Helen Robinson | ➢➢ Shapers of the 80s ➣➣

Tag Archives: Helen Robinson

2018 ➤ At the seaside Blitz Kids gather to toast unseen photos of their heyday

Posted on 10 Jun 2018 | Leave a comment

BlitzClub1980, Blitz Kids, New Romantics, London, elektro-diskow, fashion, history, nightlife, photography, exhibition, Swinging 80s, youth culture, Terry Smith, Lucy Bell Fine Art, St Leonards Sussex,

Former door-girl at the Blitz: “Your Look isn’t extreme enough, you’re not coming in!” Janet Lyon guards the door to Lucy Bell’s photo gallery in St Leonards where vintage Blitz Kids gathered to view themselves in their prime

➢ CLICK HERE TO VISIT OUR GALLERY
AND A REVIEW OF THE EXHIBITION OF
UNSEEN B&W BLITZ PIX FROM 1980

+++
◼ EVERY TUESDAY FOR A YEAR as the 1980s dawned, Steve Strange had been declaring a “private party” in the shabby Blitz wine bar near London’s Covent Garden. Inside, precocious 19-year-olds presented an eye-stopping collage, posing away as stiletto-heeled vamps dressed for cocktails in a Berlin cabaret. Others came as wicked witches, kohl-eyed ghouls, futuristic man machines. Bored by the nihilism of punk with its message of “No future”, these school-leavers were determined to shape a future for themselves. At the Blitz only outrage secured entry: and some Blitz Kids spent the whole of Tuesday perfecting their Look.

Last Thursday in Sussex, previously unseen images taken in 1980 inside the club by ex-Time magazine photographer Terry Smith went on show and for sale for the next six weeks. In the spirit of the Blitz, we set up a snap of Janet Lyon with a red rope barrier on the door at Lucy Bell’s gallery for this week’s Private View. Back in the day Janet helped Steve Strange to vet new arrivals by judging how much wit and outrage they had invested in their Look. Turn inside to read our report on the vintage Blitz Kids and others who made it past the door. . .

➢ Visit the Lucy Bell Fine Art gallery website

Terry Smith, Malcolm McLaren, London, elektro-diskow, fashion, history, nightlife, photography, exhibition, Swinging 80s, youth culture, Terry Smith, Lucy Bell Fine Art, St Leonards Sussex,

Terry Smith, the former Time magazine photographer: recalling his shoot with Malcolm McLaren and proteges Bow Wow Wow in the mid-70s

➢ Exclusively at Shapers of the 80s:
20 of Terry Smith’s unseen Blitz Club pix – in colour

➢ Exclusively at Shapers of the 80s:
20 more of Terry Smith’s unseen Blitz Club pix . . . plus the resulting Time magazine feature from September 1980

FRONT PAGE

1982 ➤ Discovered: Lost footage of PX and Steve Strange in drag

Posted on 12 Nov 2015 | 1 comment

◼ A SENSATIONAL DISCOVERY LOST FOR 30 YEARS … This 14-minute TV report captures the subculturally fertile period of spring 1982 when so many of London clubland’s collaborative talents were making their own creative waves, even as nightlife itself went mainstream with a bang and mega-discos started to take hold across austerity Britain.

Here leader of the Blitz Kids and club entrepreneur Steve Strange is discovered by Robert Mugnerot for TF1’s Megahertz in an excellent piece of reportage from London. It was shown in France on 23 March 1982, two weeks before Steve staged his Best of British designers fashion show at Le Palace in Paris, but shot presumably in that pause when Strange and his deejay Rusty Egan were clubless, between the end of Heroes in Baker Street’s Barracuda, Dec 1981, and the opening of Camden Palace in April 1982.

This package intersperses Visage performance clips with initial footage at the always-cool Embassy club showing many of the usual suspects, plus a good sequence inside Helen Robinson’s PX boutique, featuring Helen, the young milliner Stephen Jones and designer Melissa Caplan. It closes with model Julia Fodor in studio for a Visage video shoot, plus Steve Strange dragged up as his pal Francesca Thyssen singing The Lady is a Tramp in a duet with the French singer Ronny, both wearing Antony Price, as featured in Vogue. Cap that!