DESIGN:Paul Smith is not your usual ego-centric designer – he's a regular guy. And he is by far the most successful member of Britain's fashion establishment. ROBERT O'BYRNEmeets him in Dublin for the Fashion Targets Breast Cancer campaign.
THREE YEARS AGO Paris-based fashion writer Alicia Drake published The Beautiful Fall, a book that examined in unedifying detail the interwoven personal and professional histories of two designers, Yves St Laurent and Karl Lagerfeld. While St Laurent wisely adopted an attitude that aloof silence was the best response to Drake’s revelations, Lagerfeld sued the author on the grounds that his personal life had been invaded – an approach that only helped to fuel interest in, and sales of, the book.
It’s a safe bet no similar work will ever appear about another, equally successful designer: Paul Smith. “We’re squeaky clean,” he says of both himself and his business, which might seem a provocative remark to make. After all, the fashion world, despite persistent efforts to present itself as glamorous, is actually a rather grubby environment in which equal measures of arrogance and pretension are the norm. The Beautiful Fall, for example, details how Karl Lagerfeld’s background was considerably less grand than he has liked to claim. Paul Smith, on the other hand, is more than happy to speak of his modest origins in Nottingham (where his father had a draper’s business) and of how he left school at 15 with the intention of becoming a racing cyclist. An accident two years later put paid to those ambitions after which through chance encounters with various people, including his future wife Pauline, he moved into fashion retail before opening his first shop in 1970.
“If I was a real typical fashion person,” he commented three years ago, “that would mean I take myself too seriously, have a strong ego, go to all the openings and parties and pander to the press all the time.” None of which is applicable to him, and yet somehow his unwillingness to follow the usual rules has not proven a handicap. On the contrary, Paul Smith is by far the most successful member of Britain’s fashion establishment and one of a handful of design names to have achieved global brand recognition. It’s a scenario that appears to have left him faintly mystified, as though what has occurred were all a happy accident and certainly not the result of any carefully mapped plan. “I seem to be okay at business and okay at design but not outstanding at either,” he remarks, an observation that would sound more credible did his company not produce 13 different collections twice a year and in 2008 enjoyed a global turnover of £345.9 million spread across 75 countries. In other words, the man is more than “okay” at what he does: he’s outstandingly brilliant.
At the same time, he insists on playing down his accomplishments and presents himself as the regular guy who happens to have had the lucky break (or several of them). Which isn’t to suggest that Smith lacks self-awareness; he’s clearly conscious that much of what has been achieved since the opening of those first small premises in Nottingham 39 years ago is due to his own character – and to a determination not to permit that character to be affected by good fortune. He’s like a lottery winner who insists on still driving the same ancient vehicle he owned before his circumstances changed. The down-to-earthedness is stubbornly sustained: quite an achievement given the milieu in which he works. Although awarded a knighthood in 2000, he is never called “Sir Paul Smith”.
“I thought long and hard before accepting it,” he insists, “because it’s definitely not my character. And more and more people who had it shouldn’t have. But what was interesting was that my staff, especially in Nottingham, were just so proud. They wanted to have a party to congratulate me...”
So it was plain Mr Smith who came to Dublin’s Brown Thomas store earlier this week to launch a women’s tote bag and man’s T-shirt he had designed as part of the 2009 Fashion Targets Breast Cancer Campaign. “Four people who were close to me have died in the past week,” he says by way of explanation for taking on the project. “Cancer’s something that affects all of us.” Like every item from the Smith stable, the items he has produced for the campaign are simultaneously practical and quirky. From the beginning, the hallmark of his style has been to produce clothes covered by the cliché ‘classic with a twist’. Like the man whose name is on the label, they’re not radical or outlandish or necessarily innovative. But, as any Paul Smith aficionado can confirm, they’re invariably well made and will have some feature marking them out from their supposed equivalents.
It’s not always overt and definitely not flashy, and could be as simple as unusual lining for an otherwise entirely sober business suit, the kind of private sartorial joke in which Smith specialises and for which he has garnered widespread admiration. His gift lies in taking the ordinary and making it exceptional, applying the same process to his work as to his life.
