The Mother Of High Street (Picture)

In the 70s of last century, Barbara Hulanicki's cheap fashion store Biba was the second largest attraction in London.

There, young girls only need to spend 1/10 of their weekly wages to copy the fresh idols on TV.

London, 1968, a group of crazy girls.

This picture can only appear in two places: Beatles concert or weekend Biba fashion shop.

"They are equal to us."

Barbara Hulanicki, the boss of Biba, said, "they make music, we make clothes."

In her eyes, Beatles is just one of the many celebrities who have patronized Biba.

They would sit in the shop chatting and occasionally glance at young and beautiful salesgirls - they were slim, wearing Biba signboard A dress, velvet suit trousers, goats high heel boots and short short miniskirts, the youngest was only 14 years old.

One day, the girls complained to Hulanicki, "an old man has been flirting with us."

The old man with a pig's meat pie cake and a raincoat on his hand is the Italy actor Marcello Mastroianni who has just arrived.

Rolling stones, Joan Collins, Tiwggy, Manolo Blahnik, Madame Grs...

Biba is very familiar with big shots.

"Barbra Streisand, who has been in the shop, stripped naked, and no one looked at it.

That's good. "

Hulanicki said.

It is undisputed, but far from enough, to label the Biba with the swinging London Style label.

In 2009, Topshop invited Hulanicki to design the Biba for Topshop series. People say, "Topshop is today's Biba."

In other words, Hulanicki is "the mother of parity fashion".

Nearly half a century ago, she used romantic clothes at a low price. "If you don't like it after you buy it several times, you can handle it without any guilt.

Each garment costs only 3 pounds. "

Biba's clothes do not last long, because they are only suitable for young girls, to be exact, postwar girls who are just in the developmental stage who have just met food rationing and are poorly nourished.

A few years ago, Sienna Miller got a Biba fur coat from her friend's mother, and it was also stretched to the limit.

Hulanicki, 75 years old, could not wear Biba many years ago.

Now she is always dressed in black, and her fingernails are painted black.

Designing and selling cheap fashion in 1960s is quite different from what it is today.

At that time, it was not the photographer, but the illustrator who recorded the fashion show. Hulanicki, a Poland girl who grew up in England, is one of them. She contributed to many media such as the women's wear daily, the times and so on.

Paris fashion week is an eye opener for her, but her mission is not easy. "Every time they show, they only allow you to draw two sets of paintings on the spot, and then pay for them when they are looking for models.

So you must remember everything and run out and draw it quickly. "

The painting work with such high intensity may be no less than the professional training of fashion majors.

Later, Hulanicki began to design her own clothes. At that time, the British tabloids had a mail order page. She set up a mail order brand Biba with her husband Stephen Fitz-Simon.

Until one day, Felicity Green, the fashion editor of the daily mirror, asked Hulanicki to design a dress for a certain reader.

"Let's take a picture of Brigitte Bardot in St. to see, making a pink square cotton skirt with holes in the back and a head scarf with the same fabric.

It brings huge orders: 70 thousand pieces!

And it's all the smallest. "

Hulanicki said that it was because of the sale of the 25 shilling skirt that they earned the first barrel of gold.

In September 1964, the first Biba clothing store opened on Abingdon street to greet guests.

On the Saturday morning when the new shop opened, Hulanicki saw how powerful her customers were.

The noisy shop was crowded with young girls in a noisy shop. "Everyone is concentrates on trying out a Brown Striped A skirt. No one asks if there are any other styles and sizes."

She recalled, "because the family is already stacked with mail order goods, so these skirts are stored in the store."

Seeing this, her husband hurried home to move more inventory.

The dress will not sell until noon.

"People call my shop" black hole "and think of everything that happens in the shop.

Older people dare not step in. "

Hulanicki's shop is really different. For example, she set up a "handy sheep horn" at the door, offering some products that are not selling well.

"You must realize that when people encounter something they like, they steal it occasionally."

She said.

Why do girls like Biba?

Because they only need to spend 10% of their weekly salaries, they can copy the fresh idols on TV.

In 1965, second Biba opened in Kensington Church Street, and they continued to issue mail order catalogues to occupy markets outside London.

After Biba moved to Kensington High Street in 1969, it ushered in a short period of "Big Biba".

By the time the store was closed in 1976, it had developed into a five storey decorative art style department store, with restaurants, performance rooms and a Roof garden overlooking the whole street.

Hulanicki and her husband travel around the world, active in New York, Losangeles, Paris and saint to the fashion social circle, and even run to South America to open branches.

The super fashion shop, which is described as "the most beautiful store in the world" by the Sunday times, is not good for a long time. The main reason is that the Dorothy Perkins company co operated with Hulanicki was bought by a real estate developer, and the other party wanted to move the site of the Biba building for its use.

Hulanicki's details of the situation are also the two sides of the two sides of the fuse.

Later, in her memoirs, she said, "Biba is my life, and its end is just like someone suddenly told you that they did it - you have worked hard for 12 years and have nothing to do with you."

After Biba closed, Hulanicki's life did not go down.

Her personal website has a long personal resume, and only a small section about Biba.

She first went to Brazil with her husband to continue the clothing store, and also launched a cosmetics line.

In 1980s, she returned to Britain to publish her autobiography, From A To Biba, as a photographer for the evening newspaper, and even to restore her brush.

After she moved to Miami in 1987, she became a famous interior and exterior decorator in the world, enjoying 20 years.

Restaurants, bars, nightclubs, shops, hotels, private houses, she reshaped the decorative arts district on the coast of Miami, and won many American architectural design awards.

In 2003, Hulanicki began to return to the fashion industry and rejoin the fashion market. She said, "interior design is too slow!"

Today, the auction price of Biba antique clothing is getting higher and higher, but in the Asda supermarket, people can buy the retro dot dress with the name of Barbara Hulanicki for 20 pounds.

Big Biba was once the second largest tourist spot in London, but after all, it was 18 million less than Asda per week.

Keeping pace with the times, "the mother of parity fashion" said that girls who wore Biba were now regular customers of Asda.