Chapter 7

The appointment at the fashion house was on a Wednesday morning so I made an appointment with Hector at his rehearsal rooms in the late afternoon and worked my butt off putting together a folio of drawings for him and the troupe to look at.

We had eight different guys, all built a bit differently but, thankfully all reasonably slim and about the same height. I had a basic shape but each had subtle differences to suit the individual characters.

I then had to reproduce them to give four sets in different colours that I had been able to deduce from the sessions with them. It would allow them to be all the same or to mix and match on stage. On top of that I was still working through the project with my classmates to come up with ten Dianna dresses that were sufficiently different enough to be individual at the parade but not so far over the top that a normal girl couldn’t wear it at a party.

On the day of the appointments I had a carry bag with the two sets of drawings as I was going to drop in to Chelsea and run my drawings past the lecturer before I worked on the fabric selection. I went up in an early train and at the right time I entered the fashion house lobby.

It was swish, to say the least. The receptionist could have just sat down from a parade on the catwalk. I had met some snappy men dressers among my ‘special’ customers but the few I saw in this room could grace a magazine, and probably did.

I gave my name and was asked to wait for a few moments. After about two minutes a door opened and an elderly gent came out and walked to me with his hand out to shake mine.

”Amity, Miss Asquith, so glad you could come and visit us. I am Jules and I saw some photographs from your little fashion parade at the Chelsea. Come along inside and we can chat.”

He took me through the door and down a corridor before leading me into his office. It had dummies with dresses in various state of creation, tables with drawings and, on the wall, some of his creations photographed at different shows.

He sat me on an easy chair next to a table with glasses and a couple of bottles that looked like soft drink and asked me if I would like a drink.

I said no so he sat opposite me.

“Amity, when I saw your creations I was amazed that you could come up with such beautiful clothes and still be in your first term. I have spoken to your lecturer and she assures me that you are, indeed, the creator of the dresses as her own was made by you from her description of something she would like to wear. Is that your portfolio in the bag? If it is I would love to see what you have designed.”

I looked at him, realising that this may not just be a quiet chat.

“Jules, I do have to say here that I am not a designer as you are. I do not sit at my drawing board and come up with creations on a whim. I design to suit a particular person as we talk about what they would like. As such, you could say I am a bespoke designer. My bag does contain drawings but they are for the next fashion parade at the Chelsea. There are also some I have drawn for a drag troupe who want new gowns for their summer season. The only clothes I have made from scratch are for me and what I want.”

“Interesting,” he mused, “Could I see these drawings?”

I pulled out the Dianna set and explained that the project was ten dresses in the style of her gowns. We looked through them as I told him what each girl wanted and he said “Very interesting, what about the others?”

I packed the first sheaf away and pulled out the larger pack, telling him that the brief was to design stage wear for eight guys that could be similar but show their individual style. The four sets were because they needed to be worn nearly every night for four months of the season.

When he had finished and I was putting them back in my bag, he smiled.

“Now, let me get this right. I could not say to you ‘Give me my summer range’ but if I sat you down with a particular customer you would create something individual for her just from a discussion?”

“In a nutshell,” I said, “That’s about what I do. I have never even thought about creating something new unless I knew the person who would be wearing it.”

“Would you be able to show me how it works if I present you to a customer as a trainee designer?”

I said I could try and he pressed a button on his intercom and asked “Julia, dear, has Lady Appleby come in yet?”

The girl told him that she had arrived and was waiting for him in the studio.

“Come,” he said, “Just bring your sketch-book, there are plenty of coloured pencils in the studio.”

We left the room to go through another door and into a large, light-filled room where an elegant lady was looking at some pictures on the wall. She was dressed well but I could see that it really wasn’t ‘her’.

Jules went up to her, saying, “Lady Appleby, so nice of you to visit us again” as he air kissed her.

He then turned to me and said, “May I present Amity, a possible new addition to our little band. I have asked her if she could talk to you and design something for you that you may want us to make. I will ask you both to sit and, if you don’t mind, I will stay out of the conversation.”

