Dedicated Followers of Fashion Britain on Film

Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother,

arrives at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden

for a royal performance.

But this is not at all what you might expect.

It's not opera, it's not ballet, it's not even on the stage,

it's a fashion show, the first ever to be held here -

a show designed to present what Britain's top dress designers

can offer the women of the world.

But in such a setting, it's hard to keep ballet out altogether.

Each of these dancers is a ballet character

and each wears a costume to represent a fashion accessory...

..shoes and stockings,

silks and leathers, knitwear, gloves and jewellery,

furs and hats - there's no fashion extra left out.

Among the dancers is Firebird.

She wears a foundation garment

made by one of Britain's biggest corset firms.

A foundation is designed mainly on the model

and hand moulded to ensure that it fits in all the right places.

Belts and brassieres are a substantial fashion export today.

They are mass produced in the factory when a design is completed.

Controlling the feminine form has become big business,

a business that is now highly mechanised,

starting with the cutting machine which cuts out 100 pieces at a time.

The sections of the belt are sewn together at top speed.

The suspenders and ornamental stitching are put on

in one operation.

The zips are sewn in

and in about 20 minutes it's ready to wear.

It can be a long job from the original design

to the finished dress, especially if the garment is

made by hand in the salon of a top designer such as Norman Hartnell.

A dress for a fashion show is modelled from the start

on the mannequin who will wear it at the show

and the designer is there with the fitter as the dress takes shape.

The top designers naturally cater for the individual woman

with the big dress allowance

but Britain's largest chain of fashion stores

produces millions of clothes of every kind, mostly for the other end

of the buying public, in Britain and more than 20 other countries.

Today, they export thousands of brassieres as well as outer garments

to Italy, France, Switzerland and many other parts of Europe.

Britain's mass production of fashion is establishing

a reputation on the continent for good workmanship and value.

But before you can sell fashions in any quantity to a country

such as France, herself the acknowledged home of fashion,

you must show the French buyers, usually on their own ground,

what you have to sell.

These model girls are off to Paris in the spring

to show the combined wares of 28 firms who form an export group,

The Fashion House Group Of London, to buyers from all parts of Europe,

the Commonwealth and the United States.

Since it was formed in 1959, The Fashion House Group Of London,

which specialises in ready-to-wear clothes, has steadily boosted

its export figures, which now amount to more than £5 million a year.

Today, British fashion exports are up to about £11 million.

They have more than doubled in the last few years.

In this factory of one of the group's members,

thousands of dresses are produced for women of other countries

each year as well as for women at home.

Today, the world is full of imitations.

This girl, in a thousand-pound ocelot coat,

is starting off a fashion show with a difference.

Almost everything in it isn't what it seems to be.

This coat, for instance, isn't ocelot but dyed lamb,

while this one is made of rayon-fur-fabric

and costs about £20.

Here's a Persian lamb coat worth hundreds.

And here's a fur fabric copy, selling for £35.

Even the bag and shoes are not what they seem.

No crocodile ever wore those skins, they are embossed leather.

Man-made fibres come in many guises,

like this warm-looking woollen dress, which is really terylene.

Or this gay, cool, permanently pleated cotton. That's terylene too.

Since the dawn of time,

women have been dressing themselves up in the skins of animals.

They are still doing it today.

Of course, the cavewoman didn't have this sort of look.

Nowadays, skins, particularly of cattle, goats and pigs,

are made into leather of many different kinds.

But most of the leather used for clothes comes from sheep.

Mink, of course, is the thing for a night at the opera.

Today, skins come in colours to flatter the wearers.

No matter how big or small you may be,

there's a skin somewhere to fit you.

At a show of ranch-bred mink and chinchilla in the city of London,

furriers come from all over the country to look and to buy.

Points are weighed up carefully by the judges,

just like at a flower show, before the award the prizes.

This is Canadian wild mink.

About 120 perfectly matched skins will be needed

to make a full-length coat.

By the time it's ready to wear,

four people will have worked on it for four weeks.

This makes an acceptable present for any woman.

At £7,000, it's one of the most expensive fur coats in the world.

Even today, very few fur animals are bred on farms.

Most are trapped in the wild.

On the whole, there are so many available

that trapping is no threat to the species.

