Wayne in Brent is 51-60 and is a designer.
Wayne Hemingway is the co-founder of Hemingway Design, the company behind Red or Dead, one of the UK’s leading fashion chains in the 80s and 90s. Wayne tells how he started making his own clothes at age 13, about Red or Dead and about how expressing yourself with clothes changed throughout the years. We meet Wayne at the Classic Car Boot Sale in King’s Cross, a big celebration of all things vintage by Hemingway Design.
Film Maker: George Hayward, Helena Coan
Questions & Answers
- What's your first memory of London? Getting the £10 train down from Lancashire in 1976 having followed the punk explosion in the NME and Sounds andheading down to Seditionaries on the Kings Road and not believing how expensive the T Shirts were ..it prompted me to start DIY ripping and writing on charity shop T’s
- What do you miss when you're away from London? Family , the HemDes team ..unless am with them all
- What's your favourite neighbourhood? I have a love hate relationship with Wembley where we bought our first home and started our business . It has little or no cool culture , café’s or anything you can get in places like Hackney , Peckham , Queens Park etc ..but it is “real” has no pretensions , the Dosa’s are amazing and it has served us well for almost 40 years and our kids were all schooled there and they have grown up decent folk
- What's your favourite building? Probably the Southbank Centre … what it dis for architecture when it was built for the Festival of Britain and how it still “works” and feels relevant is a testament to architects and designers getting it right
- What's your ideal day out in London? A couple of laps of Hampstead Heath with the two grandkids being pushed in a running pram and dogs in tow , followed by a meal at the home of our kids ..they are all vegan or vegetarian and are damn good cooks
- What's your ideal night out in London? Probably some small club / bar where my eldest son Jack or youngest daughter Corey are playing some records
- What's your most hated building? Any residential building that has been built with pure profit in mind ( ie those ones aimed at overseas “buy to leave empty” investors )
- What's the best view in London? From the top of Primrose Hill , or Hampstead Heath or Crystal Palace or Barn Hill … any green space up high
- What's your favourite open space? For ease Barn Hill / Freyant Way ..easy to get to for a morning dog run . But love Hampstead Heath , Richmond Park , the amazing Royal Parks ..teh canal routes , Granary Square ..London is blessed
- What's your favourite bar, pub or restaurant? The Dosa houses on Ealing Road Alperton / Wembley are ace
- What's the most interesting shop? Prefer markets …give me The Classic Car Boot sale anyday
- What's your favourite place to hang out? A green space with the family
- What's been your most memorable night out in London? My favourite club of all time was Le Beat Route in Soho ..the best music , the coolest crowd ..those early 80s nights it will live in my memory for ever
- How would you like to spend your ideal day off in London? Sometimes out running and sometimes down at the beach near our home on the south coast
- Where would you take someone visiting from out of town? A long full day walk along the Thames from Westminster heading to the sea
- What's the worst journey you've had to make in London? Never had a really bad one ..you can always get round tube strikes by walking ..nothing is that far
- What's your personal London landmark? The Thames
- Who's your favourite fictional Londoner? Oliver Oliver ..never before has a boy wanted more
- What's your favourite London film, book or documentary? Oliver ..40 years ago parts of east London still looked like the film !
- If you could travel to any time period in London, past or future, where would you go? Back to 1976 and relive my years here as a late teenager / early 20s
- For you, who is the ultimate Londoner? Robert Elms …he has lived through all the cool club culture and his radio programme oozes London