Lady Appleby looked at me with a sense of amazement, “What could a teenage girl know of high fashion and what I could possibly want to wear?”

I cast a very minor truth spell at her ,“Lady Appleby, if you could just humour me for a moment. Where did you get what you are wearing now?”

She said it came from here, of course.

I took a deep breath and asked, “Do you like it?”

She glanced at Jules, who was looking a bit askance .“Not really, but it has the Jules label and that’s all I need to know.”

“Could we please sit and I will design something that Jules can make that you will love to wear.”

“That’ll be a first,” she huffed but sat.

My first question was what event she was buying for and she told me it was a dinner with an ambassador.

I asked her to think about the dress that she had worn that gave her greatest pleasure and she thought about something that she had worn as a teenager. I asked her to describe it and opened my sketch-book, taking a pencil from the table and started to draw, keeping it out of sight of both her and Jules.

I also asked her about dresses she had seen that took her fancy and made variations to my sketch as we spoke. After ten minutes I took the truth spell away and showed them my sketch.

Her eyes widened, “Oh, my God, that is glorious, just the thing for that dinner, what colour would you think would work?”

Her aura was shimmering in a pale red and I said “An apricot or maybe a little darker, perhaps with a slight sheen.”

Jules had got his senses back by now and looked at the drawing, considering the manufacturing and asked, “Would you buy one if we made it, Lady Appleby?”

“In a heartbeat,” she said, “and I have a few other occasions in mind where I could wear it if you made a few in a different colour.”

She stood and gave me a hug, saying, “Brilliant, you are so brilliant; you can get the girl out front to give me a call when I am needed for a fitting.”

With that she swept out of the room, leaving a gobsmacked Jules standing there with my sketch-book in his hand.

“What am I missing?” he asked.

“You design for designing sake,” I said, “If you look critically at the photos around this wall you will see that about half of them do not really look as if the woman wants to be in the dress. They are only wearing it because of the label. You only have to look at the pictures taken at awards, especially in America, to see that it is the designer with a single minded arrogance, not a melding of the dress to the person.”

“No-one has told me they didn’t like my designs before”.

He looked almost like he was about to cry so I told him he was famous and a lot of his designs worked for a lot of people but had had sometimes let his own ego push the envelope too far.

“I work with a dress shop,” I said, “And we are there to be an answer to our customers’ wants within the range of their purse, not to shovel something down their throats and act as if we had decided it was for their own good. Sometimes you just see the opportunity to have one of your designs in the public view and, at the time, it doesn’t matter to you who is wearing it and why. All I did today was to find out what the lady liked and when a woman is wearing something they like, it adds to the beauty of the dress.”

He looked at my drawing again. “Come with me.”

We went towards the rear of the building and walked into the dressmaking room. He showed the sketch to one of the women and asked her how long it would take and she said it would not be long as it was a very easy one to make up.

She then said, “This is beautiful, I could see that on Lady Appleby.” He asked why her in particular and she told him that she didn’t really know but it was just the design that the Lady would look good in.

He turned to me. “Amity, what you have done here is amazing. I want to take you back to the office and talk some more, but right now I will offer you two hundred pounds for this page as is”.

I smiled and told him he had a deal so he tore the page out and gave it to his seamstress, saying “You have Lady Applebys’ sizes on file, she wants at least one.”

“What colour?” she asked, and he looked at me.

“An apricot or slightly darker, with a slight sheen,” I said, “And maybe another couple in a pale turquoise and a very light green; I also think that she would love one in midnight blue velvet if you add some fur trim to the hem and collar.”

These had all been pictures in her mind and I know it was taking a punt but I needed to see if Jules wanted me in or not. We left to go back to his office where I put my sketch-book back in my bag. He got back on his intercom and asked the receptionist to have a cheque made out to cash for me when I left.

We sat back down, “If what you have done today works out, I want you as part of my team. I am happy to pay you a retainer if you can work your magic with my upper echelon customers only. I will pay you for each drawing you produce and I will create a new label that only the best people will be able to buy and it will be ‘The Amity Range, by Jules’. What do you say?”

