could manoeuvre and wanted me to go to college and everything like that. Really, I suppose it was her guidance that took me to an art college and encouraged me to draw, and then that was the art college that they did Saturday morning classes. So it was really my mother that guided me with hidden hands. That's a nice expression. She was the main breadwinner in your household, wasn't she? Which was probably quite unusual, no? I think when I look back, it must have been very difficult for my father, who was just a lorry driver and they'd met because he was very handsome and they did ballroom dancing and everything.

8:49But apart from that, they didn't have other things in common. So it must have been a very difficult time. What was your father like then? My father was like Elf Garnet, a very rough diamond. And when you see films of Elf Garnet, that was what my father was like, sort of always shouting around and everything. And I wouldn't have wanted this. You know, I think children are terrible snobs. I wouldn't have wanted to bring people back to meet him. but why not when you think about it now so why wouldn't you have wanted to bring people back would you worry about what he would say or what would it be yes if i'd knock at the front door with my friend jillian at this was when i was probably about oh seven and i say can jillian come to tea no she can't come to tea she came last week you know how much she could she have eaten she could only have eaten probably a few pieces of bread and maybe baked beans on toast but anyway I don't know why.

9:48Yeah, yeah. Okay. So your mother was very flamboyant, getting back to her. In the book that you say that she had out-of-body experiences, which I found fascinating. Tell me about that. She said she could sometimes see herself as a cucumber or something in a strange room and all sorts of funny things like that. She didn't like doing it, but she said it happened to her quite often. When you say like doing it then, was that something that she sort of tried to? I think it came upon her. And of course, my mother's sister-in-law was actually a medium called Ina Twigg. And right at the beginning of my career, a lot of Americans used to want to go and see my aunt, who used to have seances and talk to people from somewhere else.

10:35Okay. And have you inherited any of that? She came to my house once and she said, Sandra, I can see flames going up the wall behind you. And I said, Aunty, you're coming as my auntie. I don't want to know. And I don't want to know anything about it. Wow. You sure she wasn't just looking at your paint effects on the walls? She might have been when I look at it now. I can see a lot of flames coming out the back of me. And your grandmother was murdered. Is that right? My grandmother on my father's side. But I mean, her husband, what would have been my grandfather, was in the army somewhere. And they took in lodgers.

11:13and there were several lodgers and she had an affair with both of them and one of the lodgers killed her and severed her head apparently and that was in all the newspapers. And in somewhere like Chatham it was a very, very small town so it was in the newspapers. But I never learnt about that until my sister's granddaughter looked it all up on ancestry. So do you think, was all that kind of stuff concealed from you then? do you think we just wasn't spoken of it wasn't spoken of and because i admired my mother so much i think my father really got probably a raw deal really i think in he didn't get accepted for what he was really because i was always driven by my mother's ambition and you know that that of going forward and doing my work and being encouraged all the time and my father was just in the background and didn't talk about it.

12:13Okay what do you think your mum wanted you to become or what career does she want for you? I think she was very pleased that I went into art and she was very pleased that I was usually the top of whatever I did and I obviously like my work and I think I'm probably the culmination of my mother's ambition more than anything else. Yeah. What about your ambition, though? Well, I think it was mine, or maybe it was my mother's hidden when I look at it. But, I mean, I can't complain. I'm very happy that I've been able to live through doing my work and fell in love with doing textile design, and textile design led me to everything else.

12:56Why do you think they called you Zandra? Because it's quite an exotic name, isn't it, for a girl from Chatham? My mother was going to call me Zandra with an X. Like when you write Alexandra and it's an X. Okay. My grandmother said no one will ever know how to say it, so she changed it to Z, which I think is probably even more unusual. And then a few months ago someone came all the way from Australia with a gift for me and they said, we were in Australia when you were doing a big campaign and my mother was at the dentist and she read the press about you and I'm called Sandra after you. And she came to see me all the way from Australia, so that was fabulous.

