#Becky Burford

[thewidowstanton]

Josie Stone: costumier

Costumier Josie Stone was born in London and lived and worked there most of her life but is now based in Rochester in Kent. She’s been in the business “going back to the Flower Power days of the sixties” in London’s King’s Road, and worked for a lot of up-and-coming pop groups, selling clothes to Tommy Roberts’ Kleptomania in Carnaby Street. She made fashion samples for designers Paddy Campbell and Katherine Cusack, and one Christmas Liberty’s department store had windows showcasing Cusack’s dresses – including one for Diana, Princess of Wales – all of which Josie had made. She also created samples for adverts in the boutique Medusa near Sloane Square. 

Later Josie moved into the entertainment industry, making outfits for both the children’s and adults’ Royal Variety Performances, as well as doing TV work for the Des O’Connor Show, the Michael Barrymore Show, the Lesley Garrett and Frank Skinner shows, TFI Friday and for organisations such as Butlins and Bassline Circus. She’s made costumes for shows on cruise ships and for films such as Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again, and has made those for Thursford Christmas Spectacular for many years. Even though Thursford always credits her work, her considerable contribution to the industry has largely gone unrecognised. 

She is performer Becky [Rebecca] Burford’s mother, and her son-in-law is stunt man Andrew Burford. The Widow’s Liz Arratoon has always regarded costumes as a vital part of any show and was delighted when Josie agreed to chat about her impressive – and lengthy – career. 

The Widow Stanton: Have you always loved clothes and fashion? Josie Stone: It was always in me. I was one of these kids that when my mother and father bought me a sewing machine I made all my dolls’ clothes.

Was this skill in your family background? No, my mum was very good at sewing… very good. But no they didn’t do this. My father was a printer. I learnt a lot at school and a lot from my mum. I didn’t go to college; we had lessons at school for making… millinery classes and also sewing classes.

That’s amazing! We had sewing classes at school but we never learnt anything worthwhile. How did you start out actually working in the industry? I left school and went to a couple of places making shirts but that didn’t last long. Then I met up with this guy who had his workroom above Tesco’s in Victoria. He was very keen to start making… it was like Flower Power days but you couldn’t buy shirts and trousers and things like that for the pop groups. Those sort of things just weren’t around. So I went to work with him. It was a rented flat he lived in and we were all working in there making these things. Then he suddenly got this place down King’s Road in Chelsea called The Potato Shop; on the corner in World’s End. At the time Granny Takes a Trip was just down the road from us, with this American car sticking out the window that appeared to crash through on to the step. It was great! I mean good fun, great fun!

Do you design as well as make? No, I don’t design. I get a drawing and that’s it. It depends on who the designer is… sometimes you get ‘I want that at the bottom, I want the skirt to look like that and the top to look like that’. 

Can you remember any of the pop groups you worked for? [Laughs] No! You’re talking a lot of years ago, lots of years ago. It was any group that was starting out in that industry and they had nowhere to buy their things. We would buy Indian bedspreads and make them into kaftans, sailors’ trousers, dyeing them all different colours and altering them, and frilly shirts that would be sold to the antique market at the Sloane Square end of the King’s Road, near the town hall. We had one floor in The Potato Shop and there were crazy carryings on downstairs in the basement. We didn’t really know what it was all about but it was a bit naughty. One night we sneaked back into the place and worked all night so this guy could get his order out. 

We always hear about the Swinging Sixties… how much fun was it?  Oh, King’s Road was lovely. Beautiful, beautiful. It was a wonderful place to be in the sixties with all the Flower Power, then the punks. It was great fun; it was wonderful fun. It was all unknown to me; it was all new and that was the start of me getting into that type of work. My dad worked just off of Carnaby Street and he got us work from Kleptomania, a big, big place where all the pop groups used to go. We’d be making more kaftans and shirts with frills all down the sides and the centre. There still weren’t many shops around that were selling that type of thing. Tommy Roberts would sell to people like Jimi Hendrix and The Who. It was just fun. [Laughs] I was a single girl having great fun going from one place to the next, really. 

