The Surprising Life of Constance Spry Page 12

  As commissions piled up, more experienced staff were needed. When Connie heard that a West End flower shop had gone out of business, she quickly pounced on the head saleswoman, a Miss Oldfield, a large, calm and dignified lady who was initially dubious about exchanging the smart West End for a shop on the wrong side of London. Connie also hired Miss White, the firm’s head florist. ‘Whitey’, a jeweller’s daughter, did floristry work with a jeweller’s precision, taking on the most delicate tasks, such as separately wiring each bell of a bunch of hyacinths to form a wedding spray. It was largely thanks to her skill that Connie was able to offer innovative crescent-shaped sprays for brides to carry instead of the traditional bunches tied together like a miniature broomstick.

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  Connie had always been rather ambivalent about traditional floristry, and it has been customary to think of her as the woman who set flowers free from such artificial constraints. The term ‘floristry’ in those days meant the art of wiring flowers and leaves into ornate bouquets, garlands, wreaths, headdresses, buttonholes, pins and corsages. It was both fashionable and very popular, and Connie had the highest regard for those with the necessary speed and skill for this kind of work. It was essential for weddings and funerals, the bread and butter of many flower shops and, as Connie herself remarked, ‘the sentimental young thing who wants only natural flowers at her wedding is likely to be disappointed by the result.’ Her own requirements in floristry were exacting: if any wiring showed she would complain about the ‘ironmongery’; the end result had to be jewel-like.

  In many of her books Connie claimed to dislike artifice, anything that seemed unnatural, particularly wiring – ‘do not wire flowers for a vase, it takes away the natural grace of the flower’ – and she usually rejected artificially dried or coloured flowers. Yet in later years she created extraordinary dramatic effects by painting and gilding leaves and using artificial ‘drieds’. She loved to create her Christmas ‘gewgaws’, and was often seen happily wiring and waxing in Flo’s ‘Arts’ department. Connie knew the difference between these sought-after products, which were fun and very necessary to her business, and the serious art of decorating with flowers.

  Soon an assistant was also found for Flo, whose skill in making artificial flowers was proving very successful; her ‘Flemish pictures’ made out of perfectly fashioned flowers of waxed paper sold for high prices and were kept by customers until they gathered dust. She also became adept at working with papier mâché, and made boat-shaped and wall-mounted vases which she varnished or coated with plaster, then painted. Later, Flo made models of vases designed by Connie which were then made up by the Fulham Pottery and sold as collectibles.

  Connie always took great care with her choice of receptacles for her flower displays, which in her view was as important as the choice of the flowers themselves. Having inherited from her mother a passion for ornaments, she could never resist the junk-shops that proliferated at the time, where real bargains could be found. Travelling on a bus, she would often spy something in a pawn shop or junk-yard and leap out to buy another treasure. Driving around in the van made such acquisitions even easier. Connie would suddenly shout at her assistant, ‘Stop, I’ve seen something!’ and return triumphantly carrying some quite filthy and unpromising-looking object. ‘Never mind,’ she would say. ‘Wait till I’ve got it cleaned up.’ Often these finds would turn out to be copper or alabaster, but even if they were only wood or pottery she might see an interesting shape that had potential. She particularly loved giant vases that she could barely carry. This growing assortment, including jugs, tins, boxes – anything that could be made to hold water – became an essential part of her work, and both her shops and her houses would always be crammed with pieces waiting for their moment. Connie’s private clients often wanted her to use their own cut-glass vases and silver rose-bowls, but instead she would throw open their cupboards and bring out old heirlooms in bronze and marble, silver cups, tureens and sauceboats, and even bread bins, pottery dishes and meat plates from the kitchen. Once the ladies had got over the shock, they were usually delighted with the results.

