ISSUE 98
WINTER 2018
EXPAND YOUR MIND, REFINE YOUR WARDROBE
John Malkovich “Every time Poirot has been done, the moustache has had a lead role and I guess that’s great, but it doesn’t in this interpretation”
THE DUKE OF WINDSOR
A close-hand inspection of the dandy duke’s clothing in Hampton Court Palace
GENTLEMAN ADVENTURER
The man who crossed the Alps on a Space Hopper
TRAVEL
Miami, Florida in a Ford Mustang and racing the Blue Train across France in an MGB GT
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ISSUE 98
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THE CHAP MANIFESTO 1 THOU SHALT ALWAYS WEAR TWEED. No other fabric says so defiantly: I am a man of panache, savoir-faire and devil-may-care, and I will not be served Continental lager beer under any circumstances. 2 THOU SHALT NEVER NOT SMOKE. Health and Safety “executives” and jobsworth medical practitioners keep trying to convince us that smoking is bad for the lungs/heart/skin/eyebrows, but we all know that smoking a bent apple billiard full of rich Cavendish tobacco raises one’s general sense of well-being to levels unimaginable by the aforementioned spoilsports. 3 THOU SHALT ALWAYS BE COURTEOUS TO THE LADIES. A gentleman is never truly seated on an omnibus or railway carriage: he is merely keeping the seat warm for when a lady might need it. Those who take offence at being offered a seat are not really Ladies.
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4 THOU SHALT NEVER, EVER, WEAR PANTALOONS DE NIMES. When you have progressed beyond fondling girls in the back seats of cinemas, you can stop wearing jeans. 5 THOU SHALT ALWAYS DOFF ONE’S HAT. Alright, so you own a couple of trilbies. Good for you - but it’s hardly going to change the world. Once you start actually lifting them off your head when greeting passers-by, then the revolution will really begin. 6 THOU SHALT NEVER FASTEN THE LOWEST BUTTON ON THY WAISTCOAT. Look, we don’t make the rules, we simply try to keep them going. This one dates back to Edward VII, sufficient reason in itself to observe it. 7 THOU SHALT ALWAYS SPEAK PROPERLY. It’s really quite simple: instead of saying “Yo, wassup?”, say “How do you do?” 8 THOU SHALT NEVER WEAR PLIMSOLLS WHEN NOT DOING SPORT. Nor even when doing sport. Which you shouldn’t be doing anyway. Except cricket. 9 THOU SHALT ALWAYS WORSHIP AT THE TROUSER PRESS. At the end of each day, your trousers should be placed in one of Mr. Corby’s magical contraptions, and by the next morning your creases will be so sharp that they will start a riot on the high street. 10 THOU SHALT CULTIVATE INTERESTING FACIAL HAIR. By interesting we mean moustaches, or beards with a moustache attached.
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CONTENTS 8 AM I CHAP?
