How it all began - part 2

When I went to the Cecil Beaton exhibition the other week, I discovered that a number of the photographs, and the sitters in his society portraits, were familiar to me - and it's all due to this book.

With my 6" ruler at the side for scale

This history of 60 years of British Vogue was first published in 1975, and my mum received a copy as a Christmas present (probably after some very strong hints to my dad!) two years later. It's hard now, in a world where endless images are easily available online, to explain just how amazing this heavily illustrated book seemed almost 50 years ago. I spent many hours looking through it, and while The Story of Clothes and Costume sparked my interest in historical clothing, my love of vintage fashions can be traced back to these pages.

It's a wealth of period imagery

The book is split into seven chapters. Most cover more or less a decade, but the first one looks at the end of the First World War and its aftermath.

The opening of the first chapter

Each chapter begins with a written account of the period covered, and then goes into year-by-year coverage.

1919, in pictures

There is also a section in each chapter called "The Changing Face", which features famous women of the period, presumably chosen as representative of the ideal look of the time.

Gertrude Lawrence and Lady Ashley in the 1924-29 chapter

For me reading the book in the 1970s, the chapter on the thirties was the first to feature what looked like 'clothes' rather than historical costumes.

1970s me could imagine wearing some of these

My parents married in 1955, and much of our furniture came from that time, so the image at the start of the chapter on the fifties was entirely relatable.

Very familiar chairs!

The images for this decade include both formal, quintessentially 'fifties' dresses, and more relaxed looks which seemed entirely wearable in the 1970s and still are today. (Ideally made in better materials, though!)

London couture, spring 1953

Casual looks in the new wonder fabric - nylon!

The sixties and early seventies didn't hold a great deal of interest for me at the time, and I must admit they still don't.

1960

1969

Some of the last images in the book are from 1974-5, and show the thirties revival in fashion at the time.

Contrasting seventies styles, loose and fitted

But out of the 300-plus pages of the book, it was the images of the 1940s which I liked the most.

1942-43

1944

This was where I first saw Cecil Beaton's photograph Fashion is Indestructible, and I fell in love with the clean lines and pared-back elegance of it all. I was thrilled to see the original in the exhibition.

As it appears at the start of the chapter on the 1940

It's fair to say that this book has got a lot to answer for!