Discovering LGBTQ+ History in the pockets of our archives
- Written byStudent communications
- Published date 26 February 2024
What’s in your pockets right now? If someone in another time were to find your coat, trousers, or dress (it has pockets!); by digging around in them what would they know – or think they know – about your life?
It is this process of discovery and speculation that Chloe Gilbert, from the LCF Archives and Curatorial team, was experiencing when she was repackaging items from the LCF archive. Slipping her hand into the pockets of a beautiful, black dinner jacket; she found tickets for a Czech opera from over 20 years ago. Why were they there? Who had left them? And did they enjoy the complex opera about the life of Moravian villagers?
Who did the jacket belong to?
It turns out that this was more of a rediscovery as the dinner jacket is one of several items in the LCF archives’ collection that belonged to Francis Golding, one of the country's leading architectural, planning and conservation consultants. Sadly, in 2013 Francis died from injuries sustained while cycling in Central London; where he lived with his civil partner Dr Satish Padiyar, a lecturer and author in art history.
A few years after his passing, Satish invited the Museum of London to Francis’ untouched home to create a collection from his many wonderful and interesting articles of clothing. LCF’s Cyana Madsen (previous student and now course leader of MA Fashion Curation and Cultural Programming), was volunteering for Museum of London at the time and the discovery and research of Francis’ pocket items has become something of a life work for her. Her initial discovery of Francis’ pocket items and analysis has helped us shape an understanding of who Francis Golding was.
Francis “felt that his mission was to make ‘nasty-looking’ buildings look better” a friend of his told us. He certainly made his mark on the London skyline, consulting for other architects like Norman Foster and Rafael Viñoly on projects like the ‘Gherkin’ and the ‘Walkie-Talkie’ respectively.
Abstract painters and staggering out of fashion events
Francis Golding was a great lover of art, culture and fashion; admiring and being friends with the abstract painter Howard Hodgekin (a Camberwell alum), whose painting hung over his desk as the Executive Chairman of the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment. He would often disappear off for artistic weekends across Europe, making sure to always take in an opera or two as he travelled.
And it was this love of opera that led him to attend a showing of Jenůfa at Glyndebourne in the spring of 2000, the tickets for which were discovered by Chloe in that beautiful dinner jacket. On inspecting the tickets however, the team discovered they were not purchased by Francis, but by his long-term friend Paul Dyson.
Mr Dyson was happy to speak to us about his many warm and jovial memories with Francis, from them living on the same street from 1980, to their frequent trips to Glyndebourne. A great lover of fashion, Mr Dyson described how he would frequently advise Francis on clothes, regardless of how little Francis would take notice of this friendly advice.
A lover of eccentric tastes, Francis would pine after a pair of crocodile shoes that Mr Dyson had inherited until he gave in and gifted them to Francis so that he could impress the Duke of Devonshire (they really did fit him better apparently). They would often attend private views of designer launches, to which one of them would somehow acquire a press pass, and from which they would “stagger out with bags of designer clothes”.
Maybe it was from one of these events that Francis acquired the dinner jacket and some of the other items in the LCF collection?
View Francis' clothes and LCF's Archive
A (well) worn collection
After his sad passing, along with the Museum of London, London College of Fashion acquired a collection of Francis’ clothes. As well as the dinner jacket, the LCF archive also contains a well-packet and much travelled Issy Miyake waistcoat (a favourite Mr Dyson told us) and a beautiful pair of well-worn pair of black Parada shoes.
It seems that Francis was a frequent collector of things in his pockets; from tickets and photos, to seashells and packets of McDonalds salt. Dr. Cyana Madsen, has analysed and written about all the found items from Francis’ pockets. Her chapter in Everyday Fashion: Interpreting British Clothing Since 1600 delves into what a worn collection like this can “materialize moments of lived, everyday lives”.
It is this lived-in quality that the LCF Archives treasures about collections of these. They aren’t simply excellent pieces of Japanese sartorial success or fine Milanese make; they are lived in articles of a person’s wardrobe – a worn collection.
A new archive for old stories
Last summer the LCF Archives were planning their move to the new LCF East Bank site, excited to access to their new purpose-built archives spaces, with temperature and humidity control. The new LCF Archives store provides new opportunities for storing and repackaging the varied collections, as well as future cataloguing, to support access.
Chloe (LCF alum of MA Fashion Curation and now their Archives and Curatorial Assistant) would take out each item, photograph it and put it in a new, conservation grade storage bags. It was through this caring and repetitive process, feeling the fabrics of history and bringing life back into them through their documentation; that Chloe discovered these long-discarded tickets from Francis. Another wonderful surprise brought to us by the LCF move to East Bank.
The serendipity of this little discovery highlights how important it is to preserve, collect and curate items like those in Francis Goldings’ collection. Not only to educate us on the fashion, styles and designs of the past, but also the lives lived by those who wore them.
What other stories remain to be uncovered amongst the collections which include over 650 pairs of shoes and the wardrobes of other Londoners…