430: Mr Freedom in living colour

Tuesday, Mar 30th, 2010
Categories: 70s, Boutiques, Fashion design, The Look

Props to the eagle-eyed Miss Peelpants for spotting the series of youtube clips using footage culled from 1969 German TV documentary London Aktuel.

<a href="http://youtube.com/watch?v=9NYNJenLyJc" onclick="javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview('/outbound/article/youtube.com');">http://youtube.com/watch?v=9NYNJenLyJc</a>

Our favourite is this clip filmed in and around the recently opened Mr Freedom at 430 King’s Road, Chelsea. Seeing the fabled jersey t-shirt dresses in all their glory is a special treat, as is this clear evidence of Tommy Roberts’ and Trevor Myles’ fashion-forward approach to licensing Disney images and incorporating them, Pop Art style, into design. 

 

//430 King’s Road ,London SW3 1970. Pic: David Parkinson//

Read all about that in Chapter 16 of THE LOOK.

Also note the black with red piping bolero top worn in the latter half; this was one of the incredible creations of the sadly-departed Dinah Adams, who also worked for Granny Takes A Trip just down the road at 488 King’s Road.

 

//Dinah Adams, 1970: “A brilliant innovator.”// 

As former Granny’s owner and King’s Road scenester Gene Krell has said here before, Adams was “a gifted personality…a brilliant innovator who never got her due”. There are other London Aktuel segments – with more space-age bachelor pad music – featuring Biba, Laura Of London and Mary Quant.    

Stacey said,

March 30, 2010 @ 7:15 pm

This Mr. Freedom footage is BEYOND EPIC! I want to build a time machine just so I travel back to the early 70’s and go shopping in London.

Mondo said,

April 1, 2010 @ 1:59 pm

What a great bit of footage – the look of Mr Freedom, Alkasura seems have to dropped of the radar now. It’s such a great period. Possibly my fave part in Michael bracewell’s Roxy biog is the cartoon and pop art print era. Couple of things:

Am I right in thinking Hung On You was at 430(briefly)

The soundtrack sounds like something from The In Kraut – worth checking if you haven’t
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Kraut-Shaking-Grooves-Germany-1966-1974/dp/B000B6VUSY

Have you seen the recently launched Lord Dunsby art site.
http://lorddunsby.co.uk/

rockpopfashion said,

April 1, 2010 @ 3:18 pm

Hi dave

Yes – as detailed in The Look – HOY occupied 430 in 67/8. I interviewed Michael Rainey last year and will feature the conversation we had at some point in the future.

Seen Lord Dunsby’s site; it’s great. He supplied me with some wowser scans which I’m gonna post as soon as I get a chance…

Mondo said,

April 1, 2010 @ 6:04 pm

Thanks Paul – I thought was, as I remember reading it in The Look – but talking to a couple of people at a recent Plectrum Biba night, they were adamant it was never there.

rockpopfashion said,

April 2, 2010 @ 2:38 pm

More fool them – see also this: From Hung On You to let It Rock and Seditionaries – http://rockpopfashion.com/blog/?p=54

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