Flashy blockbuster fashion exhibitions are always a treat, but often it's the quieter, more profound looks at the industry and its role in the wider world that stay with you. Fashion City, How Jewish Londoners shaped global style, at the Museum of London extended its run, but it’s closing on the 7th July. Do go before it closes, also to note, on 23rd June curator Lucie Whitmore is hosting an exclusive talk about the milliner Otto Lucas, whose designs frequently graced the cover of Vogue.
The exhibition is a wonderfully evocative, faithful telling of the story of how fashion making, craft and business is woven acutely into our city and often by the hands of those who came here to seek freedom and a better life. More than that, for any Londoner it’s a riveting immersion in a side of the city that I’m sure resonates with many, that of the immigrant story, the adoption of a new home and struggle to create a thriving existence for your family within it. It shines a light on everyone from the often forgotten makers to the starriest names dressing Princess Diana and David Bowie, as well as everything in between.
Its documentation of the ‘schmutter’ trade charts the arrival and industry of Jewish people in London, fleeing persecution from the late 19th to mid 20th century. Of the 200,000 who would arrive in this country, over half found work in the fashion, clothing and textile trade.
It is a quietly profound curation of these life stories, which follows both the unknown, worn hands of the workrooms of the East End, and the glitz and glamour of high society couturiers. Jewish people ended up in garment making for two reasons, one they were banned from many industries, and two, thread, a needle and scissors were an easily transportable trade: wherever you might end up, you could start again.
The exhibition is staged as a literal walk through of the streets and shops in which they were residents and purveyors, with a Central line tube tunnel linking East to West.
It starts simply, with a trunk, suitcase and handbag carried by immigrants as they travelled to the UK, including a tiny brown leather case belonging to 5 year old Juci Laszlo, who arrived here via Kindertransport.
Then, to the East End, where the streets around Houndsditch and Petticoat lane thronged with Jewish rag trade. There are photographs and pieces of needlework from the children taught at Spitalfields’ Jewish Free School where students were trained in sewing and took on paid mending work. As well as images from the Shoreditch College for the Garment Trades – a hotspot for garment industry recruiters – which would eventually form part of the London College of Fashion, in 1966.
Smaller stories are told, too, such as that of Juda and Malka Fiszer, Polish but settled in Hackney, who ran an umbrella shop on Hanbury street in the 1920s where they are proudly photographed. But fortune was not in their favour. Their tale ends in financial ruin, with tickets from the pawn shop where Malka sold her wedding jewellery in 1933. Curator Dr Lucie Whitmore explains that it was crucial to include “stories of failure and stories with challenges in them, because that’s the reality of the industry. To only show those people who found name recognition wouldn’t be a truthful representation of London.”
More familiar ground is covered with an evocative set up of a tailors workshop – including original window displays declaring “The man who retains his smartness is always in demand! – featuring cutting scissors, mannequins as well as posters from unionised strikes in 1889. A beautifully tailored suit from a “Jewish tailor in Hoxton” is included as a tribute to anonymous makers.
A profound inclusion comes from Molmax, helmed by Max Moldau, a family luggage business whose factory was originally in Vienna. A photograph shows the Viennese workroom in 1938, with a swastika on the wall above the machinists, which they were forced to display while under Nazi control – a poignant film shows Max’s son Heinz describing his memories of their life in Vienna, and his own escape from Austria. The family fled to London, where they restarted the company from scratch near Brick Lane, eventually producing luggage for Burberry and Dior, as well as their own brand.
There is recognition of the broader cultural immigration within the East End, and how communities worked together. “We have stories about a Jamaican tailor who worked for a Jewish tailoring firm, and a Bengali home seamstress who worked for both Jewish and Bengali owned firms” says Whitmore. The sewing machine of Bangladeshi seamstress Anwara Begum features here: “it’s a family heirloom, they value it just as highly as other people might a piece of jewellery because it meant so much to them, and what their mother achieved.”
The exhibition also crosses over into starrier moments from the West End, and the blossoming of the high street under the eye of Jewish entrepreneurs, who birthed Marks & Spencer, Moss Bros, Wallis and Chelsea Girl (which would become River Island). Whitmore highlights the innovation and modernity that came with their influx of skill in the 1930s.
“Berlin and Vienna were both real fashion centres in Europe. These industries were decimated by the Nazis, [but their] designers and makers brought the latest cutting-edge technology to London” she explains.
Glamorous evening wear from Mayfair couturiers offers ritzy pieces, notably with David Sassoon of Bellville Sassoon, and a striking red coat worn by Princess Diana in 1981, alongside sketches for outfits for her, and a warm, hand-written note from the princess, signed ‘Diana’. There is also, sweetly, the tweed coat by Alexon worn by EastEnders’ Dot Cotton.
Covers of Vogue magazine from the Fifties and Sixties feature Otto Lucas’ hats (of which he had three distinct brands, for customers of all pockets); while Mr Fish, doyenne of Carnaby Street and designer to David Bowie, Mick Jagger and Jimi Hendrix, showcases the more fabulously frivolous side of the fashion world. The timeline curtails in the Eighties, when London’s manufacturing industry fell into decline with the lure of cheaper, globalised production.
This is a thorough and nuanced depiction of the makers of London fashion, elegantly documenting the humble with headlining moments, often created against the backdrop of antisemitic prejudice.
These are the stories of everyday survival over oppression and marginalisation, where some fail and others flourish, but all are worth bearing witness to remember what has come before.
Museum of London Docklands, until July 7th 2024; museumoflondon.org.uk
