Liberty

Liberty http://www.liberty.co.uk/ is up for sale to anyone with a spare £100 million, which lets face it is less than the price of some football clubs and only twice the price of Damian Hurst's bit of diamond bling (which was sold for cash!) Sadly it is beyond my reach, but I have always believed its potential remains untapped. As a child the most magical store for me was Harrods my father worked in South Kensington so I whiled away many hours here. Later when I moved to London aged 19 to study Fashion Textiles at Camberwell I fell in love with Liberty, it was the best store in town. I loved its quirkiness and inclusiveness, from Japanese woodblocks to exotic rugs, every department was a rich source of beauty. Particular favourite was the fabric section I had a wonderful collection of wool scarves fringed by my own fair hand as well as Tana lawn tops and Traditional paisley voile skirts You could do a lot with 2 meters of fabric and some imagination. I would often take tea with mother downstairs and buy some oriental bits and bobs. The book shop was a joy, I could go on.. but. After the children arrived my creative conjuring dried up and a few years ago after a rather over the top make over the relaxed atmosphere had gone and it all seemed a little uptight and precious. Now the expensively made over side addition has been sold to make way for a COS and the rest is up for sale yet, the fashion department is as innovative as ever with designers as varied as Ann Valerie Hash, Osman Yousefzada and Duro Olowu. Its potential to be marketed out to the East is untapped you only need to see how they love Margaret Howell and Paul Smith to see that so lets hope a really lovely rich eccentric person can buy it with their annual bonus and bring back the fun.

P.S Check out the exhibition later in September http://www.trashluxe.com/