This is my title
Some type of sub-title
Some type of sub-title
Ten minutes before the official launch of Guts for Garters, a concept boutique which will periodically shut down to entirely reinvent itself, Cassie Beadle, wearing a dress completely covered in peacock feathers, is giving everything, from the elaborately carved four-poster bed to the chinaware branded 'Reject the State,' a final check. Her cofounder, Rachel Chudley, pours us all another drink and tells me in her hushed, breathy tones, how all week they've both been "so, so nervous, but really excited. We just can't wait for everyone to finally see it." Tonight and for the next six weeks the basement space is dedicated to 'The Royal We,' a theme that Cassie and Rachel have interpreted in terms of grand antique furniture, kitsch memorabilia and anarchic trinkets. One mannequin wears a powder blue replica of Wallis Simpson's wedding gown while a goatskin throw, complete with taxidermy head, sprawls across the bed.
A few hours later the boutique is so crowded there's barely room to move. Yorkshire Pearl designer Bert Clayton has jumped behind the bar to help deal with the escalating demand for gin and tonics, a long queue of people wanting their picture taken with the Queen's lookalike is trailing down the stairs and extravagantly dressed guests are circulating a rumour that Rachel and Cassie have even been approached about appearing in a documentary. On his way out one partygoer tells me "This is my new favourite place. They're bringing Camden back to what it should be."
Three days later I sit down with the pair behind it all to find out, over a nice cup of tea, if that's how they see themselves. "Because of our art history background (they met studying at the Courtauld Institute) we wanted to curate," Cassie begins. "We tried to create an experience, and that kind of fell somewhere between a gallery and a shop." Today the feather dress has been replaced with a slightly more conservative ensemble of vintage tunic and turquoise thigh-high boots, which clash brilliantly with her flame-coloured curls. "Camden was never on the agenda when we first started thinking about doing something together, but it's happened that way and it's definitely been for all the right reasons. Camden is still a heartbeat of the city, despite how commercialised the market has become, so hopefully we can be part of a renaissance here."
She has a wonderfully throaty warble which lends a sure conviction to everything she says, especially when I ask whether their part boutique, part installation venture as the next stage of pop-up shops. "We function much more like a gallery than anything else," she responds, leaning forward as if to be sure she has me convinced, "with a new exhibition three times a year. There's a real cult for these pop-up places, which feels very faddy, so that's something we wanted to stay away from." Rachel agrees, "Guts for Garters isn't part of a marketing game, we want to do something a bit more genuine with some longevity."
They're a fascinating pair, with their distinctive hair (Rachel's is black,with an ice-blonde streak at the front) and fondness for eccentricity. "Basically, she's mental, and I harness her in, and then I'm mental and she harnesses me in" Cassie laughs. But what made them perfect business partners, they tell me, is a shared distaste for all things trendy. "We just want to live in our own mad world" says Rachel with a sigh. "As much as we both love fashion, it changes so quickly and we're trying to stay out of that. With our themes we can create a whole environment and explore something that no-one else is looking at right now."
So far they've succeeded: Guts for Garters is so full of curiosities that I feel a bit bull-in-a-china-shop just glancing in, but none of it is familiar. A collection of porcelain animal heads from artist Martha Todd are mounted on one wall, while partially destroyed period clothing from a Hackney-based father and son duo, Richard and Cosmo, hangs against bespoke wallpaper in a print that was inspired by mould. Almost everything in the shop except for the vintage clothing (which includes archive Vivienne Westwood pieces) was commissioned specifically for the boutique's opening theme and won't be found anywhere else. "It's taken just a handful of people to really believe in us and contribute their work," Rachel enthuses. "They've been fantastic, and the pieces are just phenomenal. We have a new favourite every day." They've curated a tiny underground world of decaying aristocracy, where everything has a kind of eerie beauty. It's stunning, but a little creepy.
At first they nicknamed the project the 'Chop Shop' in homage to the location's past life as Charles Dickens' local butcher shop, but eventually settled on the equally evocative Guts for Garters, "which is so perfect for us because it has a hard edge and a soft edge" after it occurred to Cassie in a moment of ingenuity. But rather than take any credit for the boutique themselves, its creators describe themselves instead as "a couple of crazy old cat ladies" and I lose count of the times they put their success down to "lucky" or "serendipitous" circumstances. Even their "shock and horror" at the news of the royal wedding, which very nearly coincided with their 'Royal We' run, quickly turned to elation.
It's fantastic, it's all fun" Rachel assures me, in the same soft, breathy voice of opening night. "We'd already been putting our themes together and working on the project for almost three years, so it's incredibly lucky that we started just before the wedding. Otherwise we would have had to completely change our opening theme." And they've found that aristocracy suits their new venture perfectly. As Cassie surmises, gesticulating wildly with her hands, "it represents Britishness, idiosyncrasy and coming together. We loved the idea of that iconography and aesthetic permeating through all the different mediums that we have on show." Later this year the royal paraphernalia will be replaced, first by a 'Surreal Women' theme and then by 'Anatomy.' Both hold the allure of new levels of peculiarity. "We've got some very, very exciting people in the pipeline" Cassie promises, "and we can't wait to do it all again."
