london – English designer John Bates, who helped define the ’60s in Britain with his Space Age micro-mini dress and skirt, has died at the age of 83.
Born and raised in Ponteland, Northumberland, Bates was the son of a miner. From a young age he realized that he was not like his father, who was an avid sportsman. Instead, he was bookish, which trained him as a newspaper reporter, but after failing to find a job in the publishing industry in London, he turned his head to become an office assistant and then later in the war at the National Enrolled in service. Office between 1953 and 1955.
After his time in the service, Bates, without any formal fashion training, was introduced to London fashion designer Herbert Sidon by a friend, which quickly turned into a job for him. Here she met Gerard Pipartt, who became the fashion designer at Nina Ricci for more than 30 years.
At the age of 21, in 1959, Bates began creating her own designs under the name Jean Varone to appeal to a wider audience, as English names were not considered sophisticated enough in the fashion world.
By 1965, Bates rose to prominence by designing costumes for Diana Rigg for her iconic role as Emma Peel in the British spy television series “The Avengers”, for which French fashion designer Pierre Cardin also designed dresses and suits.
It is then that Bates befriended British Vogue’s Young Ideas editor, Marit Allen, who championed her and supported the claim that she invented the miniskirt instead of Marie Quant and Andre Courage.
In the same year, The Fashion Museum in Bath, Somerset honored her with the prestigious Dress of the Year award, which has been won by the likes of Giorgio Armani, Ralph Lauren and Sarah Burton for Alexander McQueen.
The following year, 1966, Bates designed Allen’s wedding outfit, a white gabardine and silver PVC minidress with a matching short trenchcoat trimmed with silver PVC lapels.
Bates’s roster of clients included musicians and royalty, from designing Cilla Black’s wedding dress in 1969 to Bobby Willis, which was worn by Princess Margaret in Mustique.
During the ’70s, Bates changed her direction towards structural abstract designs and turned to the Woodstock-maniac look with the rest of the world towards the feminine maxi dress. During this period on the London fashion scene, designer Zandra Rhodes was up-and-coming.
She recalled, “John was always generous to himself and Bill Gibb when we were new designers, and we all showed our collections together at the Grosvenor House show in the early 1970s. He was seen as a designer and a friend. Glad to know.
In 1974, she introduced an enhanced version of her label, featuring appliques, pure silk and embroidery, which Princess Alexandra regularly purchased.
Looks from John Bates’ fall 1980 ready-to-wear advance preview.
Fairchild Archive/Penske Media
In the early 1980s, Bates decided to leave the mainstream fashion world as his label went bankrupt. Another designer, Tom Bowker, took his position. Bates retired to Wales, where he took up portrait painting.
The Victoria and Albert Museum and the Museum of Costume in Bath conducted a major retrospective of Bates’ work in 2006.
His partner in Bates’ family is John Siggins.
Originally published at Pen 18
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