13:33That's lovely, isn't it? So there can't be very many Zandras around. I'm sure there increase. I hope there increase. I'm sure you've increased the numbers. And what about your sister? Did you get on well with her when you were young? I didn't get on with my sister as a child. And my sister's a much more developed person. She's got four children and seven grandchildren and really has helped all of their lives. And she says, I was known once as Zandra's sister. then I was known as Dr Hayden's wife and then I was James Hayden the motorbike racer's mother so she said I have all sorts of names and she loves it and you do get on well with her now though perfectly in fact I'm going to stay with her for Christmas which would be wonderful okay and she puts up with me yeah and what about so her kids must love you as well that you know having you in their lives I mean that's be fascinating well we actually think it's very funny because her eldest grandchild is training in menswear in London and her second grandchild is doing interior design I believe in Brighton so she said why are none of them doctors yeah yeah exactly yeah but it's interesting that though isn't it my grandfather was a very successful architect and I think sometimes you have a figure in a family who sort of shows the way for others And so I'm sure you do do that.

15:01You must have done that for other members of your family without being conscious about it. I'm thrilled now to be an interesting auntie that they come and see. Yeah. It's fabulous. Yeah, I bet they love coming here. So I hope they do. I mean, incredible for a child. You mentioned textiles. Did you know you were going to go to art school? Was that all the plan? I went to art school first for Saturday morning art classes because I was good at art. and I thought I'd be a book illustrator. And then I came under the influence of a wonderful woman called Barbara Brown who was doing textiles for liberties and not liberties, heels.

15:40Yes. And I fell in love with doing textile print and it's a wonderful medium of covering textiles with wonderful designs, loved it. I left college with a first-class honours degree and then couldn't sell my work. So Royal College, I was a first class honours student and they said, oh, we think Pucci might love your work. And he was appearing in Woolens, a big shop in London. They sent me and I dressed up in my special grey suit that my mother had made me and I laid the work out and a very grand Italian count came in and he looked at my work and he said, I think you should design in black and white and walked out.

16:22So I wasn't offered a job at Pucci. So then I decided that since no one was buying my prints, I got a great friend who trained as a librarian to show me how to make garments because I'd never thought I'd do that. and he showed me and I put a collection together. I had a letter of introduction in America to Deanna Vreeland, the high priestess of fashion, put together a collection. I printed it, made the caftan, took the whole collection to New York with a letter of introduction from English Vogue. And I showed her the clothes and she was this amazing woman with this amazing hooked nose and her face shaded red all around the edge and dyed black hair.

17:06And she said, marvellous, they're incredible. We're going to feature them in Vogue. And she called in Natalie Wood, the film star. We're going to photograph them on Natalie Wood. And then I'm going to phone up the top boutique in New York and they should sell them for you. So I phoned up the top boutique in New York and went to see them, which was Henry Bendel. And for the next 20 years, I made clothes in London and took them over, sold them and showed the magazines and did tours all around America with my clothes. Wow, isn't that just incredible? Which I printed myself in the factory. Just amazing.

17:44What did Diana Vreeland see that others didn't, do you reckon? I think the fact was she didn't know that I was a textile designer making dresses. So she saw me with new eyes and she saw my clothes. And so really my career was first made in America and then came back to being here. So I dressed Lauren Bacall and Jackie Onassis. And so I did tours across America doing shows with my clothes. Do you think in America they are a bit more accepting of newness or the avant-garde? I hear it quite a lot that designers sometimes from here feel like they have to go over there to find a bit of a tailwind. I think it's really just to find your feet and be accepted.

18:32Then, of course, I was lucky enough that people accepted me here, so I then made clothes later for Freddie Mercury. Yeah, tell us about that, by the way. That was quite wonderful. I had my funny little studio in Bayswater, three floors up, and you'd stagger up the zigzaggy stairs to the top, and I'd get a phone call from Brian that they'd like to come and look at my work, and then I said, will you have to come in the evening? Because I didn't have a changing room. It was just an open room in a funny little building. And when I put the phone down, I had to say to my group, excuse me, what do they play?

19:10And they actually had a hit record at the time, but it was in the middle of the 70s. It wasn't when they'd done all of the wonderful things they do now. And they came round in the evening, clambered up all these rickety stairs. And then I picked a wonderful bridal top, a pleated top, and said to Freddie, try it on and see how you feel in front of the mirror. And that was when he had the one that you always see him in, the pictures that was so lovely of him. So that was a bridal piece. That was a bridal piece that he had. So brilliant, isn't it? What was he like as a character? Very shy. He really just tried the things on and then performed in front of the mirror.

19:50I mean, I've found a lot of people, you know, they're very natural when you're actually with them and trying things on lauren bacall came around there and then stepped on a pin i didn't know what to do i was on the floor trying to get the pin out of a film starte oh god oh and you've had all sorts of fabulous dinners and lunches as well so you had dinner with a salvador dali at one point didn't you that was an amazing experience in new york and And his wife had, I thought it was a real tattoo, and she had a tattooed moustache on. But it was, in fact, I think, drawn. In homage to him? I think so, yes.

