Chappy types: hip-flasked shaped pegs that don't fit in any hole.

On Sunday found myself in Soho, I am beginning to live up to the title of this blog again. Torquil and I were interviewed by a charming French journalist on, inevitably, chappism. It is amazing how actually being asked a straight question about something concentrates the mind: especially as I am inclined to be a bit ‘wooly’ in the way my conversation moves as regular readers of this blog will know.  ‘Chappism’ itself is really just a vague term anyway.

Interviewed in the French House.

The interview did provide a chance to clarify a few things so I thought I’d mention them here. One was the idea that some people get that it is full of  fogey types with right wing leanings, Yes there are a few, a very few and if they can back up their beliefs and don’t combine them with racism, homophobia, sexism or a sense of superiority they are as welcome as the other extreme. Of course the likelihood is that any one racist, sexist or homophobic will very rapidly realize they have fallen in with entirely the wrong crowd within about 15 seconds of entering any event.

Faux aristocratic pretension is another problem. Again I have no problem with this as long as it is a reference to the eccentric, above petty pretensions, nonsensical side of things rather than an effort to feel superior to others. I’m irritated by excessive ‘what- hos’ and ‘old-chaps’ a little, but that is my problem. But I have no time with those who turn up just gagging to fulfill their preconceptions about people behaving like Margaret Rutherford or Terry Thomas.  Especially when prancing about being an edgy wanabee working class type is the order of the day. Posh hating for the sake of it is ….well, just plain old up-tight retro middle class behaviour. It's not the seventies anymore.

I have more problems with the faux radical/working class or those that feel they have to indentify with one mind set. The urbanites of Norf London are particularly guilty of this. Being from mean streets and having in my extended family people who have suffered appalling upbringings and set backs I know that kind of person does not feel the need to spend their life verbalizing it and indentifying it. If someone is rude about state schooling or council estates I'll get narked, but I get this more from other groups than anyone at a Chap event.  If you grow up in care, have run from a dangerous country in the dead of night or have battled with gender/addiction issues it does not have to delineate you whole life or mean you have to spend it in a (dis)comfort zone. If you are annoyed because an electrician or builder is wearing tweed and using terms such as 'pip,pip!' there is a scary element of real prejudice in that. We should be able to annex any accent, linguistic tic or physical habit we want. Unless you feel that working class people should only behave in an erm working class way. Or, even worse, we should all fit into some acceptable pattern of liberal (not really effing liberal) London inspired form of acceptable behaviour?

The people at ‘chappist’ events seem both more tolerant and diverse than those found in many more established straight forwardly retro events. The price for that is people you may not agree with or seemingly have much in common with will be present but this left wing firebrand would take that over a bunch of Guardian reading right-on brain deads any day. There is a difference between treating people as humans  equally and decently and expecting conformity.  Thinking about it with the journalist I concluded that there was a distinct leaning to the left sprinkled with a  lot of anarchism and libertarianism but it was tricky to state it even that strongly.   

The journalist also prompted me to consider what the Chap magazine had to offer to women as despite being quite masculine it has a decent female readership.  My conclusion is that it appeals to retro fans but those of an independent cast.  The humour and absurdist occult stuff appeals to all genders, and in fact the rag itself is paradoxically endearingly un pc whilst being entirely inclusive.  The contrast between praising proper tea, good manners and well made clothes whilst being completely disinterested in conventional morality is appealing from a modern feminist point of view.

Also, and here I have to say I know a lot of wonderful vintage women who adore cats, knitting and baking  (or they'll kill me and you don't mess with the vintage mafia!) those popular ‘vintage’ pastimes leave me personally cold.  The Chap magazine fortunately doesn’t bother with these, when it did publish a ‘chapette’ section it was too far in this vein and not as appealing to the lady reader. as the normal edition, which does have the estimable Fleur de Guerre's contribution. So if I were forced to describe a so called chapette what would she be like?:

1) Independent.

2) Curious

3) Tolerant

4) Unconventional

Thats it, nothing more specific. Because again diversity and difference are more a feature than any solidarity.  I think with the current trendiness of all things vintage, the success of so called Chap events and themed things has taken a lot of people by surprise and it can be resented.  Some can be critical, quite a few affect that ‘I am so bored with it all’ attitude which is the stock in trade of the kind of urban trendy I have already taken a pop at. But the people who write the magazine and the close knit group around it are amongst the most interesting people I know. Yes they can be show offs but I like show offs, many don't. Interestingly I have met people who moan about the chaps but adore their flamboyant gay chums. Weird inverted prejudice going on there, seems to be set rules about who can be flamboyant.  Not if you are female, straight, working-class
and so forth.