After that I worked in a boutique called Medusa. I was downstairs making samples all the time. I didn’t used to do much production. Mainly I’d make a sample up and then if they liked it it would go off to wherever, to a factory or somewhere like that to do production. Medusa was a swinging place, it was in a little alleyway off the King’s Road next to Sainsbury’s. I believe it was called Elystan Place. It was an up-and-coming boutique. That was at the time when Zandra Rhodes was big, and those sort of people. One time we made some samples for Apple Records, the Beatles’ label, but it never came to anything. 

What was the best part of your life then? I was young and having fun and it was all the unknown. I lived then in Wandsworth Road with my parents, and these were all Chelsea people and they were different, completely different to the life I’d led, and it was just really way out, anything went. It didn’t matter what you wore, anything went. And I loved my job. I’d work any hours because I loved it. I didn’t always like the places, I’d go from job to job, but I did love my work and I then started having my own workroom. I decided I’d work from home. I worked with a friend from my first mother-in-law’s house and we were still doing the kaftans… a guy used to pull up in this black cab that was all painted with psychedelic patterns. It was at Tulse Hill – they were very quiet there – and the neighbours used to look in absolute amazement at everything going on. But we loved it, my mother-in-law loved it and it was good fun.

So, let’s jump ahead, how did the Liberty’s window display come about? I worked for somebody called Katherine Cusack. That was just when Rebecca was born and I was working from home. I think Katherine advertised in The Stage and she wanted to start doing semi-couture work. I’d make her samples and then she’d have a party and invite all these quite wealthy people to her lounge. It was a beautiful Edwardian house in Grafton Square in Clapham Common. Then she managed to get into Liberty’s and that Christmas the whole front had all the dresses that I’d made. 

Which of Lady Di’s dresses did you make?  It was a beautiful silk velvet in a beautiful deep blue. It had long sleeves and rouleau loops with little buttons all the way down. I think Di went into Liberty’s and bought it. I believe she was photographed wearing it for The Lady. Katherine was over the moon. But it was real pain to make because silk velvet takes its own route. It’s not the easiest of fabrics to work on because it’s so soft. It is beautiful but it’s not easy to make. You’ve go to have the right feed on your machine otherwise when you’re joining the seams up you’ll lose it and it will be longer one end. Josie! That dress was later auctioned for thousands and thousands! £48,000, I believe.

How did you make the move into showbusiness?  I moved into that when Rebecca started at Sylvia Young’s. They used to put on shows all the time because it’s a theatre school and I started making costumes. Then I went on to doing the children’s Royal Variety. 

Is that how you got on to the adults’ Royal Variety Performance? I’d got into a workroom at Acton doing samples for someone I met on the children’s Royal Variety. Then I went into my own workroom at Acton and I used to help her out. Various different designers got my name and we took on the work. That’s how we gradually started doing all the shows. She didn’t want to go on the shows so I used to go to the studios or anywhere where the work was and I’d fit the costumes and then come back and we’d finish them, but she stayed in the workroom to do whatever needed to be done there. 

Can you tell us about any really nice celebs you worked with? Oh God, who haven’t I met? [Laughs] I worked on the Royal Variety for years with a wonderful designer called Linda Martin. That’s years and years so that’s one helluva lot of people I’ve met. Des O’Connor was sweet. He was lovely, lovely, absolutely charming and so was his wife. We used to do a lunchtime show with him. I did that for a lot of years. Michael Barrymore was also lovely. I was really upset when he went off the scene because he was a nice guy. 

Does anyone else stand out? There’s very few that weren’t nice. They were all very nice. No one was horrible. I worked on Michael Barrymore’s show at Wimbledon Theatre and there were so many celebs on it that they had to share dressing rooms. This one particular share was with Warren Mitchell and Chris Eubank. And Warren Mitchell didn’t want to share with Chris Eubank at all. At the time Chris Eubank had this electric scooter that he would go all round the corridors on it. I could understand Warren Mitchell not wanting to share with him because he was a bit wild at this point. He’s the only one I can say wasn’t very pleasant, but I think it was because he was unhappy about sharing because he and Chris were complete opposites. 

