CE20_p78_p79_Stroud Vintage 6/8/2009 15:30 Page 1
Shopping Vintage style
Step through the door of Stroud Vintage on High and you will be immediately transported back
to a time when women wore pill box hats and gloves, men walked on the outside on pavements
and Fred Astaire crooned and crackled on everyone’s gramophone.
Cotswold Essence visited this Aladdin’s cave of vintage Dior, Chanel, Versace and Biba and
lost her heart to a bygone era that was simply spiffing to behold.
Words by Sue Smith
Some good time jazz was belting out music, publishing and photography
Pictures by Sarah Standing
when I visited and so popular has the over the years, but all the while they
music become in the shop that David and have always maintained a passion for
Sandra are now selling that too. clothes, making their own, hardly ever
The couple lived in Amsterdam for looking at anything new, often picking
many years and then Brighton before things up at jumble sales and
settling again in Stroud. “You could call it revamping them.
the bohemian triangle,” said David. In the 1970’s they started collecting
But they are both born and bred in costume jewellery, buying from private
Gloucestershire and grew up in the collections and antique fairs.
Stroud area. It was at one such fair a few years
They met at school when they were 14, ago they were asked if they wanted to
he was at Marling, she was at the High buy out a vintage stall as the owner
School. And in true vintage style David wanted to sell up.
says: “We are one of those crazy couples “We couldn’t believe our luck and
who are still mad about each other even bought it on the spot,” says David and
after all this time.” You could almost the couple began travelling to vintage
picture them on that railway platform in fairs throughout the country buying
the Brief Encounter film, wrestling with and selling, insisting on only the
their clipped BBC pronunciation. highest quality.
Both David and Sandra dress the part “We won’t touch anything unless it
in vintage themselves making a visit to is near perfect,” says David.
the shop much more of an experience “Although we don’t mind doing a bit
than a trip to the shops. And the glamour of repair work.”
H
usband and wife
doesn’t end when the purchase has been They still run vintage fairs in Stroud
David and Sandra
chosen. and Oxford but they are also
Ireland opened their
In a flamboyant sweep, the precious expanding their retail business and
merchandise is beautifully wrapped in will be opening vintage party centre
shop, Stroud Vintage on either pink or blue in Gloucester’s Westgate Quarter
High at the end of 2008.
tissue (depending if for a and a second shop in Cheltenham’s
But when people ask how long they
boy or girl) and top drawer Montpelier in the
have been trading David can’t help but
tied with a autumn.
quip: “Since around 1934.”
chiffon Their capsule collections of vintage
Theirs is a shop that is so exquisitely
ribbon and a are now among some of the UK's
beautiful inside, a month of browsing
rose. finest including Alexandra
would not be enough to take in the
David’s Cummings Jewellery, Forget
magpie collection of glittering jewellery
mother was a Me Not Vintage and
alone.
spinner at the Casimir
A brooch might catch the eye but is
Stroud’s Greenfield
instantly upstaged by a necklace or
old Ebley collection.
earings or an evening bag, or a hat, or
Mill which The tiny but
shoes…and then there are the clothes.
spawned his impeccably well-
You have seen them all before of
love of texti organised shop is
course on Hollywood icons such as Bette
les. bursting with vintage
Davis, Lauren Bacall, Joan Crawford,
He has made designer items,
Betty Grable - the smouldering stars of
clothes from as including kimonos from
the silver screen.
long as he can Lady Cockburn’s
Theirs was a time that was exciting,
remember and collection and some of
larger than life and gorgeously decadent.
studied fashion the finest selection
And here among the rails in this shop -
and textiles in an of costume
which is reputedly one of actress Sienna
era when it was jewellery from
Miller’s favourites - is an open invitation
almost unheard designers such
to disappear in time back into that heady
of for men to do as Haskell and
world where glamour ruled and Gauloises
so. Lacroix.
burned at the end of every cigarette
Their careers David and Sandra live in an
holder.
have spanned old farmhouse just outside
78 COTSWOLDESSENCE | SEPTEMBER ~ NOVEMBER 2009
www.cotswoldessence.co.uk
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