I fucking LOVE being the footnote to a footnote of a footnote of a footnote of this story.

(if that)

- I've never been shy of saying this, but for my generation & location GG is The One.

Jim

Sadly, for J.Simons America is now irrelevant.

Don't know about W., but you could always buy Pendleton over here from WWII onwards.

With all due respect, it might be nice if we could get an update on the website.

No one will be happier than I to see twilight recede.  I just want J.Simons to go on as long as it possibly can, with The Man sitting up there on the stool, looking cool and laconic, Jeff smiling and Ken sitting in that chair at the back near the changing cubicle.  I want to carry on hearing John doing his John act, bollocking the staff for their alleged misdemeanours, seeing him look sceptical over the Internet (even slightly uncomprehending), then asking me if I want a good tip for the three o'clock. 
Shit, I even forgive him for selling that Chinese Haggar.  And I've never forgotten that seersucker suit I couldn't afford that was hanging up in there last August.

Perhaps 'boring' was a touch harsh chum. I can tell the shop holds a big space in your heart. Although it is a wonderful shop, not everyone feels quite the same way as perhaps you do.

Lovely picture of him on ArseaboutFacebook...

Conversations with John Simons Vol 1

John Gall: Tell us about your now infamous appearance on TV in the unbuttoned down button-down.
John Simons: It was purely unconscious. I often do that. I think the original influence for doing that was the old chairman of Fiat, Gianni Agnelli. I always used to note that he wore his Brooks Brothers button-downs undone. That affected me. So whether I'm guilty of copying him or taking it on board unconsciously, it certainly wasn't contrived. He kind of informed me on that. He has this kind of casual look about him. He had quite a nice appearance. It's a kind of irreverent attitude towards things like button-down. I don't do them up you know, I haven't got them done up today. In fact to be honest I can't remember the last time I ever did them up! Although in the early days like the early to middle 50s, when falling in love with Ivy League, well that was informed by more of an Ivy League dogma so then I certainly would have done them up. I wouldn't have left them undone then.

JG: Did you want to say something about jazz and Ivy League?
JS: Well, certainly in those days an interest in Ivy League clothing was heavily driven by an interest in jazz, especially West Coast jazz of the 1950s. The West Coast jazz, the whole kind of be-bop revolution, was in fact a true counter culture. A young guy, hungry for information, wanting to be at the sharp end of what was happening, he'd want to part of that revolution, you know? I feel strongly that pop music is the recreational wing of a classical culture. It's the fun side of all that. It's the same people: heavy-lidded literature, heavy-lidded music. They're opposite ends of the same spectrum. I've always been convinced of it but it's the first time I've said it to you. But I feel that particularly the West Coast jazz, when it was at its most sublime in the early days, well it represented a true counter-culture. It was not indebted to the classical culture in any way. It's very difficult to explain ? it's a feeling.

JG: How did jazz culture differ from the pop thing, apart from musically obviously?
JS: Well I've never bought a pop record. Actually I bought "The Kid's Last Fight" by Frankie Laine, and my cousins liked Johnny Ray, but apart from that my pop music was jazz, not be-bop at first, it was a bit too untidy for me. I liked the Ivy Leagueness of the West Coast jazz.

JG: So you have this clear association between Ivy League and the West Coast sounds?
JS: Absolutely! It was as much to the button-down as the buttons! And I'm prepared for people who are interested to question me on it.

JG: Were these your own feelings or were there others who thought like this?
JS: The thing with me was, which I've proven to this day, I saw the importance of Ivy League as an on-going art form. Now people who are involved in it sometimes move away from it and no longer feel the importance of it. You see examples of that all the time, people who you knew 25 years ago and they're wearing grey shoes now and wouldn't know Ivy League from Shmivy League you know? I never forgot its importance. So in a sense I've never thought of it as less than a highly important factor in the evolution of the 20th century.

JG: What is it intrinsically about this style that you think makes it matter so much?
JS: Well I believe it's the visual connection between jazz and Ivy League that makes it for the hipster a very hip sensation. And of course, Ivy League then moved onto Jivy Ivy.

JG: When was that then late 50s?
JS: Yeh, late 50s early 60s. Esquire magazine and Playboy would start to introduce the sort of Ivy League that Elvis was wearing, like he'd wear kind of his rock and roll gear but he'd add an Ivy jacket with short side vents, maybe more of a bum-freezer than most Ivy League jackets. With hindsight John, you would not like wearing that very much today. Lenny Bruce wore a lot of Jivy Ivy - black, slick Ivy jacket, high buttoned, a little bit small, a little bit short. I used to see Lenny Bruce at The Establishment when he came over here. I think I even spoke to him a couple of times.