Do you know how many years you’ve done Thursford for?  If we go this time, probably 20 years. The designer I work with there is Stephen Adnitt; he was Cilla’s designer. I worked with Linda Martin for 12 or 13 years doing Thursford. I’d never met Stephen, I knew of him, and he asked me to join his team. The designer gets the job and they’ll have a team and usually they keep that same team all the time. I’ve worked with him for eight years. 

How many costumes might be involved in its Christmas show? We have to dress everybody at Thursford, even the orchestra. So you have 56 singers, 23 dancers and almost two full orchestras. 

So when would you start to plan something like that? We – I work with Rita Best – would start end of May, beginning of June. Our designs would come in before then. We’d measure people and make the costumes and fit them in September. There are probably eight or nine sets of costumes to make. It’s enormous! Enormous. It’s the biggest show I think in Europe. We’d spend three weeks in Norfolk just making sure that it all works on the set; making sure that sequins don’t come off – I mean it’s covered, absolutely covered in sequins – and we’ll be sitting for hours and hours sticking them on. But again, we love it. We’d see the rehearsals and the preview and the day the show starts we’d come home. Our job was done. When I was working for Linda there, I’d be there working late at night. That didn’t happen so much with Stephen. He’d be like: “We’ve got to finish now.” 

You mentioned doing millinery at school so do you do headdresses and that sort of thing? No, I would have liked to have done but for Thursford we have a milliner who comes with us; Shirley Davis, who has also been in the business a very long time.

What advice would you give to someone wanting to follow in your footsteps? Get into a workroom and learn how it goes. Learn how people work because what they learn at college is not how a workroom works. And really to earn any money at it, you’ve got to have a bit of speed on the machine. You can’t hang about. You can’t take a week or two or three weeks to make something. It’s nice if they can get into a workroom and see it first hand. I mean I get my work through various designers that I’ve known over the years or another maker who will ring me up completely out of the blue. Last week I helped someone out on a film. I’ll work on anything that needs a costume. I did Red or Black? at Wembley Arena, a game show developed by Simon Cowell. You could win a £1 million. It was massive. I worked with another designer called Scott Landridge, who did the children’s TV series The Worst Witch, the TV series Mile High and the sitcom Citizen Khan.

Have you had any costume disasters? Not really. [Laughs] I’ve had a lot of late nights or working all night to finish a costume off. You get the occasional broken strap and you have to quickly run down to the stage or on to the set and pin them up, or something doesn’t fit when they arrive. But no major disasters.

Have you been doing anything during the lockdown?  Just before the lockdown we had all these shows on cruise ships lined up but that all went. At first I was making scrubs for the hospitals. I did loads of voluntary work for anyone who needed them. Sometimes they gave me the material and sometimes I’d provide it. They were using all kinds of material in the end, even bedspreads. I did that for a while and I also made these little pairs of hearts. They were to send to hospices and hospitals so the patient could have one to hold and the family would have the other one. I made them out of all the material I have here. I also did masks, but I’m not doing so many now.

Do you ever think about retiring? No! [Laughs] I love what I do. But the work will get less and less and that will be it. I mean we’ve had hardly anything this year. We did a few bits for Butlins and a big Dame’s costume, which I don’t think ever got used because that show was cut. 

Can you pick out a few career highlights? I loved working on the Royal Variety at the Royal Albert Hall. I loved doing it in there. I did that quite a few times. Beautiful, beautiful. It’s a beautiful building and it’s just lovely to work in. If you look back at all the names that have been on the Royal and I did it for more than twenty years, there are a hell of a lot of names I’ve met. And that was quite fun. 

Josie is hoping that Thursford Christmas Spectacular in Thursford, Norfolk will go ahead this year. If so, it will run from 9 November – 23 December 2021 at 2pm and 7pm. 

In the meantime she can be contacted on 07956 832261 for commissions.

