The Sunday Supplement | Browns

It may only be second to acting for luvviness, and upstaged only by Premier League football for kissing and hugging, yet the fashion world is strangely lacking in affection for individuals. There is, however, one exception: Joan Burstein, the eightysomething owner of Browns boutique, who is not only admired by the fashion industry worldwide, she is treasured.

This year, the shop she started with her husband, Sidney (who sadly died last month, aged 93), celebrates its 40th anniversary. It was Burstein (or Mrs B, as she is affectionately known to everyone) who first brought Ralph Lauren, Calvin Klein and Giorgio Armani to these shores; who was the first to spot the talent of John Galliano, and who has, in a career that now spans four decades, continued to spot and nurture the names that define the cutting edge of fashion today.

Supported by Sidney, the businessman of the partnership, Burstein takes a simple approach. “You have to want the clothes there and then,” she says. When she saw Galliano’s graduate show, she famously bought the entire collection on the spot. “I was so excited, I was pinching the man in the seat next to me. I knew nothing at all about him, but I knew about the clothes instantly. I said to Sidney, ‘We have to have this.’” Her advice on shopping is equally direct. “If you can’t afford it, don’t buy it. But if you can afford it and you love it, you’d be mad not to.”

Delicate, refined and beautifully coiffed, Burstein is considered one of fashion’s most elegant women; she is unfailingly polite and gracious to all those she comes in contact with — a somewhat refreshing attitude in a famously bitchy world. She mixes new with old — 1970s Lagerfeld for Chloé; Ossie Clark dresses with Celia Birtwell prints, “so flattering and pretty”; even early Matthew Williamson (whose first collection was “so fresh and young, I knew immediately that I must buy it”). Her current favourites are Lanvin, Roland Mouret — “so feminine and flattering” — Dries Van Noten, Marni and Jil Sander.

<!--#include file="m63-article-related-attachements.html"-->As she takes tea in Claridge’s (one of her favourite places), it would be easy to dismiss Burnstein as simply a rich woman who likes clothes, but that would be to miss everything that makes her special. She has a deep understanding of Browns’ uniqueness, tempered by a readiness to accept change. For instance, hers was one of the first designer boutiques to go into e-commerce. “I listen to the views of the young people I employ. They must learn and I must allow them to, even if, sometimes, expensive mistakes are made. Occasionally I see things creeping in that, personally, I hate, but if they sell, I must accept. The acid test is always the reaction of my customers. They are the ones who are important to me.”

And what a bunch they are: among those paying tribute on these pages and in a forthcoming show are Eva Herzigova, Claudia Schiffer and Yasmin Le Bon, although Burstein has always had an impressive client list. “Linda McCartney was a great customer for years. She loved the marvellous Walter Albini sequin motif T-shirts. Diana Ross shops with us and, in the late 1980s, bought the most beautiful one-off Romeo Gigli coat. It was exquisite, with roses encapsuled in layers of chiffon.

“We have customers each season who come from abroad and spend fantastic amounts,” she continues. “One woman, who will remain unnamed, lost her luggage on the flight over. She always stays at Claridge’s, and takes one suite for herself and one for her wardrobe, but she had no wardrobe, so she came across to Browns and, literally, cleaned us out.”

Burstein remembers the day in 1982 when an IRA bomb threat had closed the whole of Oxford Street. She and Sidney pleaded with police to cross the barricades and get to their store. When they arrived, they were greeted by hundreds of eager shoppers queuing down the street: it was the first day of the Browns sale.

The biggest change in fashion came, she says, in the 1980s, with the rise of the Japanese designers. “It was an intelligent way of dressing, a different attitude towards clothes — nothing to do with sex or glamour. It was something Europe had never seen.” she remembers. Again, Browns was the first to stock the Japanese label Comme des Garçons.

“The thing you must never do in a business like ours is think ordinary,” Burstein says. “I cannot give any of my customers ordinary. If they want ordinary, they can find it in Oxford Street. They come to us for something different with a unique handwriting.” More recently, Christopher Kane, Mark Fast and Gareth Pugh all got their big breaks at Browns, and Burstein continues to take risks with new names. “If it is right, you can always sell it,” she says.

The modernity of her eye is amazing when you remember that she was married in 1946 and spent her early years as a wife wearing Dior’s New Look, introduced in 1947. “It was extraordinary after the war,” she recalls. “The volume in the New Look was so extravagant, worn with Dior’s beautifully balanced little jackets.”

That said, she’s the least nostalgic person you could meet. But has the amazing Mrs B ever been wrong? “Oh yes,” she says. “We once set up our own label. It was a disaster — too ordinary for Browns. Sidney pulled the plug on it when the debts ran up to £250,000. But I had learnt a lesson. We are not designers, we are not manufacturers — we are retailers.” Long may she reign.

In todays Sunday Times