Those who dare submit themselves to the ultimate sartorial assessment face admiration or opprobrium
12 T HE GENTLEMAN ADVENTURER
Steve Payne, the chap who crossed the Alps on a Space Hopper, reveals his next adventure
18 P EACOCKS AND MAGPIES
The Chap’s antiques experts, Peter Gosbee and John Minns, give insider tips on acquiring objets d’art
FEATURES 22 SARTORIAL DISPOSOPHOBIA
Chris Sullivan on the difficulty of disposing of vintage clothing that was so difficult to acquire in the first place
28 D ANDIZETTE
Doctor of Dandyism Sunday Swift on ‘The Queen of Soul’ Aretha Franklin
34 I NTERVIEW
Gustav Temple meets John Malkovich to discuss his role as Hercule Poirot in The ABC Murders
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WINTER 2018
34 SARTORIAL FEATURES
LONGER FEATURES
44 PROFILE
96 S TILYAGI
Cordings of Piccadilly, the clothier to the Duke of Windsor revitalised by Eric Clapton
46 FASHION PHOTO SHOOT
We took some of Cordings’ country wear to the streets of St James’s, to the screams of “Brown in Town”
58 T HE KING’S WARDROBE
A remarkable visit to Hampton Court Palace to view some of the Duke of Windsor’s original clothing
62 A MIDE HADELIN
Liam Jefferies meets the Dutch menswear designer who started a business based on his own personal style
65 C OSPLAY
Holly Rose Swinyard explains this phenomenon and how it differs from historical re-enactment
70 L OAKE LEGACY
A pair of half-brogues from Loake’s new commemorative line are put through their paces on Pall Mall
72 H ARRY STURGES CROSBY
Chris Sullivan on the maverick dandy, bon vivant, cocaine user and suicide who blazed out his glory in 1930s Paris
82 M AHONEY WATCHES
Liam Jefferies on a new British watch company setting its sights on creating affordable heirloom timepieces
84 G REY FOX COLUMN
David Evans of www.greyfoxblog.com takes care of headwear, footwear, cufflinks, grooming and motoring, while still finding time to sample a pipe of tobacco
88 T HE BLUE TRAIN
‘Actuarius’ recounts his own attempt to recreate Woolf Barnato’s 1930 wager to beat the Blue Train in a Bentley Speed Six from Cannes to London
Olivia Bullock on the snappily-dressed Soviet youth tribe
102 D ANNY HOUSE
Where Lloyd George drafted an end to the First World War
107 N ICHOLAS PARSONS
Sandra Smith pays a visit to the the nonagenarian entertainer
112 DAVID JONES
Ferris Newton on the First World War Welsh poet
115 B OISDALE OF BELGRAVIA
Chateaubriand, Bordeaux and other traditional victuals
118 W INTER TIPPLES
Olly Smith on what to put into your seasonal drinks cabinet
122 A CHAP HOP DIARY
Mr. B The Gentleman Rhymer on tour with Sparks in Europe
REVIEWS 128 B OOK REVIEWS
Alexander Larman meets satirist Craig Brown and reviews the new Oscar Wilde biography
135 FILM REVIEWS
Rogue Male (1976) with Peter O’Toole
138 OH WHISTLE AND I’LL COME TO YOU, MY LAD Robert Lloyd Parry on M.R. James’s ghost story
144 TRAVEL
Hunter S Thompson/Clark Griswold hybrid in Miami, Florida
152 ART
Darcy Sullivan on James McNeill Whistler
157 RESTAURANT REVIEW The Cinnamon Club
162 CROSSWORD
Cover: Charlie Gray ©2018 Agatha Christie Limited, Mammoth Screen
ISSUE 98
This included: 14 grand pianos; the chassis of a Model-T Ford; an array of human medical specimens preserved in a glass jars; a library of thousands of books; an armoury of weapons; the top of a hansom carriage; a primitive X-Ray machine; thousands of newspapers going back to the 1890s; hundreds of metal tins; and bags and bags of old orange peel. The dwelling itself consisted of an interconnected honeycomb of tunnels, which allowed passage through the junk for those who knew the way, but not for those who did not. Eventually, the police found the body of Homer and it wasn’t until three weeks later, after searching through an estimated 137 tons of tat, that on 8th April they found his brother Langley’s’ corpse, under a huge pile of newspapers and tins. He had, in response to repeated burglary attempts (maybe by fellow hoarders) built a succession of booby traps – one of which he fell victim to – while Homer, both blind and paralyzed and totally dependent on Langley, had died of starvation. Subsequently, the house was condemned and razed to the ground, while its contents were sold for a meagre $1,800. Undoubtedly, in my mind anyway, the journey between hanging onto the classic chassis of a Model T and cherishing a pair of 1952 black and
