Instant style

The other side of the street

Jerome Burn

Aterrible thing has happened to Jermyn Street. That bastion of elite shop- ping for the English gentleman, specialis- ing in bespoke shoes, hand-made shirts and exclusive shaving tackle, has become fashionable. Having carefully cultivated an image of indifference to any style that isn't at least fifty years old, it now finds itself the role model for a new breed of high street men's shops, all of which boast of maho- gany veneered cabinets, brass fittings, Prince of Wales check suits, striped shirts and brogues.

Although most of the older shops in the street cultivate their image of old world service and tradition with the same degree of care and dedication that goes into making a £500 leather briefcase, an impor- tant part of the tradition is to pretend that nothing so vulgar as image-making is tak- ing place. 'Thank heavens we don't have to resort to PR firms or marketing or any- thing like that,' declared Mrs Bersch, daughter of the present owner of Trum- pers, perfumer and Gents' hairdressing salon (0.90 for a trim), who in turn is the grand-daughter of the founder.

Their glossy leaflet is, of course, simply being accurate when it speaks of 'polished mahogany booths, marble basins . . . an air of gentility and courtesy . . . rows of glass fronted cabinets' and so on. It is all a bit like the groundsman at a venerable English estate who when asked by an American how to create a lawn of such quality, replied: 'Mow and roll regularly for three hundred years.'

But every shop in Jermyn Street attempts to wrap the gentlemanly mantle of Edwardian England, if not earlier, around its shoulders. In some cases it is perfectly justified, such as Bates the hat- ters (tweed flat cap, £23.50) which has something of the feel of a porter's lodge at an Oxbridge college, or Floris, the perfu- mier, (100m1 of aftershave, £9.95) with its genuine Georgian frontage and elegant interior (but which does have a PR person) or Paxton and Whitfield of the rich and wonderful cheeses (Gouda with stinging nettles, £4.26 per lb). However it is the places without that instantly marketable look or history that by having to strive for it reveal the dimensions of the myth much more clearly.

Fosters, for example, make classic En- glish brogues (£500 made to measure or £180 ready made) and leather bags; found- ed in 1840, its present owner is the found- er's great-grandson — slightly puzzlingly called Chester. The design of their shop, however, is pure Sixties, which was when they actually arrived on the Street. Early Sixties, too is the spindly chrome sign war- ning customers to Mind the Step. But they emphasise their links with the Edwardian tradition.

Lewin and Son — shirt and army tie specialists (shirts £30) — were founded in 1862 and are housed in a Grade II listed building; stags heads sit above rows of mahogany shelves; tradition positively oozes. But in fact the fittings all come from a shop in Essex because the original owners, who sold out ten years ago, had done a Sixties refit with formica and spot lights.

Even better is Jules Bar. The menu gives you the myth. 'Founded in 1903 by Jules Ribstein in the front of Waterloo Hotel, it soon became a popular haunt of bucks and blades.' Pale wood panelling and sporting prints complete the image. But as we downed fresh salmon the feeling grew that we were not so much bucks or blades as on a film set designed by English Heritage. LONDON SPECIAL The Waterloo Hotel, for instance, had long gone and the building we were inside was a particularly assertive version of Sixties concrete brutalism, owned by Trust House Forte; the charming manager was a spiky haired Scotsman who had been there six months and the attentive waitress had recently arrived from Australia on a round- the-world tour. It didn't feel much more authentic than a Next shop-front.

The most revealing element of the decor however was that pale panelling. It is known in the trade as 'Vogue Regency' and was very popular in the Twenties and again in the Sixties. It was also regularly featured in the Avengers television series, as a background for John Steed. Now John Steed is really the perfect Jermyn Street man. In brolly and bowler he flaunted English tradition but only in so far as it was useful; Jermyn Street man is pragmatic above all. He's not the English gentleman of Barbours and country houses but a more steely and ruthless version. Soberly dres- sed but with flash touches, like the highly polished shoes, slightly loud shirts and an array of colognes, he has, or likes to imagine having, a young and expensive blonde on his arm. The distance between Jermyn Street and Wall Street is tiny. Mr Gordon Gekko, mephistophelean hero of Wall Street, the movie, would love Jermyn Street, and his distinctive broad braces can be seen in the windows of such classic shirtmakers as Harvie and Hudson.

