I was there

Julien Macdonald remembers dressing Scary Spice in girly pink

20 years ago this month I was at the peak of my career and celebrities liked the glitz and the high-voltage glamour of my clothes. It was very red carpet and it was fun. Nobody was doing what I was doing.

I’d wanted to do something incredible for my show, and getting Kate Moss was all down to James Brown. James was the biggest celebrity hairdresser and his best friend happened to be Kate. He said, ‘Oh, she’ll do it for free, she loves the clothes.’ Just to get Kate to come to a show was rare in itself. She was the face of Chanel and only did shows for Karl Lagerfeld. But as I’d met her when I was working at Chanel, she said, ‘I love Julien, he used to dress me at Chanel with Karl. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’ll do it.’

My friend Charlotte Cutler was best mates with all the Spice Girls. When she found out that Kate was modelling in the show, she was like, ‘We’ve got to get all the Spice Girls to the show.’ I was like, ‘We’ll never get them all to come.’ But she said, ‘I’ll do it.’

At the time, Girl Power was huge. It was just before Geri left and the Spice Girls were the biggest band in the world. I used to dress both Mel B and Victoria Beckham: Mel wanted leopard-print catsuits and Victoria wanted me to do patentpink bustiers.

Then I said, ‘Why don’t we ask Mel to close the show? She’s strong and confident and shows people, come on, you can all do it.’ I called her and said, ‘I’ve got this special pink dress.’ She said, ‘You know I don’t wear dresses, I only wear jumpsuits.’ I said, ‘Come on, it’ll be different.’

The show was at the Roundhouse in Chalk Farm on a rainy night and Kate arrived enormously late. Then we all waited to see if Mel B would bloody turn up. I was on the phone to Fran [Cutler, Charlotte’s sister], going, ‘Where are you?’ She was like, ‘I’m in the car with all the Spice Girls, we’re coming, don’t start the show.’ I thought, ‘Mel’s going to be in the show!’

So she arrived just as the show was starting and I told Kate, ‘Start the show and we’ll make-over Mel as it’s going on.’

I said, ‘Mel, get in the chair. James, get her hair done – just do whatever you want.’ My friend from Wales was backstage and I told him, ‘Stick all these Swarovski crystals all over Mel’s body.’ He said, ‘What? Julien, I’m not a makeup artist, I own a dog kennel!’ I said, ‘It doesn’t matter, Mel take all your clothes off, my friend’s going to put the crystals on you.’

Just as Kate closed the show, we got Mel in the dress. She was like, ‘Julien, I can’t walk in these shoes!’ And I said, ‘Just get on the catwalk and move!’ All the Spice Girls sat at the end of the runway and as Mel stepped out, they all started screaming because it was the first time they’d seen her in heels, a pink dress and afro hair.

Everybody just went bonkers; they stood up, they screamed. Mel danced on the catwalk – she really got into it. And then me, Kate and Mel closed the finale by dancing to, I can’t remember, I think it was Spice Up Your Life.

Afterwards, everybody came backstage and we all had drinks. Me, Kate and all the Spice Girls ended up in Soho dancing all night. We were on the cover of all the newspapers the next day. Afterwards, nobody would dare to show on the same day as me. It was an iconic moment of disco and camp and fun. It was a show!