Fuchsia Perfect

[soft music]

I've had this penthouse now since the year 2000

because when I bought the building in 1995,

I had to then find the architect Ricardo Legorreta

and convince him that this was an up

and coming area in London,

and would he do his first building in Europe for me?

So it's my rainbow penthouse on top of a pink

and orange museum building.

[soft music]

I use this place for either dinner parties,

which this one I have laid

with wonderful Carol McNichol China.

And she'd worked with me for say, two months,

and she said, oh, I'm going

to the Royal College in the ceramic school.

And then for her final project,

I commissioned this lovely quilted dinner service,

and it's got my button flower prints all over it.

You know, I've treasured it for all those years,

and I'm probably going to end up donating it to the

V and As, it's still one of my favorite pieces.

I collect stones from wherever I go in the world.

So I have a collection of stones, which is quite wonderful.

[soft music]

I have a dinner party almost every weekend.

It is great.

I love getting people together

who might not have been together, who might not mix.

And you hit and miss, now and again you make a mistake,

but normally it can be quite fabulous

and you never know what happens, you know,

to dinner I had Deanna Vreeland and Larry Hagman.

I sat them together

and Deanna Vreeland said to Larry, what do you do?

And Larry said, well, I'm a cowboy in a Texas series.

[Zandra laughing]

It's quite wonderful watching this area of London develop.

I'm gradually seeing buildings creeping up,

but it does remind me almost of a new kind of New York,

because I used to go and stay with Divine,

and he had what I used

to call a pent hut on the top of a building.

And all around him, I'd have to go from one

of his little huts to another one in New York,

and you'd see all the people in the buildings

and the cleaners and all the buildings lighting up.

So who knows what's going to happen?

But not totally in my lifetime.

[soft music]

My partner sadly passed away just before COVID,

and it was always understood that when I wasn't with him,

I would come back to live in London from when he was 91,

right up to 98, Andrew Logan did a frame picture of him,

and he used to love those going up the wall

as he went upstairs, looking at that

to celebrate his age.

[soft music]

I think color makes you feel happy.

You know, I was once given a challenge

of wearing black every day for a week.

I did feel somewhat funeral.

It didn't last very long,

but I think I plunked a lot of Andrew Logan broaches on it

to make myself feel interesting.

[soft music]

[upbeat music]

Originally, my career was to design for wallpapers

and interiors, and then I got into doing dresses,

and then I've come back to the world of interiors.

So it's been a very exciting textile adventure.

[upbeat music]

Everything started when I did the design first

for Savoir Beds.

Then a bit later I designed the wallpaper of Manhattan

and they've got the commercial pale colors.

But I thought, I know I could do my bedroom in the pink

and the flashing lights of pink

and gold on black wallpaper.

And I knew it would look lovely.

So the feature was that.

And then I could put all my pictures around the wall

and I got Andrew Logan to make me a special mirrored frame

for my TV.

So it just looked like another picture on the wall

so I could live in paradise.

And now it's really, I come in here

and hope that I sometimes have friends,

we sit on the end of the bed and watch the television

and just enjoy ourselves,

which is something totally new to me.

[soft music]

The wallpaper in my hallway

is my zebra print

that I originally did in the early eighties.

And I could choose the most extreme versions

of the color, like the Manhattan wallpaper in my bedroom.

And it's been wonderful to use those things

so I can show people how fabulous they are to live with.

I think I can say I'm very lucky

and I've enjoyed all of the bits of my career

and they've led me to wonderful adventures

that I'd have never thought of doing otherwise.

[soft music]

I think what I always say to people,

when I'm lucky enough to see students is

don't let the world crush you down

and say, don't do something,

because then you'll never get anywhere.

You've always got people that would tell you,

you are not doing it right.

Follow what you want to do and try your hardest.

And in the end, something will happen

because you are leading away in something.

[soft music]