I told him that if it happened that way, I would only see his customers by appointment as I needed to work through my schooling, to at least get a qualification. I also had my work in Redhill to consider.

He looked at me, “You would stay down there rather than come here and live the high life?”

“Why not, it’s my home and there are people there who depend on me, friends who I am not willing to walk out on. If you want me to create designs for you and the upper crust, then it has to be on my terms or not at all. Let’s just wait to see what the good Lady does before we talk more. Oh, and the name on the label should be Asquith Design from the House of Jules.”

“I like it, it has class.” He said and stood. “Please give all your contact details to the receptionist on the way out. I do think I shall be in touch. Now, I think I may have to go and sit in a dark room and contemplate all I have been told today. I never thought that my customers would not like my creations.”

I picked up my cheque on the way out, leaving all of my contact details including home, shop and the Chelsea. Their bank was only a few doors up so I went along and cashed the cheque in, putting my two hundred pounds in my purse. That would get me quite a bit of material for my own outfits this year.

At the Chelsea I went and saw Judith telling her about my ‘interview’ this morning. She told me that I had been underpaid for my drawing and should treble the amount for any more as Jules sold his dresses at around fifteen hundred to two thousand pounds each.

I checked my next attendance requirements and then went to the school café to get some lunch. A few of my fellow class mates were already there so I joined them and talked about the fashion show.

I showed them the picture of the dress I was designing for myself and said that I would pay for any jewellery and accessories that were made to suit it. The girls huddled together and came up with a figure of fifty pounds, which I gave them to seal the deal. Now I knew I would get something a bit special.

In the afternoon I went to my favourite fabric shop and bought some material, mainly end of bolts, and spent another hundred pounds, including delivery to the shop. I then went to the rehearsal rooms and met up with Henry and his merry band of men.

I had come to the conclusion, while talking to each of them, that Henry was the showman and decidedly male but the seven others were doing it for the chance to wear the clothing. When I showed them the pictures my hunch was proved right.

Henry said that the designs made them look like women and the rest agreed wholeheartedly. His problem was that he considered himself to be a drag artist and the others just wanted to be normal women.

I pointed out that he, as the ringmaster, so to speak, could look over the top but the others all wanted to appear as genuine women and this would add to the act. It would earn them respect when they did their miming to songs because when the audience started to think that it was truly them singing, the act would be a success.

In the end he was outnumbered and they ordered the eight outfits in the four different colours and we agreed on a price. We now had thirty two outfits to make before the season started.

On the way home I sat on the train and thought about the day I had just had. It had been a bit different but, overall, very successful. The next day I dropped the designs for the troupe with a note on the agreed price into the shop on my way to the station again for a day at the Chelsea hunched over a sewing machine once I had raided the materials store.

My next couple of weeks followed the same way and I was nearly ready for the fittings with my class mates. I must say that my other classes were giving me an appreciation of the history of design, as well as a wider knowledge of fabrics and the way they fell with different angles of cut. It was all, actually, very much based on physics; something I had been quite good at when in school as Armand.

The other thing that was improving was my drawing skill. I was getting faster at putting the ideas on paper and my new-found knowledge of fabric allowed me to depict the designs in a much more realistic way. I was sitting in the café one lunch-time and was idly reworking some of my Dianna drawings when Judith sat down opposite me after looking at the drawing.

“You know,” she started, “You are, by far, one of the most talented students I have had. Looking at the drawing, there, I have the feeling that you could go far as an artist. Hell, I would probably buy your first effort.”

I said that I had never thought about drawing other things and then asked her if she could think of a subject that she would like a picture of and describe it for me. I found out that she had a love of horses and she spoke about a couple she owned.

I allowed my hand to move as it wanted and found that my new knowledge of fabric also translated into an appreciation of skin and hide. When I finished I looked closely at what I had drawn and was pleasantly surprised at the picture that had resulted.

If I was happy with it, she was absolutely in love with it as soon as she saw it. She let out a shriek that made the whole room turn in our direction. I signed it AA and tore the page out of my book and gave it to her, saying, “You don’t have to buy my first picture, I shall give it to you.”

