Guest post written by author Tessa Arlen
Tessa Arlen is the author of the critically acclaimed Lady Montfort mystery series—Death of a Dishonorable Gentleman was a finalist for the 2016 Agatha Award Best First Novel. She is also the author of Poppy Redfern: A Woman of World War II mystery series. And the author of the historical fictions; “In Royal Service to the Queen” and available July 5, 2022 “A Dress of Violet Taffeta.”
I first came across Lucy, Lady Duff Gordon when I was doing research for my Edwardian mystery series Lady Montfort. She was mentioned in practically every book I read about the 1890s to the early 1900s, from Vita Sackville-West’s novel The Edwardians (there is nothing like reading contemporary novels to get the feel of a time period) to The Age of Decadence by British historian Simon Heffer: a fascinating account of a brave new 20th century and the many social and political changes that took place in those fourteen years before WWI.
Lucy, Lady Duff Gordon (née Wallace) was a divorcée when it was a scandal to even think the words: Decree Absolute. The divorce laws in Britain were arcane in the late 19th century and still as unwieldy as recently as 1969, and it was impossible in Lucy’s time to divorce for any reason other than desertion. Mental and physical cruelty were to be born—preferably without burdening family and friends. An affair outside of marriage was acceptable, even accepted among the upper classes—but the watchword was discretion—it was considered déclassé to cause a scandal by being caught! Lucy also had a reputation as a social climber having married “up,” an unforgiveable sin in Edwardian polite society’s rigid class divide. There were disapproving references to her designing and selling “naughty lingerie,” in her London salon Lucile Ltd: she coaxed her clients out of their yards of heavy Swiss cotton underclothes into far less substantial and more flattering undergarments better suited to wear under her fluid and floaty dresses, but there were many women who were shocked at the idea of such scanty nothings. And then there was that business about Lucy surviving the sinking of the Titanic. All in all, whenever her name cropped up, it wasn’t very flattering stuff, but then successful women rule-breakers have often been envied and disparaged in history.
But the feeling that Lucy was simply a money hungry and ruthlessly ambitious female changed one February afternoon in London when I popped into the Victoria & Albert Museum and completely by chance came across an exhibition of Lucile Ltd. I was instantly transported back to the elegant and excessive luxury of the early 1900s. Fine silks, mousseline de soie, lace and velvet trimming: the detail of each dress was exquisite; the lines elegant and alluring; and the colors used so subtle in their combination that the entire exhibition shimmered! Could these stunning creations be the work of a grasping social climber and the Titanic coward? I was intrigued that Lucy named her favorite gowns: Passion Flowers First Kiss; the Sigh of Lips Unsatisfied and Happiness! To me there was a playful wit about her walking outfits, afternoon dresses, teagowns and breathtaking evening gowns.
Among the many offerings at the V&A shop was an illustrated book the museum had published, Lucile Ltd., with a detailed account of Lucy’s career from abandoned wife to an haute couturiere who opened fashion houses in London, New York, Paris and Chicago. I was lucky that day, because the exhibition’s assistant curator was in the shop, and she suggested that I read Lucy Duff Gordon’s memoir Discretions and Indiscretions. “Don’t be put off,” she advised me. “If she sounds a bit egotistical at times. All those grand ladies came off that way then.”
She was right, Britain’s Imperial swagger in the middle 1800s until the end of WWI in 1918 was not confined to the English male alone. Lucy’s memoir followed no ordered chronology, but she was very quick to proudly claim firsts. The first woman to stage a live fashion show. The first woman to liberate women from contorting whalebone-ribbed corsets into the natural lines of the alluring gowns I had seen in at the V&A. There were more revelations: Lucy’s salon in Hanover Square was a venue for the rich and titled to come and drink tea, chat with their society friends, try on hats and sometimes spend time with a gentleman admirer in one of Lucile’s elegant private fitting rooms. Her memoir was so Edwardian, so full of opinion and gossipy disclosures. It was as if Lucy simply couldn’t wait to be seen as a bohemian in her lifestyle. She barely referred to her surviving the sinking of Titanic, but it was interesting to note how much she valued her staff and kept them over the years in the over-worked ‘rag trade’ of sweat labor. The women who worked to make up those very original designs were valuable members of Lucile Ltd., their skills never taken for granted. And it was touching when Lucy referred to her second husband Sir Cosmo has her dearest and closest friend. There was a good deal of hubris to be sure, but there was also self-deprecating humor and a wistfulness for the time when Lucy had reigned as one of London’s most sought after fashion designers.
I had to know more about Lucy’s Titanic experience, or rather the aftermath of its sinking. There are many Titanic websites with useful data available, some more thorough than others. But I unearthed, on-line, the 1912 British Board of Trade’s inquiry that had been appointed by the British Wreck Commission to investigate Titanic’s end. Among the transcripts of dozens of testimonies was Lucy Duff Gordon’s account of her ordeal when an unsinkable ship hit an iceberg in the North Atlantic. It was fascinating to read all the conflicting accounts: the finger-pointing, justifications and accusations that went on as the Board of Trade sought to defend the many mishaps, mistakes and incidents surrounding Titanic’s end that all converged that night one hundred and ten years ago.
Most of all this research freed me from my uncertainty about making an unsympathetic, selfish woman the protagonist of a historical novel. Lucy Duff Gordon was undoubtedly tough, but she was much loved by her many friends on both sides of the Atlantic for her wit, her generosity and her courage and deeply respected by a fashion industry dominated by men. How could I not write about this artistic, indomitable Edwardian who created such beauty and had the courage to step out of the stereotype of her time?