But Australia's koalas were almost wiped out

to make fur gloves in the early 1930s.

Polar bears almost died out in Alaska,

until the United States protected them by law.

But today, it's the spotted members of the cat family,

such as the cheetah, that are in most danger from the fashion hunters.

Leopards are legally protected in many parts of Africa,

but trappers still shoot or trap 50,000 of them illegally every year.

So the slaughter goes on.

One day we may find, unless we really do something about it,

that these species will have completely disappeared.

For 100 years or more, men have had a horror of wearing anything

which might make them conspicuous.

Just look at the lengths they go to in the city.

Even when the British male dresses up for an occasion,

he restricts himself to toppers and tails in sombre colours.

There is always, of course, the pioneer who sets his own fashion.

But today, there is a new spirit abroad.

Slowly but quite perceptively,

men's clothes are becoming more individual.

Ideas which may have started in Pall Mall

are taken up by other sections of society.

Army service, holidays abroad, these have given some men new ideas too.

And women have had quite a big say.

A trip to the seaside used to mean a pair of old flannel bags

and a tennis shirt, but today you have to have a special rig

if you don't want to be a figure of fun on the pier.

Some fashions haven't changed a lot.

This London hat shop goes back more than 200 years,

although the unsold merchandise in the windows is definitely post-war.

Napoleon's war.

To get the fit exactly right,

they use a machine called a conformitor.

At first glance, you might imagine its function was to make

the header conform to the hat, but in fact, it's the other way around.

The steel pins mould themselves to every bump or depression in the

customer's cranium, then prick out a record of their findings on a card.

More men than ever are paying regular visits to the hairdresser's.

Half the barber shops in Britain cater for men.

And they vary in style every bit as much as the women's,

like this old, established and dignified Mayfair salon,

or this hairdresser's in Hounslow, Middlesex,

where you can have the same sort of treatment women get.

And, of course, one or two purely masculine things as well.

You can have your hair permanently waved or straightened.

And while you're drying, you can have a manicure.

Trimming eyebrows is all part of the service.

Today, more and more people are becoming colour conscious

to achieve an effect, and not necessarily to hide grey hair.

This house, set in 20 acres of Berkshire countryside,

is the house of Raymond, still known as Mr Teasy-Weasy to millions.

With it, go a string of racehorses, a London flat

and a villa in the South of France.

There is always room at the top,

and these youngsters know it as they spend two years training

at the London College of Fashion, run by the Greater London Council.

Always ready to encourage up and comers,

Raymond is an honorary governor of the college.

Among the hair set, wigs are playing an ever-increasing role,

and the college lays special emphasis on teaching the arts of

weaving, knotting and ventilating.

With wigs, of course, a woman can speedily change her hairstyle

for the different occasions of the day.

Rosalie Ashley shops in her own hair -

friends in for coffee, and a fall is added, placed on a headband

and worn like a hat.

A lunch date completes the move from simplicity to sophistication.

Cocktails call for a change of colour as well as style.

And with the ball scene, on goes the kitchen stove.

But you may not be the centre of attention if Raymond partners you.

He's got his false eyelashes on.

Another man who's been in the van of this revolution is Vidal Sassoon.

Sassoon himself works at tremendous speed,

and with an infectious enthusiasm

that animates everyone who works with him.

He may change his styles as he makes or follows

the fashions of the day, but the basic cut does not change.

It is deceptively simple.

Until one realises that it can take a new stylist

two whole years to learn.

One of the hallmarks is the glowing health of the hair,

which can be largely due to correct cutting.

The cut is always with the natural growth of the hair.

Whether symmetrical or asymmetrical,

shape must always be a basic principle.

When hair is properly cut, say the experts, the owner could dip

her head in a bucket of water without any ill effect.

The hair will simply fall back into its correct shape.

Another advantage is that, however the hair is styled, the client has

only to brush it through for it to immediately revert to the original.

Now, the style that this girl has is...

Oh, so sorry, sir!

Sometimes it takes two to create a style.

Well, she seems to like it. A fine style for a party, anyway.

And a party is what the girls are wigging up for.

Each of these wigs take more than eight hours to cut,

over a period of two to three days, before perfection is reached.

Each will cost from £100 to £140.

For a swinging party, some swinging hairdos.

