The Daily Telegraph

Tom Gilbey

Fashion designer who brought whimsy to Savile Row and performed a striptease in Cologne

- Tom Gilbey, born May 19 1939, died May 23 2017

TOM GILBEY, who has died aged 79, was a men’s fashion designer who brought a nonconform­ing flair to Savile Row.

He opened his studio there in 1967 at a time when men went to Savile Row to be dressed the same. Within four years of his opening, Men in Vogue magazine had identified him as “Britain’s one and only home grown couturier for men”, and by 1984 his ascendancy was affirmed. The first edition of Who’s Really Who declared him to be “Britain’s answer to Pierre Cardin, Ralph Lauren and Calvin Klein”.

Gilbey was one of the most eminent of the new generation of Sixties designers making their names as men’s fashions moved away from timehonour­ed conservati­sm. These were times when men discovered they were as interested in clothes as women. A new, youthful commercial world had been created and Gilbey determined to make his own mark the day his studio at 36 Sackville Street opened for business with his first designer collection.

While his tailoring skills matched those of more establishe­d tailors, this 28-year-old Young Turk produced clothes unlike any they made. His were in lightweigh­t fabrics, in styles new for those times: safari suits, jump suits, donkey jackets and shorts – each item different enough to provoke discussion and publicity.

Strong, clean lines were offset by elements of whimsy; he put zips on sports jacket pockets, turned anoraks and windcheate­rs into sophistica­ted jackets, and had sweaters knitted as if inspired by Gustav Klimt. But his clothes were always practical, and his ideas were well received.

“Savile Row can’t design,” he proclaimed. “They can make superb clothes. What they need more than anything else now are designers.” He had little doubt of his own credential­s for such a role: “I opened what I believe was the first men’s couture house in the world, dealing with the avant-garde rather than the traditiona­l Savile Row suit. If any of my clients had wanted such a suit, I would have sent them to Huntsman or Anderson & Sheppard.”

Thomas Gilbey was born on May 19 1939 in the East End of London and left school aged 15 to study art and design at Sir John Cass College, before honing his craft working on the bench alongside East End tailors.

He then moved to a textile manufactur­er in Germany to learn about fabrics before returning to Britain to join the high street tailors John Temple and Neville Reed, whose shops specialise­d in made-to-measure and ready-made suits to men at competitiv­e prices.

His next stop was Soho where he worked for the tailor Dougie Millings in Old Compton Street. Millings was known as the “tailor to the stars” having achieved fame in 1962 by making the collarless suits worn by the Beatles. His clientele included showbusine­ss personalit­ies such as Steve Mcqueen, Warren Beatty and the Rolling Stones.

Gilbey then approached John Michael Ingram, who had become a trendsetti­ng driving force in men’s fashion with his John Michael boutiques, and proposed setting up a fashion design consultanc­y for him, before establishi­ng his own studio.

Gilbey’s collection­s reflected his own passion for sports, particular­ly tennis and golf. “I’m slightly balding and athletic,” he explained. “Most people think I’m a dancer or choreograp­her or an actor rather than a designer, which influences the way I dress. I try for clean sporty looks or hard dramatic ones.”

He fought a vociferous campaign against stiff formality, claiming a man could still be well-dressed not wearing a tie in a restaurant or Pall Mall club, and that an aristocrat in jeans was still an aristocrat.

“I liked to stand out,” Gilbey once said. “I always did something different. I was never embarrasse­d. I never blushed.” In Cologne during men’s fashion week he once performed a striptease on a table in a stolid nightclub, ending up with only a napkin to protect his modesty. At parties he was often to be seen impeccable in a jacket with short sleeves or wearing a schoolboy cap.

After 20 years in Sackville Street, Gilbey moved his business to New Burlington Street, where he created waistcoats worn by Prince William. But when building repairing clauses made a Mayfair base prohibitiv­ely expensive, he quietly bowed out.

To the end of his life Gilbey hated conformism in fashion, deploring the way footballer­s wear suits that make them look like bank managers while politician­s take off their ties to look like the man the street.

The Fashion Museum, Bath, the Victoria & Albert Museum and the Museum of London have examples of his work in their collection­s.

Tom Gilbey is survived by his second wife, Sally Riley, a literary agent.

 ??  ?? ‘Britain’s answer to Pierre Cardin, Ralph Lauren and Calvin Klein’: Gilbey in 1970 modelling one of his own designs
‘Britain’s answer to Pierre Cardin, Ralph Lauren and Calvin Klein’: Gilbey in 1970 modelling one of his own designs

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