JG: That term "Jivy Ivy": was that in the currency then?
JS: Yeh it was, it was in the verbal currency. I don't think it was much used but it was a way of kind of keeping Ivy alive before the public eagerly jettisoned it at the end of the 60s for a more hairy flarey style and a more fun-loving music. Yes it's an interesting point this ? they eagerly jettisoned it for a less cerebral music, I think a more terrible music, but only because cerebral and terrible rhyme: that's the only reason I think it. You've seen photos of friends of mine who within 12 months had changed from severe Ivy to long-haired flarey and hairy. When it changed it changed so quickly. Because I believe that the society I've grown up in is always up for the soft option and the soft option I think was, you see, jazz and Ivy League had a rigorous doctrine.

JG: Rules.
JS: Heavily laden with rules. I mean, if you wanted to be a good jazz player, unless you were hugely talented, you normally had to practice endlessly and your ideals had to be way up there in the stratosphere. And the young really they yearn to embrace the soft option and it still goes on. In England the reason I had to keep it, was because it was part of my trade you know, it was part of my portfolio of ideas, although I had to embrace the 70s and 80s and I did tend to do toned down versions of the fashions of those eras. But to me it didn't have anything to offer compared to the sublime mood of the West Coast jazz period. Well I mean you're sitting there now wearing that stuff and enjoying every minute of it. I don't think, well you might come in next week in Flower Power stuff, you know but I somehow doubt it. My feeling is that the Ivy period wasn't held onto very dearly. You've only got to go to America and speak to people about those fantastic days of those early Ivy League clothes: they virtually don't even remember that it happened. Or they say they do but they don't. Although of course there'll be people there that are now yearning for it and trying to get back to it, that's for sure. I don't know all the answers you know?. you can only kind of kick it around.

Conversations with John Simons Volume One

The first in an occasional series in which we explore the past, present and future of clothes, music and culture

JG

JS

J.Simons, 2 Russell Street, Covent Garden, London WC2B 5TD tel 0207 379 7353 fax 0207 240 4788

The Harrington & Us

A J.Simons Classic
This jacket is long established as standard issue Americana. In the States it is known as the G9, or the Baracuta jacket. In the U.K. John Simons began calling this stylish windcheater a Harrington in 1965, after the character Rodney Harrington from the popular '60s soap Peyton Place, a man forever sporting the 2-button stand-up collar jacket. The name has stuck and the jacket style has continued to draw its admirers. In the 50s and 60s this jacket was everywhere and it effortlessly evokes classic American '60's cool. The Ivy and Squire Shops became synonymous with the Harrington and J.Simons continues this tradition.You will normally find a range of styles and colours in stock. We have recently taken fresh delivery of the famous Baracuta Harrington, after a period of time when we couldn't get hold of them. They are much in demand and we have some striking colours in stock. Call us to enquire further.

In the J.S window November 2007


A Visit to J.Simons

A VISIT TO J. SIMONS by Russell Street As a young man growing up in London - learning how to order a round of drinks properly and when to make a girl laugh (and when not to) - all the usual 'rites of passage' stuff - two shops were important: Ray's and John's (and Ronnie's was the most important club...).The old Ray's Jazz shop is now sadly lost to us with its long counter and rough wooden floor.. But John's, or more properly 'J.Simons', is still with us and only a short stroll from where Ray's used to be. 'J. Simons' is far from being John Simons' first shop, but it is the shop of his that I knew first and the shop where I first met real 'Ivy League' style in London after trying to put together 'The Look' by myself based on films, magazines and of course the LP sleeves that I used to study in Ray's Jazz every Saturday morning. And 'finding' J. Simons was a real life-changing moment for me, because if there was a shop in London that sold all this little-known stuff I was into, then it meant there were other people like me in London who were into all this too. But I'm jumping ahead of myself here - back to my first visit to J.Simons - or rather what I'll do is to combine an amalgam of visits to the place over the past 23 years to try to give you a flavour of why the shop is so unique in London and why it means so much to a certain section of the English population. J. Simons opened in 1981 but it was only when I was told about the place in 1985 that I knew it even existed. I had walked past Russell Street in Covent Garden for years but had never been down it. I had been out for drinks after work when I met two guys in a club who dressed a bit like me. Like me, but a lot better.. So we got talking and drinking until the club closed and they told me about John's and next Saturday we all went there. Simple as that. J.Simons is quite a small place, about the size of an average sitting room I guess, with a real 'college shop' feel to it and for me it was very hard to take it all in at first. Shoes and clothes were everywhere. Having been told there was a small shop in London that sold all this stuff I really wasn't prepared for the volume of stock the shop carried. The place was, and is to this day, crammed with Ivy League clothes and Americana. I had no idea where to start. After being starved for this style for 7 or 8 years I was suddenly standing in a space filled from floor to ceiling with just about everything that interested me.