white loafers that have never fitted isn’t really that far, though it is something that, unless you live in a mansion, should be addressed. Obviously, as I endure said condition myself, I am not the best person to tender advice. However, my long-suffering ex-wife, when my wardrobe colonised hers, suggested the following: “First bring two big rubbish bags to each room, one labelled ‘throw away’ and one ‘give away’. Go through all your shit and ask yourself for each and every item: Do I really, really want this? What does it do for me? Will I wear it again and can I live without it?” I followed her advice and it took me an hour to decide whether I should throw out a brace of
“I still regret that I gave away a perfect petrolblue Charlie Chan-style unlined tropical suit from 1947, because it was a 40 waist and 46 chest and way, way too big. It would have fitted me perfectly now” 26
used detachable collars, a moth-eaten pair of grey spats and a pair of size 30 herringbone bags from the 1930s given to me by the American millionaire Huntington Hertford. I was so exhausted by such contemplation that I gave up, stuck the box back on a shelf and had a lie down. The Collyer brothers would have been proud. As Christos Tolera concludes, “I would guess that I think about these clothes much more than most, and I value them in a way most people couldn’t comprehend. And I still have the odd clothing holy grail that I am obsessed by and still looking for – the perfect pink gabardine, the perfect collar on a shirt, the perfect pleated back suit, the perfect loafer, the perfect jeans, the perfect belt... The list goes on.” As for yours truly, I still regret that I gave away a perfect petrol-blue Charlie Chan-style unlined tropical suit from 1947, which I bought from Flip in 1985, because it was a 40 waist and 46 chest and way, way too big. It would have fitted me perfectly now. To this day I still have nightmares about this. n Chris Sullivan’s book Rebel Rebel – Mavericks who Made the Modern World is published by Unbound in December 2018
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TOURING EUROPE WITH SPARKS Excerpts from Mr. B The Gentleman Rhymer’s Chap-Hop Diary continue, with a tour around Europe with electro-pop legends Sparks
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Music
5th June 2018
best Sparks support act since Queen’ or the chap who sent me a message, 15 minutes into my halfhour slot which just read ‘Get off now’, I thought it went rather well. The following night we played at the Forum in Kentish Town to a most rapturous and unexpected reception (it’s London. London doesn’t tend to do a lot of the old rapture). It almost felt like a headline show. All especially nice, as members of the B clan had come along. I could tell that pater had enjoyed the evening as he said ‘my word’ quite a lot. As I came off stage I bumped into the band’s manager. She told me that she’d enjoyed the gig and that they had been struggling to find Sparksappropriate support acts for the European tour. We checked dates and before one could say ‘ein, zwei, drei, vier’ I was booked, and here I am, sat in the sun watching the Munich traffic go by and wonder-
E
verything went disconcertingly smoothly this morning. I actually got a spot of kip before the call from Abdul my cabbie chum, who was waiting for me at a quarter to four in the morning. The roads were clear, the weather was fine, the flight to Munich uneventful, and I managed to find the right train and alight at the correct station before finding the venue without any trouble. The venue was of course closed. I suppose it was 10 a.m. and no-one would be about for a few hours yet, so I plonked myself down with a coffee (proper tea is not easy to locate in Munich) at The Magic Café, overlooking three lanes of traffic in this summer’s current heatwave. So, here I am; it’s all happening. A month or so ago I received a tweet from a lady saying ‘you should support Sparks’, to which I replied ‘of course I should’, or something along those lines, and thought nothing more of it. A couple of weeks later said lady came along to my recital in Hitchin, and informed me that she had connections in that area and that Sparks were on the look-out for support acts on their UK tour. She furnished me with some relevant contact details and a couple of weeks later I found myself on stage at the Leeds O2 Academy, playing to a couple of thousand eccentric music fans, and I must say that, depending upon whether one believes the person on the Sparks fan forum who called me ‘The
“Whether one believes the person on the Sparks fan forum who called me ‘The best Sparks support act since Queen’ or the chap who sent me a message, 15 minutes into my set, which just read ‘Get off now’ – I thought it went rather well” 123