Best obit yet: “It’s not beige, it’s fawn!”
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Morson Clift
Last Updated: 12:01am BST 31/03/2007
Morson Clift, who has died aged 96, was a society dressmaker, gigolo and male model in prewar London; while still in his twenties he featured in advertisements as the “Brylcreem Man”.
A good-looking Australian, Clift arrived in London in the early 1930s and landed a job with the royal dressmaker Handley Seymour; the firm was patronised by the elite of London society and had been chosen to make the wedding dress for the Duchess of York, later Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, in 1923.
Although he was soon busy running up a dress himself for Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands, he was “interested in making a bob” and declared himself dissastisfied with his Handley Seymour wage.
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Telegraph - Menswear/ShoesClift moved to take a position at Murray’s Club in Soho, earning three and a half guineas a week as a gigolo, dancing with women in the afternoon and earning an extra guinea by wearing tails on a Saturday.
In one of the biggest advertising campaigns of the day (for hair cream) he featured as the Brylcreem Man but, much to his chagrin, he was succeeded by an even more brilliantined star, Richard Greene, later famous on television as Robin Hood. “I had hair that would make a stormy day at Bondi look calm; I had so many waves,” Clift remembered.
He also advertised Cherry Blossom shoe polish and Craven “A” cigarettes, which almost proved his undoing. His father, back in Sydney, recognised his photograph in an English newspaper at the barber’s. Generally an equable man, he rang his son, told him he was “behaving like some male whore” and demanded he return home. Clift, however, stayed put, setting up a small dress shop in South Molton Street where he was a hit with the debutantes.
Family pressure did eventually force him home after three years and he established himself in downtown Sydney. Clift dressed and charmed generations of Sydney’s elite - belles, brides, graziers’ and governors’ wives, rich men’s mistresses, actresses and society figures - making many of them friends for life. He teamed up with another dressmaker, Hal Hertzberg, whom he had spotted dressing the window of his father’s shop (”I’d get out of the tram and there would be Harold with a mouthful of pins”). Initially, Clift had not taken to Hertzberg, telling him: “Never - with your unfortunate colouring - never, never wear a beige shirt.” Hertzberg retorted: “It’s not beige. It’s fawn.”
Morson Alexander Clift was born on December 13 1911, dividing his childhood between the family’s three homes in New South Wales. He was educated by the Sisters of Mercy and later by Jesuits at St Ignatius’ College, Riverview, in Sydney, where he played the violin and rowed in the school’s first IV; although he started to study Law, he was encouraged to be a designer and left for London in search of fame and fortune. During the Second World War Clift joined the RAAF, and served in New Guinea.
Notwithstanding their unpropitious start, Clift and Hertzberg became an enduring double act. Despite postwar coupons and price-fixing (”You practically had to beg for a yard of interlining”), they did well, having taken over Hertzberg’s father’s shop. After three years they sold up and took a house at Cannes.
In the 1950s they returned to London, creating a Regency salon for the Astors at Cliveden and an evening dress for Mrs Bergdorf, of the American department store Bergdorf Goodman, who had seen one of their creations on a friend. They could not obtain the material Mrs Bergdorf wanted, so Clift found something in the Portobello Road (”it was all absolutely synthetic from whoa to go”) and covered it with an exquisite black corded lace. Mrs Bergdorf was delighted.
Returning to Sydney in 1955, Clift and Hertzberg opened a shop in Double Bay and named it Cassano, having scoured the phone books to make sure that there were no greengrocers or fishmongers of that name. Clift flourished as a wedding specialist. Sometimes he would dress three generations at once - the bride, her mother and grandmother. Vice-regal wives, prosperous countrywomen and suburban matrons became Cassano clients.
Just before the war, Clift had made for Margot Asquith’s sister, Lady Wakehurst, wife of the Governor of New South Wales. In the mid-1950s Viscountess Slim, wife of Australia’s Governor-General, would call when in Sydney.
Sir Frank Packer’s widow, Florence, did not frequent Clift’s salon in person but once, at a ball in Monaco, resplendent in a Cassano gown, she was approached by Karl Lagerfeld who told her she was the best dressed woman there.
Keeping his promise made when she was four, Clift made his last wedding dress for his seamstress’s daughter in 1990. He and Hertzberg took to travel and continued to enjoy the social round.
Clift had a face-lift (”Well, we only had enough money for one; and Hal didn’t need it”), retaining his striking good looks till his death on February 17. Hertzberg died in 2001.
