The Royal Vauxhall Tavern is a dowdy gay boozer in South London – not the most likely of places to be graced by fashion royalty, but last week, Dame Vivienne Westwood put in an appearance and Mooks was there to lap up every word of wisdom which dropped from the yellow-haired Queen’s mouth.

The night was Scott Capurro’s Position – a live comedy chat show which features bands, comedians and celebrities. Previous interviewees include Gail Porter, Matt Lucas and MP George Galloway, but it’s the presence of Westwood which raises the bar to dizzying heights.

The musical interlude was supplied by Toy Toy – a hurricane of electro punk and grrl attitude fronted by leopard-print-leotard-wearing Demelza who belts out numbers such as ‘F#@k My Boyfriend’ and ‘The Me Song’ with raw and genuine energy, an apt choice of entertainment for Vivienne, who sat at a table at the back of the pub for most of the evening.

Viv’s live interview with Scott proved to be a meandering affair in which she skilfully swerved around questions she didn’t care to answer. Instead, she ploughed on with getting her message across, the main gist of which was that humanity is endangered and needs to “get a life” and stop “skating around on the surface and sucking everything up”, she stated that we “use crap to fill a gap and distract ourselves with television and consumerism”- an interesting angle considering her life’s work has been about establishing a brand and reaping the rewards from it’s success.

When asked where she likes to shop, Vivienne stated that she mostly wears her own clothes (on the night, she was dressed in a checked shirt, kilt, green tights, legwarmers and a brown belt with a blue mosaic heart buckle), she revealed that she does occasionally wear Yves Saint Laurent and Ralph Lauren, but hasn’t heard of the high street giant H&M.

On the subject of her career Vivienne remains simultaneously proud and humble, simply stating that she always has to have a project on the go as a form of support and strength and that fashion helps her explore and understand the world, which seems to be her ultimate goal.

She revealed that she didn’t even like fashion for the first fifteen years of her life and originally thought she would become a school teacher. She went from living in a council flat in Clapham to achieving worldwide recognition – something which has kept her feet firmly on the ground and makes her an approachable soul, she has only ever blanked one fan and likes people as a whole.

In terms of the Westwood brand, she believes she has given people the chance to beautify themselves and they can either take it or leave it. She thinks people should bring an element of DIY into their style and should only buy things that they really, really like. “Don’t buy a coat – go out with a towel wrapped around you”, she states.

During the interview Vivienne seemed perfectly comfortable talking about her personal life, addressing the death of her former husband Malcolm McLaren, who died on her birthday earlier this year. Although the pair had lost touch in recent years she spoke with nothing but fondness for him and muses that he didn’t go as far as he should have done. He wanted to change everything within the realms of rock ‘n’ roll but never quite achieved it and no one else has managed to since.

Vivienne’s two sons and her husband Andreas Kronthaler were both in the audience, Andreas is 25 years her junior and she stated that they have a really healthy marriage, he just wants to make his wife look and feel amazing all the time and apparently she is perfectly happy for him to do whatever he wants so long as he lets her read her book.

On the subject of motherhood, she feels that she wasn’t a good mother in terms of providing her boys with any sense of normality or routine when they were growing up, but that they were always given freedom and respect and she has always listened carefully to everything they had to say, which has kept them firmly in love with one another.

Some accuse Westwood of putting on a continual front which subconsciously makes us go out and buy her clothes. Others are convinced she is stark raving bonkers and that her creations are nothing but hideous – balls to the lot of them. Viv is an English national treasure and there is a lot of sanity lurking beneath her eccentric exterior. I can’t imagine many other dames taking to the stage of a grubby pub in Vauxhall and hanging out amongst us lesser mortals for the evening for no fee.

Long live the queen of punk.

With special thanks to Aaron Molloy for the images.




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