J. Simons is softly lit and so walking in from the daylight you can easily miss things if you move too fast; your eyes need a moment to adjust. On your right as you walk in is the shoe cabinet - an old wooden country style dresser pretty much - and it is round about at this point that the smell of the shop hits you, just a couple of steps inside and out of the traffic fumes of the street. The smell has changed slightly over the years (the Sanforized cotton of the shirts isn't such a strong note these days as you can't get the American shirts... The Americans don't make them like they used to for one reason...) but the smell of clean warm wool, leather and wood is still as distinctive as ever. No other shop smells quite as good as J.Simons in my experience. And another treat for the senses is that you can just wander over and pick anything up that you fancy and check it out. This is not always the case in London where certain sales people in certain shops can be more than a little 'territorial' about customers invading their space. Depending on who's on duty in J. Simons you'll get a nod from John, a smile and a Hello from Jeff and another nod from Ken and then they'll leave you to it. They let the stock sell itself pretty much, but as soon as you ask a question then you have their complete attention. American loafers and brogues feature heavily in and on the shoe cabinet along with bucks, saddle-bucks, chukkas, Steve McQueen style 'Playboy' boots & shoes. And all the usual names are there: Bass, Sebago, Allen Edmonds, Redwing, Loake, Walkover, Florsheim, Alden & Cole Haan too in the past. Unusual names have also featured: 'Eastland' handsewns from Freeport Maine, 'Buffalo Creek Traders' (again handsewn) from Virginia, Paraboot from France... Anything really with The Look that John Simons has discovered on his travels. After the shoes as you walk further into the shop come the ties along the right hand wall. Knitted silk or cotton in stripes and solids, silk foulards, regimentals and reps, all hung across the wall between the shoe cabinet and the shop's counter. Generally round about here, if John is in his usual place near the till, you can just about start to hear the jazz he has playing softly by his chair which reminds you of how the Ivy League style came into London in the first place via American GIs and English Modern Jazz fans mixing in the clubs of Soho. Beyond the till are Sack and Slack jackets and suits, overcoats and outer jackets hung up to the ceiling pretty much with trousers, khakis and cords hung in the same way on the left wall of the shop opposite. And the space in between is also taken up with yet more racks of clothes and display cabinets featuring whatever new stock has just come in. At this point I usually head for the shirts further down the left hand wall for a bit of a breather before I tackle the central part of the shop. It wouldn't do to miss anything... Shirts are from a variety of sources in button-down and plain-point collar styles. Solids, stripes, multi-stripes, plaids, madras, seersucker - all the usual suspects. But you can't help thinking of all the names from the past which were once there in the wooden display cabinet and are now lost to us: Troy Shirtmakers Guild, Sero's 'The Purist' shirts ('Nothing is obvious except the quality'), New Haven's 'Par-Ex', even the slim-collared Geoffrey Scott button-downs... However Woolrich and BD Baggies are still there along with Hartford's wonderful soft-collared shirts amongst others so the sun hasn't quite set on this aspect of the shop. If America still made the old shirts then J. Simons would still sell them. Like any Ivy League shop seasonal stock comes and goes at J.Simons. Soon again it will be that Pendleton time of year with their wool shirts and zipper jackets adding to the mix in the shop. Then when Spring comes again the new season's range of Haggar half-sleeve sports shirts will appear along with their polo shirts and shorts. The stock never stands still and there's always new things coming in, sourced from the US or Europe. Increasingly important to the shop are John Simons' vintage finds which bring in fantastic original items from all the big names in the Ivy League style from over the years like Brooks Brothers. Remember back when Brooks Brothers used to sell the Ivy League style? More than just Ivy, the J. Simons vintage range also brings in items from various designers and from Savile Row too - all one-off pieces selected for their quality and style. The shop is very much John Simons' own vision, informed by his passion for, and knowledge of, the Ivy League style and is a real London landmark. But don't take my word for it - just ask any Cabby and he'll take you straight to Number 2, Russell Street, Covent Garden. The place is a legend.

Russell circa 1985 shortly before the first J.Simons visit

Russell circa 2003 resplendent in 'the look'

J.Simons, 2 Russell Street, Covent Garden, London WC2B 5TD tel 0207 379 7353 fax 0207 240 4788



NEW! "John's" by Jim

"John's."

