He wouldn't give the paper up, so I turned on my machine and Googled fearfully for two minutes: "Belgian lingerie manufacturer Van de Velde has bought majority share in UK-based upmarket luxury retailer." Don't tease, I said. June Kenton is still on the board and Rigby & Peller will definitely see me out.
For me, Rigby & Peller did that thing I hate hearing other women say about some frippery bit of womanish marketing: "Your [insert product here] changed my life!" I hate saying it myself even more than I hate hearing it, but, alas, Rigby & Peller changed my life. It was a smallish change, but a life-enhancing one. They sold me a bra. I was of age, I had pre-school children, since I was 16 I'd bought many a bra and oft. But I'd never before been slipped into a bra like a shelled mollet egg is slipped into a tablespoon.
Until I went to Rigby & Peller, five minutes' walk from my office at Tatler. The late, fabulous Issy Blow had started wearing a Rigby & Peller corset bra around the office. Michael Roberts, the fashion director, put a pouty, 20-year-old French actress on the cover in 1986 (Isabelle Pasco, where is she now?), wearing a white skirt, white gloves, bling belt and bangles and a bra. Nothing else. Very daring. The credit said: "White satin couture bra, made to order from Rigby & Peller, by appointment to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, Corsetieres, 12 South Molton Street."
The actual corsetiere, the woman who fitted the Queen's bras, was the owner, June Kenton. It was her, I think, who completely revolutionised the way women buy bras in Britain. All my schoolfriends bought bras the same way - by measuring our bosoms (inside a bra) and then measuring our chests, the "underbust". And there was some sum you did in order to come up with a cup size. (Forgot it now.) For a special occasion, you might go to a department store, where a woman would "fit" you, ie hand you a bra in the size you asked for, "slip outside while you pop it on" and then come back and tell you it looked lovely.
When I saw June Kenton for the first time, I said: I've come for a new bra, erm, I'm a 36C - and she interrupted. "Yes. Just take your blouse off for me, please? Mmm. I see." Me: Or a size 34. Her: "Never mind the size. Just tell me whether you're looking for an everyday bra or something for evening under a low-cut dress?" Me: Um, both, I suppose. She disappeared.
When she came back, holding a bra, she asked me to lean forward, strapped the bra round me, snapped the straps upward, reached into the cups and repositioned the shapeless - erm -mass, reshaped it and smoothed it back down. Without any embarrassment, she said things like, "You need to get the nipples level," and "Of course, this one's bigger than the other." "You're nothing like a 36, by the way. You're a 32 chest, and the cup size is DD."
When I stood up, I thought - with some dismay - that I'd never be able to buy an ordinary bra from an ordinary shop ever again. It was a revelation. You're not thinner or anything daft. You're just trimmer and neater and stand straighter. I can see women on telly now who wear properly fitting bras and just assume that they're customers of Rigby & Peller. I can watch late-night news programmes and feel sorry for good-looking women with totally shapeless front centre panels. There are other bra shops now that have learned from June Kenton. But she's the real deal.
Posted in: Beauty