  Connie’s little shop gained an element of masculine resourcefulness, stability and humour with the addition of George Foss. ‘Fossey’, then only twenty-four, had ambitions to be a head gardener but his father said they were a dying race and sent him to Drage’s department store where his brother worked. When Fossey saw Connie’s dramatic flower arrangements in the store’s windows, he was hooked. With his horticultural knowledge and experience in retail, he was an ideal flower buyer. The only problem was that he could not drive. Val put him in the van and made him drive round and round nearby Vincent Square until he ran into a lamp-post, after which he was considered qualified. He was willing to turn his hand to anything, or, if it was beyond him, to find precisely the chap who could do it – such as the craftsman who made the watertight tin linings for Connie’s junk-shop finds, or the chap who could construct pedestals, screens and backgrounds for her displays. Fossey accepted with amusement his position as the only man in a small and decidedly feminine world. He was infinitely kind and helpful to the beginners and always had a shoulder for anyone to cry on. Over thirty years later he was still there, as Managing Director, and like so many of her devoted staff remained working with Connie for the rest of her life.

  Connie listened to her clients, learned from them and tried to interpret their wishes and preferences – only steering them away from things that seemed dull or ‘unsuitable’. Happily, many of her private clients were discerning, cultured people from whom she could learn as well as share her own novel ideas. There was the client who wanted vases of ‘old roses’ the same as those in her Aubusson carpets, another who wanted the greens and greys and crimsons of a wonderful tapestry to be emphasized, an artist who wanted flowers that did not look ‘too real’ and was given urns of sculptural-looking arums. Each commission was personal and individual; and gradually Connie developed a deeper understanding of how to use flowers to suit both an individual room and the character of its owner. From the peaceful atmosphere afforded by fresh greens and soft plums to the simple prettiness of pinks and blues to lively scarlets and acid yellows, she demonstrated vividly that flowers had the power to create mood and also to reflect it.

  Connie’s first grand customer was Lady Winnifreda Portarlington, the wife of an Irish peer. Lady Portarlington was driving home from a Royal Horticultural Show in Vincent Square when she saw the little shop, and something ‘novel and exquisite standing in the window’. The chauffeur stopped the car, came into the shop and asked for the owner. When Connie appeared, Lady Portarlington leaped out of the limousine with cries of delight, amazed to find that Constance Spry was the little Connie Fletcher who had worked with her old friend Lady Aberdeen in Dublin. She immediately invited Connie to do regular flower arrangements in her home and became her lifelong friend and patron.

  Grander still was Molly Mount Temple, mistress both of the vast Broadlands estate in Hampshire and of a superb London house. She was a domineering and exacting woman and not popular with the staff at Flower Decorations. She would phone the shop in the morning and order flowers for the dinner table to coordinate with her chosen gown. But she was also dynamic and amusing, and there were times when she even laughed at herself. ‘Exit tornado!’ she would cry as she got into her car, knowing she left behind her ‘gasps of relief’. But she had a genuine feel for good decor and was a passionate gardener. She did not, of course, soil her own hands with actual gardening (she is said to have been the first person in London to paint her fingernails), but she was a knowledgeable garden designer who broke away from the old Victorian ‘blaze of colour’ borders and planned her planting in harmonizing tones – blue and grey, or all-red, or silver and white. She employed ten male gardeners and two girls who were students from horticultural college. Two of Connie’s best flower decorators, Margaret Watson and Joyce Robinson, came ready-trained from Broadlands. They shared a bothy in the grounds and were pai
d very little while they were training. Their chief work was to pick and arrange flowers for the large weekend house parties. They also made up baskets of cut flowers for Connie’s shop, to be sent up to London early on Monday mornings. Over the years Molly Mount Temple and Connie became close friends, sharing an interest in interior design and gardening – although, according to their mutual friend Beverley Nichols, there was a certain rivalry between the two ladies which, ‘in Molly’s case, grew into a positive animosity’.