# You make me dizzy, Miss Lizzy

# When you call my name

# Whoa, baby, yeah

# Say you're driving me insane... #

# I can tell because it's plain to see

# Yeah, I can tell the way you look at me

# The way, you know, you hold my hand

# Yes, pretty baby, I can understand

# I can tell, I can tell

# I know you don't love me no more... #

Shoulders back.

Get a swing in it. Keep the smile going.

That's it.

Oh, well, it's a hell of a life being a model girl,

but it has its points.

There must be about 1,000 of them in London alone.

You know, anyone who thinks modelling is all glamour, or that the catwalk

is a shortcut to a rich marriage, had better forget it and stick to typing.

For one thing, the rich aren't what they used to be, are they?

The fact is that the life of the model girl is in some ways

like that of a primitive savage, rough, tough, and usually short.

No union hours for the model girl.

For her, it's any time, anywhere.

Tired or not, she'll be expected to smile and smile and smile.

It's no wonder that most girls want to get that model look.

HE WOLF WHISTLES

Nearly every girl wants to be a model these days.

But, in fact, only a few have the necessary equipment.

For instance, unless a girl has hips 35 to 38,

waist 23 to 26, bust 33 to 37, and height 5'6" to 5'9",

she may as well save her time, money and tears.

Responsible modelling schools will only accept girls

they think have the basic qualities to success.

Lift up. And down.

Now I want you to bounce from side to side.

And right, and left...

To scores of girls who aren't blessed with the right statistics,

the model school classes are like a finishing school.

Though they may never make the grade as models,

they come just the same to develop the flair and get the with-it style.

And stretch.

And push. And out.

The ones who do succeed can really get jet propelled.

£50-odd a day in London is bottle tops compared with what

a girl can earn in the international model set.

Into the dressing room, on with the war-paint and into battle.

One more big show for the cash customers.

Some of the shows are so elaborate these days

that they need days of rehearsing, almost like a floor show.

Shortcut to the altar, don't make a girl laugh,

it might spoil the make-up.

Oh, well, the cheque's good-looking anyway.

They say London swings, it doesn't. Not even the King's Road, Chelsea.

But here and there among the conformist, fat-cat crowds

is a lean cat or two, looking like it might swing,

given some encouragement.

And in among the chain stores and supermarkets is,

here and there, a shop

that may have something all its own to say.

To the character who can send up a mass production car,

to people who can put living before a living.

World's End means where the King's Road ends,

which shows what the King's Roaders think of themselves.

Granny Takes A Trip, the shop behind the face calls itself,

and it's typical of the non-typical,

conforming to the nonconformist image of the in.

What they used to call "way out", and before that "with it",

and before that "groovy", and before that "hep",

and what Granny herself would have called,

"The very latest thing, my dear."

In this King's Road that London is lumbered with, stands, just,

a collation known as The Antiques Supermarket,

and antiques can mean clothes.

This lady's time machine is headed for the flapper world of the '20s,

doubtless a trip many a time traveller would love to take.

One way of saying no to authority is to parody it.

Some of the young with little to say yes to

come to Soho, that pulsating heart of swinging London,

where girls join clubs to see old men strip...

Or is it vice versa?

..and at the cutely named I Was Lord Kitchener's Valet

buy uniforms of the past to affront the uniformity of the present.

In Carnaby Street, you can't tell the assistants from the customers.

Anybody addressed as "Madam"

would probably sue for defamation of character.

John Stephen, these are his shops,

is the uncrowned king of Carnaby Street.

Many of his business rivals would dearly like to see him crowned.

The return of the dicky,

for the man who can't afford a clean shirt but won't admit it.

How about spats? Ideal camouflage for the larger foot.

Once upon a time, just a year or two ago, to be precise,

fashion originated in the haute couture salons of Paris,

then spread downwards through society in ever-cheapening copies

with one predominant theme.

Shops such as this would have interpreted the mode,

but no more.

Now, they originate, and so do a dozen others, in a dozen styles,

owing nothing to Paris or anyone else.

What gear the cats are wearing is one story,

where they wear it is another.

But whether here at Tiles, or here at the Bag O Nails,

or at Samantha's, or George's, or the Cellar Room,

or any of the in gaffs where THEY go,

just don't take any of it too seriously

or you'll miss the whole point.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd