An auburn tease of hair accompanied with a warm smile greets you over a counter that was in fact, previously used as a chest of drawers in her sister’s living room. Everything about this woman, from her fluent hand movements as she talks, her 1920’s black housecoat “that also works great for a Halloween outfit” radiates eccentricity. Describing herself as a Labrador, a loving devoted excitable animal, doesn’t quite cut it, as she is corrected by her friends to be more like a Spaniel – an erratic, intelligent, lively animal.
As Hepwrights’ celebrates its first birthday in its store in Bedford Place, it’s a perfect time for founder Catherine Wright to look back at how far she’s come. What started as selling beautiful garments with a fellow single mum on eBay six years ago has gone on to becoming “a centre for the creatives of Southampton – putting us on the map.”
Spybaby Vintage, the creation of too many beautiful garments with her friend grew from selling hit French Connection skirts on eBay from her back bedroom, to a front bedroom, and eventually the basement of a cafe with rising attention from its customers admiring the pieces they bought between them. Around 2006, Catherine’s business partner had other commitments in her music to pursue and the cafe taking back their basement, leaving Catherine with the tricky decision - to go it alone and set up shop or give up now?
So when Catherine found a dodgy first-floor office space in the quiet area of town with “weirdy-windy” stairs, it seemed like fate. As the idea of being committed to the shop full time was at first daunting, Catherine held once a month sales under the name Hepwrights - Spybaby Vintage held too much of an emotional connection for ex-partner Donna - using her own surname but incorporating three things she admired - Audrey Hepburn, Katherine Hepburn and the hip hep-cats. Using this prefix allows Catherine, she tells thoughtfully, to be able to emotionally detract herself from the business she created if she were ever to sell it on, although at this time she was only just getting started.
Bad luck however seemed to plague Catherine, with her teenage son Bill in and out of hospital, and a younger daughter needing heart surgery for a illness she’d carried since birth, family commitments could have prevented Catherine from continuing with the business. Two car accidents, both write-offs and neither being her fault, Catherine’s luck really was down. Being a survivor, Catherine kept on running her ever expanding collection of marvels in the tiny office space, until the worse of all happened, a house fire destroying “everything apart from the walls and the roof.”
This is where Jennifer Anyan, stylist and lecturer on Fashion Styling at Southampton Solent University found her. The friendship that developed brought advantages for both parties, Anyan having access to the wonderful pieces Catherine stocked for photo-shoots and fashion shows, whilst in turn the attention blooming Catherine’s confidence about the business massively, to the point where she decided to open her shop full time in new spot in Bedford Place.
Catherine regards the 27th September, the day she signed a five year lease for her shop as such a key point in her life - “the longest thing I’ve ever committed to”, smiling as she recalls the memory, for it to be more important than the shops anniversary on the 5th November, her birthday, so she wouldn’t forget it. But talk about the future of her shop, and of vintage overall is a big question mark for Catherine. “I’m happy that language changes, and the meaning of vintage has changed. But it’s a double edged sword, what happens to our little businesses when vintage goes out of style or the meaning changes?”
Vintage clothing has, as far as Catherine is concerned, never gone out of fashion. As a child of the 70’s, she was always aware of the inspirational punk movement going on around her, and still cherishes the Do-it-yourself ethos of punk and new romantics. “My friend Maggie and I would make a schedule of car boot sales from the Friday newspaper and cycle between them all with black bin bags full of pieces. I remember my dad saying: ‘I hope you’re gonna wash that before you wear it.’”
Catherine adopted this DIY attitude through her teens, she recalls her first gig, Elvis Costello at the Mayflower Theatre, that she attended alone in mens pinstripe trousers, cricket boots, a collarless shirt and a tux jacket with lurex lined collar that she created from men’s pieces. “ I wasn’t a Miss Selfridges girl, I was a bigger girl then and there was a lot less available out there on the high street.”
This DIY attitude still rings true, Catherine uses playing cards as clothing tags at Hepwrights, saying that she “tries to re-use beautiful stuff that already exists” taking inspiration from Martin Creed’s Turner prize winning “Half the air in a given space” where he filled the room with balloons, but tried to use as little stuff as possible. Catherine’s business itself has been pretty DIY, with Catherine building her website with basic IT knowledge and the use of Wordpress. “I love technology…I get more laughs a day from Twitter than anything else!”
Catherine, when discussing her shop is adamant not to have a favourite period of fashion - “I have a fashion business, not a fashion period business…vintage to me is 25 years old and back.” When asked who she admires in the fashion industry, Catherine favours stylists over celebrities, gushing over the original Sex and the City stylist Patricia Fields, as well as the ostentatious style of Iris Apful with her large owl-like glasses and “more is more attitude” which Catherine adores - “I’ve always had the fantasy of making ‘well done on your outfit’ badges to give out to old punks or people with good tattoos!”