In fact the American connection is im- portant for the street. A couple of the more honest shopowners, asked what changes they had noticed in the last few years, commented gloomily, 'fewer Amer- icans', kept away by the weak dollar. That's not a problem that worries the brash new-comer Czech and Speake — toiletries and Edwardian-style baths and loos — who were only founded ten years ago and now do a considerable percentage of their business with the States. There is nothing retiring or traditional about them except for the packaging.

Enquiries are handled by a very articu- late, stylishly dressed PR lady whose ex- pression, when asked about the origins of the shop's name, briefly resemble that of Princess Anne at a particularly dull press conference. 'Frank decided that he had to have a double-barrelled name if he was going to survive on Jermyn Street and he had a Czech partner with an unpronounce- able name, so everyone calls him Czech, and then Frank talks all the time, so Czech and Speake just sort of stuck.'

The Frank in question is Frank Sawkins, an ebullient designer who is firmly rooted in the East End but makes sure that clients hear only tinkling Sloane tones when they call the shop. 'Frank has come up with a bathroom concept. It's to do with atmos- phere and space. You ask yourself, How does it feel? . . . We are design-orientated; our products have to look good and have a function . . . . Our roots stem from peo- ple's toilet and what goes on there. . . . We don't do a scent because we are essentially into the bathing function.' You began to see why they were doing so well in the USA.

At the western end of the street is Vincci which as first sight, with its cherry red lacquer and heavy brass surrounds, looks like a beached refugee from the Bond Street Italian menswear gang. Even the Jermyn Street 'tradition' should have trou- ble clutching that to its flexible bosom. However the owner, Vahe Manoukian, an Armenian but a Jermyn Street man from the toes of his highly polished shoes to the ends of his raffish moustache, has no doubts. 'I am not interested in the normal passer-by. I do not have clients, I have friends. They are the super-rich. Bob Monkhouse is coming for a fitting on 20 June.' A Jermyn Street man indeed.

Women don't get much of a look in There's Floris for flowery scents and its new hybrid Eighties offspring next door, James Bodenham, for herbal shampoos (£1.95) and the 'natural' chintzy look. But really Jermyn man prefers either no women — Guy Burgess, definitely a Jer- myn man, lived here in the Fifties and held court in the famous Turkish Baths which closed in the mid Seventies — or the sort that are to be found at the Gaslight, located in one of the side streets. Here, surrounded by the 'traditional' decor, Jer- myn man can relax while good-time girls appreciate his expensive cologne and made-to-measure shoes — for a price.

Just how unfortunate the results can be when there is an attempt to appeal to the `fair sex' from a sternly masculine base can be seen from the windows of the venerable shirt makers, Turnbull and Asser and Lewin and Son. In one, mannequins in unremarkable dresses have their heads stuck into pink frilly boxes, while the other offers the familiar striped shirts but with frilly collars that appear to have been inspired by cup cake wrapping. The overall message is that gels are rather like chaps `Terrible news — St Patrick has fixed up an extradition treaty.' only with bumps at the front, or possibly something a whole lot more sinister.

Even the pretence of a coherent Jermyn Street style breaks down when it comes to interior decor — never a very strong English suit anyway, once the safe territory of chintzes and hunting prints is aban- doned. A relative newcomer to the Street is David Hicks whose look is fine for those who want their living room to resemble the foyer of an up-market international hotel; it's not distasteful, just rather impersonal. In fact it would be just the right setting for a man who bought his clothes from Dunhill, who have recently had their English-gentleman look redesigned for them by Landor Associates, the American firm who re-vamped British Airways.

Like all the best myths, that of 'tradi- tional English' Jermyn Street proves more complex and contradictory when viewed up close. But the very mutability will ensure it will effortlessly survive the tem- porary embarrassment of having a cut- price version of just one of its looks on display in every provincial wine bar.

Jerome Burn, a former editor of Time Out, is working on a history of the 20th century.