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Sir Terence Conran
A LIFE IN
DESIGN As he reaches 80, we celebrate the man who brought the modern lifestyle to Britain WORDS MORAG BRUCE
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Photography (portrait) John Parkinson Agency
erhaps it was a sign of things to come when the schoolboy Terence Orby Conran started making dolls’ house furniture to sell to his sister’s friends: once an entrepreneur, always an entrepreneur. As Sir Terence celebrates his 80th birthday, it’s possible to look at his life’s work and see that same spirit of adventure running throughout. His ability to give people what they want (often before they know they want it) has transformed our eating habits, what we buy and how we style our homes. That we expect great design to be accessible – rather than the preserve of the wealthy – and our restaurants to be cosmopolitan is largely down to his vision. Aside from introducing duvets and chicken bricks to the UK, Sir Terence made headway in other areas. The opening of The Conran Shop made retail destinations of underrated parts of London and, although property developers thought him crazy to invest in the run-down warehouses of Butler’s Wharf on the Thames, his concept rejuvenated the area. It also showed a spirit in common with his influences – William Morris, the Bauhaus school and food writer Elizabeth David – who were united by a fierce ambition to make things new. That influence is still felt today in his collection for Marks & Spencer. As we say ‘happy birthday Sir Terence’, let’s take a look at his ground-breaking career so far… >
Enrols at Central School of Arts & Crafts
1931
1948
Born 4 October in Kingston upon Thames
my work
‘What unites is the pleasure of an environment that I hope will people, and make them feel good.’
creating
charm and amuse
After a stint in France, opens Soup Kitchen in Chandos Place, London
1952
1953
Launches Conran & Company
1954
Launches Conran Design Group (CDG)
1956
Opens second restaurant, The Orrery
1963
First Habitat opens in Chelsea
1964
Purpose-built CDG factory opens
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The retailer When Sir Terence saw the Brits’ desire for casual, European-style dining thriving in his restaurants, a quandary arose – how could the experience be duplicated for customers at home when it was near-impossible to buy the equipment? The answer was Habitat, a one-stop shop opened in 1964 that packaged modernism for Britain. ‘We wanted to give people things that made living easier. The average furnishings at the time were dull and ponderous,’ he says. ‘We wanted design to be democratic. Our benchmark customer was a teacher – we had to be affordable for a teacher.’ With Vidal Sassoon-coiffed staff dressed in Mary Quant clothes, Habitat swept aside the Grace Brothers-style stores of the day. It sold items of exotica such as woks and duvets, as well as furniture from
its own Conran Design Group; what we now think of as design classics. Pop stars joined teachers at the tills and homeware was never the same again. Fast forward through a retail career including Mothercare, Next and Bhs, and we arrive at the 30,000 sq ft Conran Shop, opening in 1987 in the magnificent Michelin House building on Fulham Road, an event that Sir Terence cites as his career highlight. >
things Sir Terence popularised in the UK...
LEFT Early days at Habitat. THIS PICTURE The Conran Shop’s home in Michelin House, built in 1911.
1 The wok 2 The duvet
3 The chicken brick 4 The kilim rug 5 The paper lantern
Photography (top left) John Maltby/RIBA Library Photographs Collection; (top right) Alamy; (still life) Pixeleyes
The designer ‘Plain, simple, useful’ is Sir Terence’s design philosophy, which is evident in each of these key pieces, particularly his personal favourite, the Casper cup and saucer, far right. FROM LEFT Brindley side table, £199, Terence Conran for Marks & Spencer (marksandspencer.com). Matador chair, £995 (conranshop. co.uk). Casper cups and saucers, £4.50 each (conranshop.co.uk). Hector Bibendum lamp, £199, Terence Conran for Original BTC (conranshop.co.uk).
The House Book published
Neal Street Restaurant opens
1965
1971
Habitat Tottenham Court Road opens, followed by branches around the country
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1973
1974
Habitat’s largest branch opens on the King’s Road
Boilerhouse opens at the V&A. Develops Next.
1980
1981
Conran Foundation set up
1982 Buys Mothercare
Receives knighthood. Buys Butler’s Wharf
1983
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BELOW Sir Terence’s latest culinary venture is Lutyens restaurant.
The Casper range featuring a fabric pattern designed by Sir Terence for the Festival of Britain. Chequers teapot, £19.95; side plate, £9.95 (conranshop.co.uk).