Over the next weeks I finalised my designs for the fashion show and had nearly finished the dresses for the ten of us, two from last term having dropped out. The event already had fliers pinned on the notice boards and Judith told me that she had to book the biggest lecture theatre in the college.

At the shop we were working on our spring and summer collection and we had a string of customers coming in to order dresses. I was not really needed very much as Roberta was getting much better at picturing the requirements and her drawing skills were improving as well. When she ran into difficulty she would just picture the dress in her mind and I would take it and sketch it for her, which didn’t take very long.

Actually, we didn’t have to make as many special orders as we used to, as our customers were getting much happier taking stock items and Helen had started to steer her purchases towards the sort of styles that we knew would move.

Kayla had worked hard at the bulk order and, by the end of March, they were ready to deliver. We hired a van with racks and loaded them up to take to the rehearsal rooms. When Helen and I delivered them it was a success, with the troupe going off and putting their dresses on, doing their make-up and giving us a show.

They were very good and even Hector actually looked more feminine, even if he didn’t want to. All of the others made appointments with Helen to come down to Redhill and get a basic wardrobe made as they all had decided to see if they could live the life as well as going on the stage en-femme.

Early April we had the fashion show and it was a success. Judith did the commentary in a glittering creation of silk, lace and taffeta that almost reflected the spotlight back on the audience. My eight class-mates all looked magnificent and I was no slouch, either.

It was again a pre-lunch show and we all gathered in the café in our fine gowns for a meal. Again we had a range of nice comments from the other students and staff. A week later I had a phone call from Jules, who said “I have been sent the pictures from your latest show; can you come in and see me tomorrow?”

The next day I was back on the train and fronted up to the fashion house on time. This time the receptionist smiled broadly when I walked in and she spoke into her intercom.

“Jules will be right out, Amity” she said and he was, almost immediately. This of course led me to think that they had me here because they needed something. Looking at his aura I could see that Jules was anxious about something and I was sure that I would find out very soon. He took me into his office and I immediately saw two new photos on his wall.

Stepping closer I saw that one was a magazine clipping, in colour, of Lady Appleby in her original Asquith Design dress, looking radiant and very happy. The other showed her in the black velvet at a ball, standing next to a film star. The dressmaker had done a great job in adding the fur trim I had suggested and, once again, the Lady looked pleased with herself.

A voice behind me said “You, young Amity, have not just opened a can of worms; I think you blew the top right off.”

He ushered me over to the easy chairs and I accepted a soft drink this time.

“Right, I will come clean and we can have a rational discussion,” he said, “As you can see from the pictures we sold the good Lady all four of the dresses you designed and I have to admit we did charge a premium which she happily paid once she saw herself in them. As such I am going to give you another cheque for six hundred pounds, seeing as you did give me four designs. My immediate problem is that I do not have your signature on a contract and we have Lady Appleby coming in to have you design another dress for her, no, make that three.”

I stayed quiet and he then carried on. ”On top of this, she managed to convince a friend of hers, who has never bought one of my designs before, to contact us about having a range of about five dresses made for different functions in the early summer. The lady is a Baroness and is seen at everything that remotely looks like a social occasion. If I win her I can start getting more highly paying customers. She wants my designer to visit her at her stately home in Wiltshire tomorrow.”

“I have to plead with you now. If we put you on a retainer of, say, a hundred pounds a week and pay you three hundred per design, would you sign on?”

I thought about it for a few moments and then asked “Was the dressmaker for the first dresses the one that we spoke to in the sewing room?”

He said that it wasn’t but was May, a talented seamstress who had joined them a couple of years ago.

“OK, I will sign on but I have one condition other than those I stated earlier. I want you to allocate May to all the orders we get as she made those dresses perfectly to my design but her additions in trim were brilliant. I want her to be with me when I talk to any future customer to guide me in any production problems I might be designing in.”

His aura had brightened considerably and we spent the time before the arrival of the good Lady in sorting out a contract I was happy to sign as well as getting May to join us in the studio.

When I left here today I was going to have to have a word with my lecturer as my spare time was being eroded, fast.

Marianne Gregory © 2022