Fashion is instinctively inclined to hyperbole but here is a designer averse to making exaggerated claims for who he is or what he does. And this is why he enjoys such a broad appeal, even in the most unexpected markets such as Japan. It’s easy to see why Paul Smith would do well in his own country, and elsewhere in Europe where there has always been a certain cult of traditional English dress. But Japan? Then still a small player in the international market, in 1984 Smith was invited to visit the country by a fashion talent scout and discuss the possibility of entering into licence agreements with manufacturers in that country. “I went with my girlfriend, now my wife, Pauline,” he remembers. “It was a 16-hour economy flight via Anchorage but I was really excited and humbled to be invited there. I thought, if I only went once it would be enough.”
Two years later, he entered into his first licensing arrangement with the Japanese. “What was great about it was the fact that although the amount was quite small, a fee of about £15,000 per annum, it gave me a bit of stability; I knew the money was coming in and it was a safety net.”
Over the next few years, he paid a lot of attention to developing his market in Japan, repeatedly returning to the country and working closely to develop a good relationship with his licensees; he still travels to Japan annually, keeps a permanent office in Tokyo and sends a team of some 35 staff from London out there twice a year.
“I was willing to take the trouble whereas a lot of other designers are so arrogant – they just take the royalty cheque.”
Taking the trouble has paid off. Last year, between shops in department stores and free-standing premises, there were 208 Paul Smith Japanese outlets, many more than he has in Britain and the US combined. Furthermore, annual retail sales in Japan accounted for two-thirds of his business’s worldwide sales. It turns out the Japanese like him for the same reason everybody else does: his clothes are “very British but with a sense of fun and a little surprise”.
After almost 40 years in the same business it would be understandable if his enthusiasm, and his energy, had started to flag, but this doesn’t look to be the case. As he reaches the age of 63 in July, he continues to be engaged in every aspect of what is now a very considerable business, and sees no reason why that should not remain the case. His personal office in central London is a profusion of books and bric-a-brac, the former piled in heaps on the floor, while the latter covers every available surface.
“It’s proof of my childlike approach to life,” he explains, clarifying “childlike” not “childish”.
“I try to rid my head of the clutter and knowledge that advises people what they should do.” For example, it was only around 15 years ago that “I thought we should start having meetings because every time I rang people they were in one.”
Even before meetings were introduced into the regime, the growth of Smith’s company had been organic and plans for further expansion are similarly fluid, especially in the present economic climate. “The absolute truth is that what I most want to achieve in my heart and head is continuity. Normality is what I want; I strive for continuing normality.”
He owns 60 per cent of his business (the other 40 per cent used to be divided between his wife and his manager but is now held by his Japanese licensee). This allows him to remain in charge and to make sure Paul Smith’s character is stamped on everything carrying his name. “At the moment I’ve no plans to go anywhere,” he says but in the event that he might no longer be around to run the company, he sees it continuing into the future, albeit “almost certainly it would immediately become more commercial. I spend a lot of my time saying no: I could have customised five or six phones in the past year.”
Still, if that’s the worst outrage he has to fear then Paul Smith’s reputation for being a regular guy is likely to remain intact. As the subject of an Alicia Drake-like expose, he makes for disappointing material.
The Fashion Targets Breast Cancer tote bag and men’s T-shirt designed by Paul Smith are being sold for €35 and €45 respectively in all Brown Thomas stores and BT2 on Grafton Street, Dundrum and Blanchardstown Shopping Centre outlets. All proceeds from sales go to Action Breast Cancer and Europa Donna Ireland.
PAUL SMITH ON RECESSION SHOPPING
A phenomenon of recent years has been the link between famous designers and high-street outlets, with the former producing ranges of clothing for the latter. Some of the grandest names in the business have agreed to participate – even Karl Lagerfeld designed a collection for HM in November 2004 – but not Paul Smith. Yes, he has been asked, on more than one occasion but “I always say no thanks, I don’t even have to think about it.”
The strength of his core business means Smith doesn’t need the extra income working with a chain store would provide (which is certainly an incentive for many younger designers) but the downside is that in these recessionary times not everyone who wants to buy his clothing can afford to do so. What advice does he have for fashion-conscious but financially straitened consumers?
“If you’re spending less on how you look,” he proposes, “the key point is to add to your wardrobe carefully – and you can revitalise it with accessories. Think of colour as the punctuation in a sentence: it’s that little statement of happiness in an outfit. Add colour to your wardrobe through something small and it will make a difference.”
While aware that for most of us money is no longer so plentiful as has been the case in recent years, nevertheless Paul Smith says, “personally I think even if you can’t afford to spend a lot it’s important to buy the one good piece. Buy something timeless that will last for years, and then you can have your fun with less expensive items.”