France Summer Fashion Lucinda Chambers 2017
Mid June 2019 and the streets of the town of Lectoure, in south-west France, are empty. Locals and tourists akin are huddled under shop awnings to encounter out a sudden summer deluge. All but one, that is. A alone figure – a petite blonde adult female in a wide cherry-red and white candy-striped trousers – is striding with purpose down the street, carrying a large umbrella. What could possibly be so enticing to tempt anyone out in such intemperate weather? Well, the woman is Lucinda Chambers and she is heading – like a heat-seeking missile – towards a brocante.
It is not just this fabled flea market that makes Lucinda defy even the soggiest of climates. The one-time manner director of British Vogue – a position she held for 25 years – is every bit renowned for her painterly and visionary manner shoots as her love of eclectic finds. Her razor-sharp eye has seen her enthusiastically rootling around in boxes at dawn in markets from Portobello and Kempton to Republic of india to Africa. 'I even know the name for a garage auction in Swedish,' she says proudly. 'It's called a loppis. Isn't that marvellous? I've been and then lucky to have shopped the world.'
If you are wondering what Lucinda has washed with her substantial drove of expertly rummaged fabrics, wicker, paintings, furniture, ceramics, beaded bottles, jugs, rugs and mugs, y'all will find the answer once yous step inside either of her houses in London and France. Outside the village of Lachapelle, near Toulouse, she and her husband Simon Crow and their three sons share a 19th-century cottage. Now a cornucopia of colour and cosiness, it was once a simple house, where the family would have lived at the front and the cattle in stalls at the back. The latter is now a kitchen and dining room, though it retains the stall divisions.
The interior is likewise an explosion of imagination and style, made up of layers of memories. 'I love a projection – finding something to set up upward, repair, paint, sand down or dip dye,' says Lucinda. 'Everything has come up together in this business firm over the past 20 years. Chair by chair, plate by plate, absorber by absorber. Slowly, slowly. My mother and I both sewing, friends making things and on it goes.'
In typical Lucinda fashion, the origin story of how she and Simon came to own this jewel of a house is quite the tale. 'In 2000, a friend came to our house in Shepherd'south Bush-league for supper. I asked how our mutual friends Cindy and Richard were and she told me they were selling their firm in Toulouse. Years before, when I co-owned a niggling homeware shop in west London chosen Swallows and Amazons, Cindy had come in and bought a rag rug, saying that it was 'for the blue and white room in Toulouse'. It sounded so romantic. Then when I heard the house was for sale, I chosen Cindy and went over to see pictures of it. The side by side day Simon and I flew to Toulouse. Nosotros bought the house with everything in it, with me telling him that I wouldn't have to practice a thing to it.' Over the years, she has changed everything, even so: 'I can't aid it.'
From its wide terrace, the house overlooks verdant farmland, framed by a line of poplar trees at the peak of a afar colina – 'planted to give Napoleon's soldiers shade as they marched along the sun-parched roads', according to Lucinda. She and Simon practice not practise much formal entertaining here. Rather, they have 'a commune' of friends who stay regularly 'even if we aren't hither. But if we are, everyone mucks in. I'1000 non a swell foodie and the cooker is pretty basic – but Simon cooks, thank goodness, and friends assistance and astonishing meals appear'.
The aforementioned goes for the firm: 'I don't decorate with a particular indicate of view – I purchase something and put it somewhere, then I don't touch it. What I really honey is when my friend Russell Marsh and his husband Marking come up to stay.' Russell is a former casting director for Marni, Prada and Celine, who is now weaving textiles. 'They have been coming here for 20 years and he has taught me so much about space. Information technology's great to have a fresh eye and his is very rigorous – he is always banishing cushions, so you can put your feet up, and making sure that at that place is enough light to read by. He strips everything abroad and makes it all more than functional.' Lucinda'due south lifelong passion for collecting has pervaded every corner of her existence: 'I think decoration is what I enjoy – whether information technology'southward a moving-picture show, a room or a piece of clothing.'
Elements of pieces Lucinda discovered in the Friday market on Portobello Road, W11, were woven into the collections she worked on for Marni. She was responsible in big part for turning the once obscure fur house into a leading fashion make. Soon after leaving Vogue in 2017, she was approached by Molly Molloy and Kristin Forss, ii designers with whom she had collaborated at Marni. They had an idea for a new fashion label – Colville – which the trio launched the following year.
More recently, the eclectic taste displayed in Lucinda's dwelling house can be plant on Collagerie, the website she has created with her former Vogue colleague Serena Hood. It sells an informed edit of fashion and lifestyle products – from an Ikea rug to a JW Anderson dress. The upshot is that a whole world of fashion, inspired by Lucinda's extraordinary vision, is now available at a click. What could possibly exist more exciting than that?
colvilleofficial.com | collagerie.com
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