Back in 1967, only months before he was bludgeoned to death by lover Kenneth Halliwell, playwright Joe Orton was given a fur coat by agent Peggy Ramsay. It cost her just £13 15/- and, as Orton wrote in his diary:
You look very pretty in that fur coat you’re wearing’, Oscar Lewenstein said as we stood on the corner before going our separate ways. I said, ‘Peggy bought it me. It was thirteen pounds fifteen.’ ‘Very cheap,’ Michael White said. ‘Yes, I’ve discovered I look better in cheap clothes.’ ‘I wonder what the significance of that is?’ Oscar said. ‘I’m from the gutter,’ I said. ‘And don’t you ever forget it because I wont’.
What I didn’t know, though, was that Orton also looked good in cheap chairs. That seat in which he is posing, now on display in the V&A, was a cheap imitation of the Arne Jacobsen model 3107 chair, picked up by photographer Lewis Morley in Heal’s for only five shillings.
And yes, it is that chair, in which 1960s femme fatale Christine Keeler posed. What’s less known is that Morley also photographed himself, David Frost and - erm - Dame Edna Everage sitting on the thing (though not at the same time).
So, this week, here’s to cheap clothes that look good and elegantly cheap chairs.
Will you sit to that?
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Comments
It’s the cutout for a handhold that gives it away, isn’t it? Oh, I see from the link that you know that… Ahem.
I read somewhere that Keeler didn’t want to pose nude but had some contract with a magazine that required it - rather like a Big Brother contestant in Nuts - the chair was the compromise that the photographer came up with.
Goodness me, I can’t imagine pickingup anything for fifteen shillings in Heals these days - it’s far too effing expensive for the likes of me.
Excellent choice; reminds me of a conversation I had on Sunday about my dress - was asked where it came from ‘twelve quid from Peacocks.’, I answered. ‘Well, it doesn’t look like twelve quid from Peacocks on you.’ she kindly replied.
Here’s to being cheap in all things but sensibilities.
Puss
Yes but Puss, she must have liked it or she wouldn’t have asked!
Great pictures, Ben, fun post. Love the Dame Edna one.
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