High street brought low: the proliferation of dreary chains Charlotte Metcalf
No wonder Jamie’s Italian and M&S are ailing. Dreary chains don’t offer the simple grub and stylish clothes we crave, says Charlotte Metcalf
Walk down the King’s Road with any oldie and you’ll hear the same melancholic grumble – where’s the Chelsea we knew and loved?
Baby boomers who hit London as teenagers inevitably headed to the King’s Road, drawn by its rebellious exuberance. It was colourful, louche, exciting, hedonistic and unpredictable. Today, it’s becoming as homogenised as any suburban high street. Chain stores, cafés and juice bars have edged out the smaller shops, pubs and greasy spoons like the Picasso, the Stockpot and the Chelsea Kitchen.
Never has the high street been less alluring to an oldie. Few places tempt us to splash our cash. Joe and the Juice, Caffè Nero, Costa, Starbucks, Pret, Pain Quotidien, Aubaine, Côte and the rest offer breezy service and adequate refreshment but fail to deliver the sustaining sense of character and quirk that we crave. We want quality but not if it’s served up in a cynically designed insipidly tasteful environment that looks the same in Guildford, Watford or Gatwick Airport.
Take Jamie’s Italian: much as we admire what Jamie Oliver tried to do for our children’s school meals, most of us could not resist a smirk when his chain collapsed. It was the same with Carluccio’s. Their ubiquitous restaurants lacked the honest cooking, spontaneity and element of surprise that define the authentic Italian trattoria.
Chains of shops or restaurants simply don’t offer sanctuary in the same way. We’d much rather browse for books in the higgledy-piggledy confines of independent bookshops such as John Sandoe or Heywood Hill than in Waterstones. We’d prefer to buy our clothes from a privately-owned boutique – if we can find one – than trudge to Hobbs or Jigsaw for a dispiriting trawl through their rails.
Trusted institutions like Marks &
Spencer have been wrecked by committees of well-meaning but misguided designers trying to imagine what old people want to wear. This is patronising and insulting. We want simple, classic basics, not sparkly embellishment and complicated flounces. Jill Stanton, who has returned from a stint at Old Navy in the US to take the helm as the M&S Women and Kids’ Director, assures me we’ll see a noticeable improvement in women’s fashion from August.
A recent visit to their flagship store at Marble Arch did nothing to make me feel optimistic as I confronted an overwhelming choice, comprising garish, clashing colours, fussy details and hectic patterns. The experience is enough to dampen the soul for weeks.
But it’s not just Marks & Spencer. Generally, why is it so difficult to find a well-cut navy jacket or a crisp white shirt? Does no one make summer dresses with sleeves any more? And where, oh where would a female oldie begin to look for acceptable swimwear?
If the high street would only hear us, we would reward them handsomely – and we do, whenever we stumble across a jewel like the Mona Lisa Café at the far end of the King’s Road, which has miraculously survived the decimation around it. Reassuringly old-fashioned, with its spindle-back chairs and striped awning, it offers a hearty set menu for just £9.95. Oldies happily rub shoulders with students, young people and regulars, united in their delight at this cosy refuge serving generous plates of calves’ liver fried in butter and sage, lamb cutlets and spaghetti with meatballs.
Recently there was a memorial service for Roberto, the much loved maître d’ at the tiny Venetian restaurant, Ziani on Radnor Walk. When I left hospital after my daughter was born, I went straight there for lunch before going home. Roberto and his team welcomed my new baby as if she were royalty. After all, he’d served her grandmother on many occasions. Would that have happened in a Pizza Express or Strada?
We’ll admit that most chains are reliable and reasonably priced – but where’s the joy? The Ivy used to be a treat, but there are now too many for it to feel special any more. I recently sent a French friend and his Californian girlfriend to Andrew Edmunds, the privately-owned and -run, tilting, Dickensian, candlelit restaurant in Soho. ‘Thank you – it was so romantic,’ raved my friend.
Richard Ingrams founded The Oldie in 1992 as a light-hearted alternative to a press obsessed with youth and celebrity. If he were reincarnated as a town planner, he might design us a high street that we could stroll down without sinking hearts. Of course, the decline of the high street is due largely to the demise of retail, but it’s also to do with developers’ short-sighted, greedy and unimaginative approach. It’s an approach that fails to consider the lure and potential profit to be found in the idiosyncratic. The oldie might not like the King’s Road any more but young people have also abandoned it. The tide of homogenisation has long been creeping up our high streets and the collapse of Jamie’s Italian suggests we’re finally starting to build up some resistance to it.