Joanna Wane meets 'The Normals', whose remarkable personal and professional partnership has lasted for 45 years.
There was one essential accessory for any Auckland man with a "flare" for style in the 70s: fast shoes.
"You always had to be ready to run," says Michael Cox, one half of the design duo behind Strangely Normal, the retro menswear label that's been redefining the boundaries of masculinity since The Clash released their debut album and Star Wars blew up the Death Star for the very first time.
Cox got thumped more than once out on the town in his crushed velvet and paisley. Poofter, they'd snarl. Pansy. "If you went into a pub and wanted to get from the front to the back, you'd better be ready for the abuse you were going to get. You got good at seeing trouble coming."
Now, we've got Harry Styles wearing a dress on the cover of Vogue. "Kids today have got it so easy," Cox sighs. "You can do just about anything."
It was 1977 when Cox and his teenage girlfriend Claire Dutton went into business together, selling foraged vintage clothes and their own 50s-inspired designs at Auckland's Corner Village Market. Today, their iconic Strangely Normal store in O'Connell St is still an homage to the era, from shirts in fabulously fruity fabrics and Elvis socks to trilby hats, vintage cufflinks and a bespoke tailoring service.
Two Oscar-winners have worn Strangely Normal tuxedos to accept their Academy Awards. In 2013, Dutton and Cox dressed 150 VIP guests at Napster co-founder Sean Parker's wedding in California, and Anthony Hopkins declared that the single-breasted suit they recreated for The World's Fastest Indian finally made him feel like Burt Munro.
Their sideline in costume commissions can be challenging (sometimes it's obvious the supplied measurements — how to say this diplomatically? — underestimate the actor's true size). Jesse Plemons was just lovely, though, at his in-person fitting for the suits he wears in Jane Campion's Oscar-nominated The Power of the Dog. Dutton and Cox did all the tailoring for that. Sadly, Benedict Cumberbatch's sexually repressed cattle rancher rarely removes his filthy chaps.
An unbroken 45-year run is extraordinary longevity in the fickle clothing trade, known for its short attention span and fragile profit margins even before the fast-fashion onslaught from cheap manufacturers offshore. With street closures obstructing foot traffic and then Covid-19 shutting out international tourists — who are among the shop's best customers — Dutton says it can feel like they're surviving from week to week.
Even more remarkable is that they can still stand the sight of each other, after living and working together almost 24 hours a day since their chance meeting at a concert by US folk and blues singer Maria Muldaur at the Auckland Town Hall. Dutton was about to turn 19. Three months later, she moved in with him. By the end of the year, they were in business.
"You've got to double it, because we're living and working together, so that's 90 years," says Dutton, of a rock-solid partnership that survived a brief experimental period seeing other people. They were still sharing their home and workshop at the time. "I don't recommend it!"
So, who's the boss? "Oh, I work for Claire," says Cox. "I learnt that years ago. Things run better that way." He's stubborn and more volatile, though, generating just enough creative friction to ensure they don't get bored or stale. "We have to tell people we're not having an argument; that's just the way we talk to each other. It's good to blow things out at the time."
The couple have never had children, making their relationship even more intense (although they did become famous for being adopted by a series of stray cats). "Strangely Normal" was originally Dutton's nickname for Cox — "I thought he had a way of making something quite mundane sound almost off the wall" — and it stuck.
The label has stayed true to its roots, paying homage to the 50s and 60s — styles that have never really got old. Dutton sees herself as a "maker" rather than a fashion designer, being innovative with fabrics in place of constantly releasing a brand-new collection. "Why would you hate what you loved last year? I can't believe we're still having Fashion Week. Are you serious? It's had its day, hasn't it?"
Over the decades, they've seen people in the industry come and go, often after expansion or diversification has spread their finances (and their attention) too thinly. "Or too much party," says Cox — which is a bit rich coming from the couple who were members six and seven of Le Bom's infamous Dean Martini Club in the 80s. Peter Urlich, who ran the restaurant at the time, remembers customers running up bills of $2000 a table. Cox groans: "It would kill me to stay up that late now."