  As her reputation grew, Connie found herself being taken up by society women who wished to be her patron; she was their very own flower decorator, a ‘special discovery’ whom they could recommend to their friends. Her easy charm and ability to move effortlessly between different social circles meant that she was even invited to luncheons and occasionally to parties. She was, however, always very wary of combining business with social life, declaring that she was ‘a shopkeeper, and shopkeepers do not attend customers’ parties’. She hardly ever accepted dinner invitations. Exhausted after a long day, she far preferred spending a quiet evening at home with Shav in the garden or playing Scrabble or doing the crossword puzzle. Occasionally she went to luncheon parties where she could see her flowers ‘in action’ and make useful contacts. She was always a popular guest, keeping everyone laughing at her stories and her mimicry, though she still claimed she was shy with strangers.

  Back at home, friends were always welcome in the rambling old house and the semi-wild garden at Abinger. Marjorie Russell was a regular visitor, bringing her theatre and ‘arty’ friends who enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere, good food and far-ranging, sometimes racy talk. Sidney Bernstein had rented a cottage nearby from Vita Sackville-West and visited with his own weekend guests such as Oliver Messel and his sister Alice, Norman Wilkinson, John Gielgud and Charles Laughton. Connie particularly adored Theodore Komisarjevsky, not because of his famous sexual allure but because, like him, she loved to make something out of nothing. Komis could design stage sets out of the most unpromising materials and make them look remarkable by his artistry and his supreme ability in lighting. Given a few second-hand flats, an old back-cloth, some paint and a modest lighting set, Komis would give you beauty. And it cost almost nothing at all. In the course of their long association Connie learned many valuable tricks from Komis, which she developed in her own way for parties and weddings.

  Similarly, her long and enduring friendship with Oliver Messel brought her numerous important commissions and she took many valuable ideas from his theatre designs. Talented and precocious, Messel was in his early twenties when Connie first met him. His family was cultured, wealthy and artistic; his grandfather and father, of German extraction, were the knowledgeable plantsmen who created the famous gardens at Nymans in Sussex. Messel, whose mother was a daughter of the artist Edward Sambourne, studied at the Slade School of Fine Art in London under Professor Henry Tonks. He so impressed his teachers with his extraordinary and original masks modelled from wax and papier mâché that, while still a student, he held an exhibition of them. This led to his first professional commission to create masks for Massine’s ballet Zephyr and Flora. ‘Cocky’ Cochran, alert as ever to young talent, engaged Messel to create masks for his 1926 Revue at the London Pavilion. During this time Messel designed costumes and scenery for a succession of Cochran’s revues, including, in 1928, the setting for Noël Coward’s song ‘Dance, Dance Little Lady’ from This Year of Grace

  One weekend Val Pirie brought an old schoolfriend who had recently finished a cookery course at the famous Cordon Bleu School in Paris. Rosemary Hume was one of the first women to have gained the coveted diploma. She had been taught by Henri-Paul Pellaprat the repertory of French dishes derived from the great Escoffier.

  Rosemary was born in 1907 near Sevenoaks, Kent. Her father, Colonel Charles Vernon Hume, was in military intelligence and had recently served as military attaché at the British legation in Tokyo during the Russo-Japanese war. Her mother Ursula was from Keswick in Cumberland. Rosemary and her sisters grew up in several homes, often staying with family or friends in large country houses where she quickly found her way to the kitchen and wheedled the cooks into teaching her their skills and recipes. She had failed to shine at school but instead became passionate about cookery. Connie took to her immediately.

  It was the beginning of a lifelong friendship which eventually became a professional partnership too. Since her return from Paris Rosemary had often been asked to cook special luncheons and dinners for friends and pass on a little of her expertise and knowledge in French cuisine to their somewhat reluctant cooks (some of whom so resented the idea that they required any instruction that one woman threw a saucepan at Rosemary’s head). Nevertheless, one of her elder sisters recalled that she was astonished to see such ‘a shy, unassuming girl gain such rapport with these old pros’. Connie was sufficiently impressed with Rosemary to persuade her to give her cook Gladys Trower some lessons. Happily Gladys proved to be a keen and talented pupil. Connie herself was always present during these sessions in the kitchen, watching, tasting, learning and taking note of every detail.

