Nina Manandhar: What Soho Wore

The photographer fills Clash in on her latest nostalgia trip.

If your sartorial interests extend beyond the high street and your exploration of photography further than Instagram, the chances are you’ve come across Nina Manandhar’s work. A photographer whose client list boasts Nike, Tate and Otho, her personal work focuses on the street while a fascination with youth cultures led her to produce What We Wore, an online archive for people to upload their own photos and spill the stories that fostered them.

Two years after the site became a physical publication of the same name (here), Manandhar’s latest project is an in-house residency at The Photographer’s Gallery unpacking the aesthetic codes and cultural history of Soho with the aptly titled, What Soho Wore.

“A lot of (my own introduction to Soho) is actually centred around music,” she says, no doubt echoing the thoughts of many.  “I grew up in London, so from about 14 I would go to gigs at The Astoria on Tottenham Court Road and later to clubnights at places like The 100 Club and Trash. In my mid-twenties, I would hang out on Carnaby street with people who worked in the independent clothing shops.”

The removal of the area’s more authentic credentials – an ugly form of gentrification dressed up as necessary improvements – has been well documented, likewise the erasure of London’s club scene; most of the indies have fled (and no doubt packed up altogether on account of the city’s rising costs), replaced instead with businesses fit for the mainstream.

“Not so long ago Soho was a mecca for independent youth culture,” Manandhar continues, “although you would never believe it now. When I’ve mentioned the project to younger people, a few of them have said ‘why would I go out in Soho, it’s just coffee shops and fancy restaurants’, but it has had a significant place in clubland and music cultures, with independent music shops on Berwick street, boutiques and clubs in and around Carnaby street, and of course it’s been a culture centre for the gay community. The sartorial codes of these scenes have been important in bringing these movement together.”

Asked further about what sets the place apart from the rest of the capital, she’s enthusiastic about the rich history of co-existence among multiple parties: “That’s what city life should be about.”

Initiated by a proposal from Nina to the gallery, the residency starts proper this Friday (and continues into September), but already the theme has won a number of fans online, such as Posh frontwoman and founder of the iconic Shopgirl boutique Pippa Brooks, pictured above.

“This is outside the Raymond Review Bar on one of my birthdays around 97/98,” reads the note that accompanies the post on What We Wore. “I spent a few birthdays there, we would watch the live show and then all get lap dances. A few girls and a lot of gay men! At that time Soho was more about sex and kebabs.” The Raymond Revuebar and its glowing ‘World Centre of Erotic Entertainment’ sign shuttered in 2004, replaced by The Box Soho.

“Most of ‘my’ Soho is long gone,” writes another contributor, Adrian Stern. “Not only the abstract businesses but also the physical buildings are being torn down willy-nilly. The power that attracted me has been replaced by another kind of commercialisation, so the individual quirky places get replaced. The idea of Soho having an aura of power is interesting. I don’t know if it still has that, but it’s still physically the heart of the city and there is a buzz to that.”

In a post-Brexit environment this focus on a such significant area and the intrusive nostalgia for times past is perhaps more prominent than ever, indeed, the photographer describes the former as bleak, and the power of the individual to take action difficult to inspire, but she’s excited to be concentrating on a local level celebrating people’s personal histories: “I’m hopeful that it can remind people of what London was and can still be.”

Fancy playing your part? Photos can be submitted here, or shared on Instragram with the hashtag #whatsohowore. 

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