No. 2, Russell Street, Covent Garden, from 1981 onwards, was a world of its own in London. Styled like nowhere else and with an assemblage of products and knowledge which were also to be found nowhere else. And it was that assemblage that was the unique thing about the shop. I use the term in its Art History context: a 3D composition of "found" objects and items. The visual and tactile conclusion of a long process of evaluation and discernment born of experience and a self-imposed training in what works and what doesn't. The final words of an artistic 'conversation'. The place also had a sense of humour and an edge. A warmth & a seriousness. It engaged and educated, but always with a shrug. It was always down to you to follow up the leads on offer in "John's". Miles Davis playing in the shop? It was always down to you to get yourself down to Ray's or Mole Jazz to find out more.It was a greasy spoon cafe before it was "John's", serving the workers of the old Covent Garden Fruit & Veg market nearby, and post John it will be... whatever. Another Retro Sweet Shop? Whatever... As for me, I wouldn't have missed Mr. Simons' "Russell Street" years for anything. In my opinion, post The Ivy Shop & the difficult break with Jeff K., "J. Simons" in Covent Garden was John with his true friends and at his best so far. And the real story here is the guy who made it happen: Mr. Simons with the team he drew together around him. The shop premises were just the setting in which they placed what they were doing. Only a frame for the bigger picture. And so now the shop goes, but what do we actually lose? John, Ken, Jeff and ALL the other names over all the years ARE the real shop. We're not losing them. And so the story goes on... 1955 and counting. And talking of 1955, why not rewind to how all of this started? One guy with an eye for detail and a passion for style. An East-End boy Up West who just so happened to shape various aspects of the modern world of which he was so much a part by his quiet influence. There is no "Harrington" without John Simons. And I wouldn't be sitting on an Eames chair right now without having encountered the influence of Mr. Simons either... The Artist as Retailer is a rare thing. And I sincerely believe that that is what we have in Mr. John Simons. And so the story goes on.

J.Simons, 2 Russell Street, Covent Garden, London WC2B 5TD tel 0207 379 7353 fax 0207 240 4788

A Letter of Appreciation

Its been many years since I frequented the Squire Shop in Brewer Street, button down half sleeve shirts, bell sleeve cardigans ( whatever happened to them?) wing tip brogues and shetland crew necks. I was just 21 at the time. The Village Gate followed, I remember Quincy too! There was also a Squire Shop lookalike in Ilford called Bronx, remember that?I don't know where the years have gone since, nowadays I love the real Stone Island, CP Company and the like. I still love clothes but am bewildered sometimes by the choice and style. Its been a long journey from the days of Take 6, then just a spin off from Brent and Collins in Romford market.I loved your website, I stumbled into J Simons and remember buying Paraboots about 10 years ago in black and brown! My then boss thought they looked like cornish pasties!! You know the shoes I mean ? They sort of folded over and tied with two eyelets aside at the top. Brilliant! I thought I'd wear them forever.There has still never been anything to beat the Harrington in a sort of dark green. I remember them being worn in Peyton Place by Ryan o'Neil and Norman ? who played his brother. I do however remember the dreadful cheap imitations worn by skinheads in the early seventies!!I will be back to visit soon, I might even return to the styles I loved so much back in the late 60's and early 70's. Whatever, long may the shop continue, you know what? I think I could even fall in love with Bass Weejuns again!!Regards to Mr Simons and his team.Andrew Morris. St Johns Wood.

J.Simons, 2 Russell Street, Covent Garden, London WC2B 5TD tel 0207 379 7353 fax 0207 240 4788


UPDATED! Home Page

Welcome to the J.Simons website. Whilst we currently have little to tell you in terms of new clothing in the store we can assure all of our regular customers that there is still life in the old place and that various new plans and ideas are now taking solid root. The business remains directional and forward-moving, like a shark (see menu above). Since we opened in 1981 J.Simons has sold the very best, the most interesting and the most expertly selected range of menswear in London. Rooted in traditional clothing from a variety of sources, though primarily dedicated to the Ivy League style, we aim to offer a welcoming atmosphere, good service and reliability. John Simons opened the inspirational and influential Ivy Shop in Richmond in 1965 and is an expert in his field. The shop has history and both the people who work there and its customers have stories to tell. This website will promote J.Simons clothes shop and also serve as an archive of John's work and its importance in the wider cultural sense. There will always be a corner of England that is forever natural shoulder.

The J.Simons website

Ben Shahn

John rallies the Ivy League troops in 1965

J.Simons, 2 Russell Street, Covent Garden, London WC2B 5TD tel 0207 379 7353 fax 0207 240 4788