20:28So it was a very exotic luncheon at the Pierre in New York. Wow, okay. And then you also went to Andy Warhol's factory, didn't you? That was an amazing experience because there were all sorts of things happening. And there was his office with all these exotic things and then other people doing things in the background. I mean, the whole thing, one almost felt like you weren't even treading on the ground in New York in those days. Yeah. It was quite an amazing experience. So you became known as the Princess of Punk, didn't you? I know, with my three eyebrows. But in fact, the funny thing is, I got known as the Princess of Punk, but I only did one punk collection with the beads and the safety pins.

21:11But it got known as that. And then, of course, after I'd done the collection with the beaded safety pins, 10 years later, Versace did his black dress that was worn by Elizabeth Hurley for the opening of the film that they went to. And it was quoted in the newspapers that I had done that 10 years before. And he banned Susie Menkis from his show for only two seasons. And then he asked her back again. So interesting. so I mean it was all happening in the 1970s wasn't it you know you were very much part of that avant-garde how do you look back on that period now what what do you sort of feel about it I'm thrilled to have lived through it I mean I lived through that and into the 80s it was all I mean my feet didn't touch the ground I think but funnily enough I was always working and then I'd it was only in the evening when I'd shove the caftan on and look all right for the evening and the rest of the time I was printing fabric and working in my factory in Hammersmith.

22:13It sounds to me that you have this incredible work ethic. Is that fair to say? I'm lucky that I like designing. I like textile design. I think it's wonderful that you can put a pattern on a fabric and all sorts of adventures can happen through the pattern on the fabric. So it's been quite wonderful like that. Yeah, yeah. So to bring it back to the home for a moment, and it was andrew you you your first flat which i've read a bit about sounds fascinating so i think it was meant to be kind of like a sort of 3d version of pop art right is that right i just feel that if you're a designer you should often live design as well because if you if someone comes to your house and says well what do you do and they can't even see and they think oh this is very boring you know after all i mean i'm i'm representing my work and if i'm i say to someone you'd look lovely in a zandra rose dress and then all they're looking at is a person in black with nothing else how can they believe in a zandra rose dress so i believe in my work and i love it when other people do yeah yeah and that transpires as well in in your in your living spaces and it sounds like this place um your first flat had sort of artificial grass on the on the floor did it oh we had artificial grass i think it was round and under the television and round by a bar and then we built the circular table because I was teaching this circular table.

23:43We built with a blackened decker and I felt that you had to represent what you were selling. And at the same time, I love having dinner parties so I could invite people around to dinner and you can seat 20 people around this table easily. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, you say that, but you are absolutely synonymous with colour. But you mentioned dinner parties there. When it comes to cooking, right, you only cook beige things, don't you? I did only cook beige things then. I cook all sorts of things now. I could do trifle. I could do something upside down with flames on it. No, I could do all sorts of things.

24:25I've perfected myself from just beige dinners. Have you? Oh, yes. What was in your famous beige dinners then back in those days? I think it was usually probably a beige soup followed by probably a pasta with cheese and things. I can't think what it might have been. Maybe I would have served ice cream. I can't remember in those days. It's so long ago. Yeah. I remember we did an all black meal once. Albert, my business partner. That would be difficult. It was very good, actually. It was like, I mean, it sounds really pretentious now, but it was like squid ink risotto or something and black forest.

24:59gato and who knows what else that sounds extra exotic that's extra intelligent i mean but i'm quite good on soup beet soup yeah or a lovely cold beet soup with with cream on the top you know so i mean i can come to try different things yes so do you still mix different people at dinner parties which is always fabulous and so what's a memorable dinner party that you'd have had in this place Well, not in this place, but in my old house in Notting Hill, I had Larry Hagman and Divine and who else? Oh, and then Deanna Vreeland, the head of American Vogue. And I sat her next to Larry Hagman and she said, excuse me, what do you do?

