Filmed in Miami, where Barbara has resided since 1987, she prepares for a London drawings exhibition while reminiscing: Polish-born, she moved to Jerusalem in the 1940s with her diplomat father, only for her life to change aged 12 when he was assassinated by Zionists.
Growing up in England, Barbara was working as a newspaper fashion illustrator when the Daily Mirror asked her to design a day dress - her design in pink gingham, costing 25 shillings, resulted in over 17,000 mail order requests!
Barbara and husband Stephen Fitz-Simon opened Biba in 1964 which in it's third move became Big Biba on Kensington High Street: where seven floors offered it's customers, for the first time, a whole lifestyle - clothes, furniture, food. make-up, dog food - at affordable prices.
Shelf or charity shop? Big Biba is one of my most treasured memories of growing up in Kensington in the 1970s so this is obvious to keep! It is also interesting to follow Barbara's post-Biba career designing hotel and restaurant interiors in Miami, and to see her meeting old friends like Twiggy and Molly Parkin.
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