My favourite people are pretentious and flamboyant, but they are great fun, you can stick your little cliques, and fashionable urban habits where the sun don’t shine.  Most trendy London minorities are arses….  You might find the Chap magazine doesn’t appeal, fair enough nothing wrong with that per se.  But in any case generally if someone is actually rude about them I know I am facing a bore. And you know what we Sohoites think of bores….

I was a bit wrecked and couldn’t face the full vintage turn out, no hat and my best white gloves were a bit grubby. I did wear my Tara Starlet Peggy dress for the first time which is a very practical frock and matched the general ambience of the French House on a Sunday lunchtime. Shame there weren't any olives tho.

 Minn xxx

Chap Olympiad 2010

The contestants await their fate..

The Chap Olympiad has come and gone, again and once more the Internet is awash with photographs; it is a very photogenic event. I am remarkably unphotogenic, I will always look like a double chinned housemistress enjoying a private joke.

Vivien of Holloway frock, vintage bolero jacket, hair by Betty.

But despite this I enjoy my one day of sanctuary, ensconced in a little green oasis of fecund Bloomsbury amongst hordes of other people that think (some) of modern life is rubbish. As you join the queue, or circumvent it (I’m a Magellan of queue circumnavigation) you are immediately struck by three things: the stylishness of the vast majority of the attendees, the friendliness and the familiar faces. There are people you only seem to see at the Chap Olympics. A familiar refrain is ‘where do they all come from?’ Well they come from all over the place. As do the photographers. Chap Olympians wonder who will win the Getty picture steeple chase every year….

My experience of the event varies, once I had to deal with a profoundly drunk bearded one who could only stand up when supported by a couple of burlesque dollies. Another saw a triumph in the gin martini relay, enhanced by a hat so large my unphotogenic face was largely hidden. Then there was a hot Saturday in Hampstead which basically involved sitting on a blanket knocking back cava and nibbling quails eggs until I was incapable of movement or indeed thought.

The Chap Olympiad has a number of things to recommend it, apart from the variety of potential experiences. One is that its resolute promoting of amateurism, eccentric sporting and events cocks an elegant snook at the revolting orgy of corporate arrogant dullardism that infuses all major sporting events. We don’t need their cocacolaMacanike extravaganzas in citizen murdering nations. Stuff ‘em.

Is it Bloomsbury or Casablanca.

We want the cucumber discus, and jugs of pink cocktails and twirly taches. In the spirit of this, whilst the organisers lay on the props and some vague semblance of organisation (albeit of the Dad’s Army variety of organisation) those in attendance make the entertainment.

Fleur de Guerre and the ultimate winner of the event square off.

There is pleasure in observing the well dressed hordes. NOT in ‘costume’, something I wish the meedja could get their heads around but in their Sunday/Saturday any damned day of the week best.

Then the snippets of conversation are endlessly amusing. There are the dogs in neckties, men in bathing costumes plus stevedores, dandies and vintage poppets strewn across the acreage gossiping, making arch comments or indeed talking absolute rubbish: in an elegant inebriated way. Several hundred tickets were sold and people were drinking steadily all day (hurrah!) yet there was not a single fight (well apart from the competitors).

As one virgin Olympian noted people were overwhelmingly friendly and genuinely interesting. It would not be going too far to say it is a joyful occasion. The Chap Olympiad crowd burst into song, impromptu umbrella duels and flamboyant congas at the drop of a top hat.

The gathering of the tribes that takes place is also refreshing: steam punks, tweedy gents, tattooed rock chicks and Victorian flaneurs loll about in what the editor of the chap, Gustav Temple, might describe as a state of ‘chumradery’.

Of course all is not perfect. The cakes sold out. And not even the Chap Magazine can legislate against the presence of the odd annoying charmless ‘look at me’ bore. Whilst gentlemen attendees had almost all made an effort a few young ladies had decided that as they were young and pretty they would just turn up in festival style crap. Lads, if you invite them next year, be kind and treat ‘em to a tea dress they looked like Poundland plastic tulips in a sea of real daisies.

However the sight of decadent ruin at 9pm when those having to return to the outposts of Chapdom had departed was reassuring. Dancing continued on the stage. Bodies lolled around on the grass, wine and cocktails were being consumed. Even the debris was stylish….

Some of the photos on here are from taras curiak's flickr account.