25:38He said, well, I play the bad man in a cowboy series, but you probably knew my mother, Mary Martin, because Mary Martin played Peter Pan in New York for years. So it was very funny. That's excellent. Just a quick interlude to tell you that this podcast is sponsored by Vitsu. As many of you will know, Vitsu produces the brilliant Universal 606 shelving system designed by the legendary German designer Dieter Rams. What's incredible about this shelving system is that it's been in continuous production since all the way back in 1960. On this podcast, of course, we get to hear about people's family homes from yesteryear, and it's safe to say that interior styles have changed a bit since the early 60s.

26:21But Vitsu has amazingly remained a complete constant throughout, unaffected by any trends or changes in lifestyle. And I think it's the very dictionary definition of a design classic. To find out more about this amazing shelving system, you can visit vitsu.com. That's V-I-T-S-O-E dot com. Right, back to the podcast. Okay, let's move on to your current home. where we're sitting now. Just tell us the backstory of this place. How did you find it? What's the backstory of how we ended up here? Well, my career was sort of in a bit of a doldrum. People had got fed up for a while for my chiffons. They came back to them again, but they got fed up for a while.

27:01And then my great friend, Andrew Logan, was living in this area and the Shard hadn't been built. And he said, Sandra, there's a cash and carry building going around the corner. Why don't you buy it and form your museum that you've been talking about because I'd saved, in fact, I've saved over 6 ,000 of my garments. And I said, what do you think I am? Made of money. And then I found I could sell my house in Notting Hill Gate and it paid for the cash and carry building. Of course, I hadn't calculated that I wouldn't get a government grant and that I'd have to get it converted. So I lived in squalor for about five years in the cash and carry building with their offices and then my boyfriend who he was in fact the president of warner brothers cinemas and he said well let's think constructively if we build nine apartments on the top where priests sell some of them and that will pay for building it so that's how we did it okay now it's the fashion and textile museum in the on one side and my studios on the other and then I have one flat and then there are another nine flats at the back.

28:12So anyone that's been down Bermondsey Street in South East London will have seen this building because you can't miss it right? It's orange and pink and it's designed by Ricardo Ligaretta the top architect of Mexico sadly died now and I flew him over first class on my mileage tickets. Did you? And I said, this is an up-and-coming area. Of course, there was nothing here. And I got top architect, but I knew if I chose a top one that did absolutely way out stuff like, say, Zaha Hadid, it would never get passed in Bermondsey. So he designed this lovely refit for my building in orange and pink, and it was his first building in Europe, and it was opened by Princess Michael of Kent.

28:59And we now have a fantastic exhibition of fashion from the, of underground fashion from the 80s. It's gorgeous. So I'm proud of having founded that. It's an amazing building, an amazing legacy. It's a great thing. I mean, for those that know about Mexican architecture, it feels very much like the legacy of Louis Barragan. It's those colours, it's the kind of hot pink and the orange. Oh, and the blue outside with my white hydrangeas. And white hydrangeas in front of the blue. I mean, it's so optimistic and it's so you in a building, isn't it? Do you feel it's very autobiographical? I hope so. I mean, I love it and I love Bermondsey.

29:37You've got the shard now shining away. I think it's a sort of wonderful place to be and I'm very proud and love living here. So tell me about colour because there aren't that many people that could live with this level of colour. I mean, just behind you, I'm looking at yellow, orange, blue and green. How do you feel when you are in a room filled with intense colour like that? It's awful to say one's immune to it. I mean, I just love colour. I think if it was all white, I wouldn't like it. I love the colour. I love it when the flowers are out in spring. And sometimes I do feel when I'm on the tube and I'm the only person in pink and bright bright orange I think I wonder what's happened to everyone else but I keep thinking they're going to get converted in the end do you think that yes but it's just color makes you feel happy color and plants and life and I hope I don't tire of it I don't think I will yeah well you've been here a while now and I'm green and black today so that's pretty sober no one's ever said that about you but we'll go with it um but if it was all white and it was quite pared back would you hate it i don't think i'd hate it if it was all white as you can see i have plants all around me so you'd already have something green at the moment it's looking very red and green because it's christmas and so we have to decorate it all you know and then i've got all wonderful things around like a one in my book I've written about Divine always loved Christmas and he used to stay with me and he always gets he'd go mad and buy things and he bought me the lovely Christmas goat from Sweden where he'd been doing an appearance so and then there's all different things that I've got left over from from America that came back with me like Christmas stockings and a stuffed Father Christmas and I'd go out immediately after Christmas and buy them cheap so And my father Christmas, who's a three foot high, I bought in a sale immediately after Christmas and he's lived with me ever since.