SW3 style: punks, peacocks and miniskirts

In 1955, a small revolution took place in Chelsea. That year, a new shop opened at 138a King’s Road. Named Bazaar, it was started by Mary Quant, along with fellow Goldsmiths graduate and future husband Alexander Plunkett-Greene.

The shop soon gained a cult following. This was thanks in part to its window displays, with mannequins arranged in striking poses. There was also a café in the basement, free drinks served in the evenings and the latest music playing in the background.

But the clothes were the real reason for the boutique’s popularity. Traditionally, teenagers and young adults would dress in the same outfits as their parents, but Bazaar produced clothes designed to make people feel ‘alive’. The shop also championed styles like the mini-skirt, which allowed women to dance, run and move with more freedom than old-fashioned womenswear.

Chelsea already had a colourful history when it came to clothes. In the nineteenth century, it was occupied by pre-Raphaelite painters like Dante Gabriel Rosetti and aesthete writers like Oscar Wilde. These figures were often known for their extravagant outfits and gorgeously decorated homes, adding to the neighbourhood’s bohemian reputation.

However, in the post-war decades, Chelsea was a run-down part of town. Rents were cheap, making it a popular neighbourhood for students and young creatives. It was also a popular spot for independent shops, becoming home to numerous trendy boutiques, selling clothes, antiques and interior design objects.

The King’s Road soon became ‘a wilderness of stoned harlequins,’ according to the aristocratic antiques dealer Christopher Gibbs. Gibbs was known as the ‘King of Chelsea’ and he played an important role in turning the streets around the King’s Road into the capital’s coolest neighbourhood.

Gibbs was said to be the first man to wear flared trousers in 1961, and one of the earliest to adopt floral shirts in 1964. His home on Cheyne Walk was filled with artefacts from Morocco and North Africa, while his shop on the Pimlico Road inspired many of the distressed bohemian interiors of the period.

As an editor of the quarterly magazine Men in Vogue, Gibbs also popularised the Peacock Revolution. This term was used to describe iconic bands like the Rolling Stones and the Beatles, who embraced clothes with floral prints, bright patterns and colourful designs.

Gibbs was friends with members of both bands, and with their help, he pioneered the ‘hippy’ style. Over the course of the Sixties, the King’s Road became the centre of London’s counter-culture, attracting a mix of musicians, models and ‘slumming’ aristocrats.

By the following decade, tastes were beginning to change. The most influential Chelsea boutique was now Vivienne Westwood’s store, SEX. Occupying no.430 King’s Road, it sold shocking designs by Westwood and her partner, the music producer Malcolm McLaren. Though it only lasted two years – 1974 to 1976 – the shop was a favourite for bands like the Sex Pistols, pioneering the rebellious style of the punk movement.

If the punks had a rival, it was the New Romantics, who rejected monochrome austerity for a more dandified style. Influenced by figures like David Bowie and Marc Bolan, they blended romantic items like frilly shirts or military coats with motifs from cabaret and the commedia dell’arte, as well as make-up, glitter and androgynous styles.

One famous video from 1981 shows the two groups jostling for space on the crowded pavements of the King’s Road. But really, these two styles were different expressions of the same anti-establishment spirit – and members of both movements would dress in Vivienne Westwood’s design.

By the twenty-first century, the counter-culture had moved to East London. But the streets of Chelsea still contain independent boutiques, mixed in with upmarket fashion brands. You are more likely to find wealthy Europeans shopping on the King’s Road than art students and punk musicians. Nonetheless, as this year’s Flower Show celebrates, the neighbourhood remains one of the city’s fashion capitals and arguably the most stylish address in London.