For Thursford tickets click here

undefined

[gyrlversion]

Beast of Broadwell leaves onlookers flabbergasted at big cat

Spate of big cat sightings continue as ‘beast of Broadwell’ leaves onlookers ‘flabbergasted’ after being spotted prowling through the Cotswolds

Feline the size of a Labrador was spotted by fearful pub manager in the village 

Pets have vanished in Cornwall amid claims of panther-like animal stalking them 

Police and RSPCA have issued warnings amid growing concerns about big cats 

By Sebastian Murphy-bates For Mailonline and Milly Vincent For Mailonline

Published: 06:59 EDT, 10 April 2019 | Updated: 07:24 EDT, 10 April 2019

This is the moment a ‘Labrador-sized’ feline was filmed prowling outside a pub as Britain’s big cat epidemic continues.

Footage taken by The Fox Inn’s landlord, Ed Simpson, shows the beast after her filmed it from a first-floor window in the Cotswold village of Broadwell on Monday.

It follows police and the RSPCA confirming that pets have vanished in a Cornwall hamlet after being stalked by a ‘panther’ like animal.

Mr Simpson was ‘flabbergasted’ at the size of the beast, saying: ‘We were upstairs and saw something out of the window and said ‘look at that!’

‘There was this big cat. It paraded across the field quite happily then it jumped over a wall and vanished.

‘It was really huge, it could have been the size of a labrador. I put it on Facebook jokingly saying ‘has anybody lost a Puma?’ and it got loads of attention.’

The cat (pictured) was roughly the size of a Labrador and was first spotted by a pub manager startled by what she saw 

He said that he was inundated with rumours of big cats from the area, both online and from locals at his pub.

‘Some of the old boys said there had been sighting of big cats around here in the 70s, and that this could be a grandson,’ he said.

‘Somebody also sent me a link to a news story about the beast of Burford,’ Mr Simpson added.

In October local newspapers carried two reports of large ‘puma-like’ cats sighted in Burford, just 11 miles away.

Bar manager Kerry Hogg, 56, first spotted the cat out of the first-floor window while she was was in the room talking with Mr Simpson and his wife.

‘I was upstairs having a coffee and a chat and I looked out the window and saw what I thought was a black Labrador,’ she said. ‘I went to the window to look closer and I said ‘My God look at this!’

Pictured: The beast stalks the village fields as Britain’s big cat epidemic continues to worry residents 

This graphic shows recent reported sightings of black cats across the south-west of England as people have been left disturbed by the encounters 

‘It was definitely a big cat – 100 per cent, I’d bet my life on it. There was no way it was a domestic cat. It was huge.

‘It was walking through the field and then in leapt up onto the wall and dissipated. I couldn’t believe my eyes, it was massive.’

Ms Hogg agreed that the beast was the size of a Labrador but clearly moved like a cat. 

She said: ‘I won’t be parking out the back of the pub on a late shift again… I don’t want to go out there at night with that thing around.’

It comes after Steve Swatton, 63, claimed he has also seen a large fawn cat and a large black cat on the outskirts of his home city of Plympton, Devon.

Steve Swatton, 63, who claims he has seen a large black cat on the outskirts of his home city of Plymouth

He spoke out after reading about the recent sightings and incidents in Harrowbarrow and Callington in Cornwall.

Mr Swatton said he saw a ‘huge black panther’ on a second occasion when he was walking with his friend’s son, Brad Bugdale, near Sparkwell Village in Devon. 

Mr Swatton said he ‘feels sorry’ for the people who are currently speaking out about big cat sightings in Devon and Cornwall, as they are rarely believed and end up being ‘ridiculed’.

Last week, residents in the village of Harrowbarrow revealed they were being stalked by a suspected puma or panther.

James Stephenson told of how the animal attacked his Labrador Marley and later ran at him in his garden, as it emerged that several cats have gone missing from the village near Callington.

There was also a sighting at the weekend in Praa Sands, near Penzance in which Becky Abrey captured the black cat on video.

Becky Abrey was celebrating her birthday with a family meal when she spotted the huge beast believed to be the size of an Alsatian this weekend

  Advertisement

Share or comment on this article:

The post Beast of Broadwell leaves onlookers flabbergasted at big cat appeared first on Gyrlversion.

from WordPress https://www.gyrlversion.net/beast-of-broadwell-leaves-onlookers-flabbergasted-at-big-cat/