  In 1931 Rosemary borrowed £2,000 from family friends and set up a cookery school in London with Dione Lucas, a fellow student from the Paris Cordon Bleu. They rented two ground-floor rooms in Jubilee Place, Chelsea. The larger room was the kitchen, the smaller the office, and in a corridor to the street, according to Rosemary’s niece Griselda Barton, ‘they set up a few tables and chairs for passers-by to partake of the more edible results of their students’ efforts’.

  Val Pirie was now spending almost every weekend at Abinger, helping in the garden and relaxing after the long, arduous week. Sunday afternoons were spent gathering in the garden, woods and hedgerows enough to fill the huge hamper with flowers, leaves, seed-heads and branches to be driven up to town early on Monday. Although Connie sometimes took her friends for granted, her friendships were always intense and close, very trusting and generous. She regarded Val as part of the family and the most important member of her team. She relied on her for her loyal support and unfailing good advice on running the business. Whereas Connie, as already noted, had neither aptitude nor interest in the business side of things, Val showed considerable talent for it.

  A few days before Christmas, when Connie, Gladys and Rosemary were up to their elbows in mixing-bowls preparing puddings and pies, Connie sent Shav and Val off for a walk in the woods with instructions to collect some branches of larch well-studded with cones. They claimed they could not distinguish a larch from a pine and their search took them a long time. They returned home several hours later, giggling conspiratorially at some intimate joke. Their arms were laden with all kinds of greenery. Long trails of creeper wound all around them, tripping everyone up.

  SIX

  All-White

  1932

  The late 1920s and early 1930s were a golden age for party giving despite the fact that the country was in the grip of a depression. Wages fell and prices rose; there were strikes in the coalmines and hunger marches on London. More and more people were beginning to experience the kind of poverty Connie had seen in the East End: the long dole queues, the apathy, the clothing clubs, the undernourished children forced to give up their education and work for a pittance.

  But the rich seemed barely to notice, and continued to spend with extraordinary abandon, lavishing fantastic sums on entertaining. The Season of 1932, everyone agreed, had been ‘every bit as amusing as previous years’. The society pages of newspapers and magazines reported in every trivial detail who was where, with whom, what they were saying and what they wore:

  But really [exclaimed one social diarist], how does anyone stand the whirl of the London Season or hope to keep up with it? There were so many interesting things going on: Ascot and Henley, the Tattoo at Aldershot, the Test matches, a show of 19th-century paintings at the Lefevre gallery, the Opera at Glyndebourne, The Dubarry, playing at His Majesty’s Theatre, with Margaret Yarde giving a vigorous perform
ance as a hardboiled lady of unimpeachable lack of virtue . . . Really, Londoners are spoilt. And that is before one mentions the parties.

  Lady Rothschild’s ball was the most magnificent of the year, ‘with live, powdered footmen in yellow plush; with so many guests, Hyde Park was opened specially for parking cars . . . Mr Jimmy Rothschild, complete with eye-glass, and Mr Winston Churchill were amongst the interesting older men while all the household names among the girls and young men were there,’ gushed Vogue, while The Times reported: ‘The debutantes, for all their tulle and simpering organdie, are much better made up this year; some of them can even dance the tango, though the current favourites are “She didn’t say Yes” and “I want all of You”.’

  Fashions were carefully noted: for example, at a private view at Tooth’s Galleries guests were given ‘a novelty’ in the form of cardboard cylinders through which to peer at the pictures – ‘An excellent idea, but which did not prevent one noticing that the chicest woman present was Mrs Charles Winn in a red and white dress with a little white cap.’ At one society luncheon it was reported that Mrs Vreeland, ‘who is the last word in polished American chic, was wearing a small black suede beret with a black quill at a daring angle and a coat of black pony cloth, so smooth it looked like patent leather’. Other guests included Lady Lister-Kaye who wore red, Lady Chamberlain in brown, and Lady Carisbrooke in black. Lady Juliet Duff was draped in a cape of nine silver foxes – ‘we counted them’ – and Madame de Polignac ‘appeared magnificent in apricot satin and the loveliest ermine and pearls’.