Fashion pop ups in unlikely places | reviews, news & interviews
Fashion pop ups in unlikely places
Fashion pop ups in unlikely places
Browns is in this season (and every season past)
Thursday, 20 May 2010
While wandering back from a meeting with a hedgie on Haymarket, I noticed a banner emblazoned with the logo of Browns, clothes shop to the well heeled (to mix metaphors), above the entrance to what appeared to be a building site. It was indeed a building site, off Marshall St, near Carnaby St, but two floors of the new apartment block there have been taken over by a pop-up exhibition to celebrate 40 years of Browns.
Browns, ever since it was taken over by Joan Burstein in 1970, has always been one seam ahead of the pinking shears, which is why a pop-up museum makes perfect sense, although the whitewashed walls and pine floorboards are a world away from Browns' luxurious flagship shop on South Molton St in Mayfair.
There is as much self-love here as at the Grace Kelly exhibition at the V&A - you can't spell 'fashion' without 'onanism' - but Burstein was a fashion revolutionary rather than a clothes horse. She introduced the concept of the boutique with multiple designers, and brought over American houses like Ralph Lauren and Japanese ones like Commes des Garçons. Galliano, McQueen and Chalayan are other finds.
Mannequins are adorned with outfits drawn from the Browns archive and large portraits show celebrities wearing them: Iman in Armani (or whatever). There are blown-up magazine spreads from Vogues past and even a news clipping by Mollie Parkin from soon after Browns' inception.
This may seem frivolous - and indeed my only connection with fashion is having watched The Devil Wears Prada 15 times - but it is a thoughtful show, well curated, with archival material, which mixes the paradox of fashions past with a very modern instantiation.
There is as much self-love here as at the Grace Kelly exhibition at the V&A - you can't spell 'fashion' without 'onanism' - but Burstein was a fashion revolutionary rather than a clothes horse. She introduced the concept of the boutique with multiple designers, and brought over American houses like Ralph Lauren and Japanese ones like Commes des Garçons. Galliano, McQueen and Chalayan are other finds.
Mannequins are adorned with outfits drawn from the Browns archive and large portraits show celebrities wearing them: Iman in Armani (or whatever). There are blown-up magazine spreads from Vogues past and even a news clipping by Mollie Parkin from soon after Browns' inception.
This may seem frivolous - and indeed my only connection with fashion is having watched The Devil Wears Prada 15 times - but it is a thoughtful show, well curated, with archival material, which mixes the paradox of fashions past with a very modern instantiation.
- Browns: 40 Years of Fashion Innovation is on at The Regent Penthouses and Lofts, The Courtyard, 16-18 Marshall St, London W1 until 30 May. Hurry!
more Visual arts
Fantastic Machine review - photography's story from one camera to 45 billion
Love it or hate it, the photographic image has ensnared us all
Yinka Shonibare: Suspended States, Serpentine Gallery review - pure delight
Weighty subject matter treated with the lightest of touch
Jane Harris: Ellipse, Frac Nouvelle-Aquitaine MÉCA, Bordeaux review - ovals to the fore
Persistence and conviction in the works of the late English painter
Sargent and Fashion, Tate Britain review - portraiture as a performance
London’s elite posing dressed up to the nines
Zineb Sedira: Dreams Have No Titles, Whitechapel Gallery review - a disorientating mix of fact and fiction
An exhibition that begs the question 'What and where is home?'
Yoko Ono: Music of the Mind, Tate Modern review - a fitting celebration of the early years
Acknowledgement as a major avant garde artist comes at 90
Unravel: The Power and Politics of Textiles in Art, Barbican review - the fabric of dissent
An ambitious exploration of a neglected medium
When Forms Come Alive, Hayward Gallery review - how to reduce good art to family fun
Seriously good sculptures presented as little more than playthings or jokes
Entangled Pasts 1768-now, Royal Academy review - an institution exploring its racist past
After a long, slow journey from invisibility to agency, black people finally get a look in
Barbara Kruger, Serpentine Gallery review - clever, funny and chilling installations
Exploring the lies, deceptions and hyperbole used to cajole, bully and manipulate us
Richard Dorment: Warhol After Warhol review - beyond criticism
A venerable art critic reflects on the darkest hearts of our aesthetic market
Dineo Seshee Raisibe Bopape: (ka) pheko ye / the dream to come, Kiasma, Helsinki review - psychic archaeology
The South African artist evokes the Finnish landscape in a multisensory installation
Add comment