Photography (far right and above centre) Tim Winter; (still lifes) Pixeleyes Hoyo de Monterrey Epicure No2 cigar, £15, cigars.co.uk
The gastronome In the early Fifties, Sir Terence followed in George Orwell’s footsteps by working as a dishwasher in Paris, and it was here that he fell for the ‘food is first’ ethos of French restaurants. ‘Back in Britain,’ he says, ‘we were still being rationed. You couldn’t buy garlic and you could only buy olive oil from the chemist.’ So no wonder food writer Elizabeth David’s books, with their talk of terrines and cassoulets, got him excited. Upon his return in 1953, he opened Soup Kitchen in London, an eaterie with stripped-back décor, young staff and, crucially, baguettes. A year later, he expanded onto the King’s Road with a coffee bar called The Orrery. Since then, Conran has overseen the opening of hotels and restaurants that, like Habitat, tapped into the national psyche – Le Pont de la Tour, Neal Street Restaurant, Quaglino’s, Bibendum, Great Eastern Hotel, Lutyens, Boundary and Albion. It’s so committed to providing fresh produce, Albion’s bakery tweets (@albionsoven) each time bread comes out of the oven. There’s no sign of slowing down, either, with a new restaurant complex scheduled for spring 2012 in a former East India Company warehouse in the City. >
Benchmark furniture makers set up in the grounds of Sir Terence’s home in Berkshire
1984
1985
Creates Conran Octopus publishing house with Paul Hamlyn
1987
Le Pont de la Tour in The Butler’s Wharf Building, SE1, opened in 1991.
back Fifties olive oil
‘When I came to Britain from France in the , you couldn’t buy , and you early from the .’ could only buy
garlic chemist
RIGHT Quaglino’s with its iconic staircase. BELOW The famous Q ashtray, £30, designed by Sir Terence (quaglinos-restaurant.co.uk)
Design Museum opens in Butler’s Wharf
1989
Buys Michelin House to accommodate The Conran Shop, Octopus and Bibendum
Cantina del Ponte restaurant opens
1991
1992
Conran Restaurants created. Opens Le Pont de la Tour
The Conran Shop opens in Tokyo
1993
1994
Butlers Wharf Chop House opens. Relaunches Quaglino’s
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The philanthropist
BUY THE BOOK
In the early Eighties, Sir Terence used some of the profits from the flotation of Habitat to create the Conran Foundation, a charitable trust committed to the promotion of industrial design. One of its first initiatives was the Boilerhouse Project, a prototype Design Museum set up in a basement in the V&A to stimulate
Since the influential The House Book in 1974, Sir Terence has been a prolific author on all home matters. All works available from The Conran Shop.
• When it opened in 1953, Soup Kitchen had only the second Gaggia coffee machine in London. • Sir Terence Conran’s partner in his first furniture studio was the celebrated artist Eduardo Paolozzi. • Neal Street Restaurant had menus designed by David Hockney. • In the Seventies, the Habitat Basics range was so successful in Japan that Seibu – the department store that franchised Habitat – developed the no-brand formula to create Muji. • By the time Quaglino’s was 10 years old, 25,000 of its iconic Conrandesigned ashtrays had gone ‘missing’. • Sir Terence’s favourite brand of cigar is Hoyo de Monterrey.
The Design Museum in Shad Thames.
design awareness, which showcased innovative exhibitions by the likes of Kenneth Grange, Issey Miyake and Dieter Rams. In 1983, Conran bought the 11-acre Butler’s Wharf site on the south bank of the Thames where a Fifties warehouse would become the Design Museum, the world’s first of its kind. And what started in an old basement will be housed in the larger Commonwealth Institute in Kensington from 2014 – a move assisted by Sir Terence’s £17.5million donation. Now that’s a CV to be proud of. Livingetc says, happy birthday Sir Terence. Design Museum’s exhibition Sir Terence Conran – The Way We Live Now runs 16 Nov 2011–4 March 2012 (designmuseum.org).
Opens refurbished Great Eastern Hotel
1999
2000
The Conran Shop opens in New York
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‘I love the work of Charles and Ray Eames. The House of Cards game has charm and humour.’ House of Cards, £34 (littlebaby company.com)
‘This is my favourite chair: it really makes me smile.’ Karuselli chair, £4,080 (conranshop.co.uk)
Boundary Hotel opens
2003 Named Provost for the Royal College of Art
2008
Launches Château Boundary wine club
2009
2010
Lutyens restaurant and members’ club opens
2011 Donates £17.5 million to Design Museum. Launches design collaboration with Marks & Spencer
Research Victoria Cockell, Susanna Sanford Photography (Eames House Of Cards) monpetitar@LCSS; (Design Museum) Luke Hayes
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