A "fabulous aunt" bought Dutton her very first pair of long trousers, purple paisley bell-bottoms, from London's Carnaby St. She already had a natural instinct for layering. "Mum said I used to like getting dressed all the time but I was too lazy to take things off, so I'd just add on."
At 16, she left school to work as an office girl in a law firm and was waitressing at The Hungry Horse when she went on her first date with Cox. They'd actually met briefly a few years before, through her friend's brother, when Cox turned up in a convertible Morris Minor with Grateful Dead imagery painted on the side. She doesn't remember what he said, but Cox made her laugh. He still does.
It was an ex-boyfriend who gave Dutton a spare ticket to that Maria Muldaur concert and arranged for Cox, who lived near her parents' house, to give her a ride home. On such moments fate turns. Cox had trained as a hairdresser and lived in Honolulu with his brother for a while before moving back to Auckland, where he was working on the waterfront for the council's parks and reserves team. By then, he'd swapped his long hair for op-shop blazers (the handlebar moustache came later).
"Wasn't it random?" says Cox, who was 24 and immediately recognised Dutton as a kindred spirit. "We didn't have — what do people use now? — apps like Tinder and all that crap." Dutton thought he was funny, "Really funny." Their first date was at Tony's, a traditional steakhouse restaurant in the inner city, because they were meeting after Dutton's waitressing shift and on a Sunday night in Auckland in the 70s, there weren't many other places to go.
Both of them were restless and ready to strike out on their own. In those days, it was easy finding vintage clothes at flea markets and garage sales in good condition to sell. When Cook Street opened they switched markets, their stall's American mid-century vibe out of step amid the kaftans, incense and love oils. "It was full of hippies," says Dutton. "We had a tin lamp behind a venetian blind and used to sit with our dark glasses on, pretending we weren't really there."
Cox, whose mum used to make his flares, had plenty of entrepreneurial ideas — or what Dutton calls stupid suggestions. She gave most of them a try, anyway. Men's naval trousers with a front flap and buttons: "Beyond niche!" he admits now. Intricately detailed Mexican wedding shirts: "Again, ridiculous!" Charles Atlas-style, high-waisted 50s men's swimsuits. Weirdly, they sold pretty well. "I looked all right in them then," says Cox. "I wouldn't wear one now."
In 1979, they opened their legendary Strangely Normal shop on Hobson St, refurbishing what was once a Chinese dry goods store. Dutton remembers ripping hessian out of the walls that smelt like shrimp paste. A raven-haired, va-va-voom beauty, she'd occasionally wear a 50s frill-skirt bathing suit and sandals to serve customers when it was hot.
The following year, Michael Giacon had just started his first job as a master at Auckland Grammar when he stumbled across Nirvana. "New shop in town!" he wrote in his diary on September 2, 1980. "Very nice man. Lovely clothes." Eventually he built up an entire Strangely Normal wardrobe, most of which he still has today. Of Dutton and Cox, he says: "They were absolutely cool and absolutely unique."
The shop had a jukebox and it became customary to gather with "The Normals" on Friday nights and style up a new outfit before hitting the clubs. Zanzibar. The Six Month Club. Alfie's. It was compulsory for Grammar teachers to be involved in Saturday morning student sports, and Giacon remembers staying up all night and driving straight to a tennis or soccer game in his 50s Metropolitan car, still half-sozzled and "swaddled" in Strangely Normal gear.
Giacon, who's part Italian, went on to become a published poet and a senior lecturer at AUT. He says the quality of Cox and Dutton's work and the chemistry between them created "an incredible kind of magic. It's a love story for our times."
The 90s were tough after the sharemarket crash and a hike to GST. The store closed and they operated out of what is still their workroom in Avondale for 12 years before re-opening on O'Connell St in 2006. Opportunities to move to New York or Melbourne came and went. It has cost them financially but all their manufacturing remains onshore, a deliberate decision to retain control over working conditions and the quality of what's produced.
There's still a boutique market for bespoke suits but even city lawyers don't wear ties anymore unless they're in court. And while men have gradually become bolder in what they wear, Dutton and Cox are horrified by some recent fashion crimes. Think sagging trousers that show your butt. "That's not bold in a good way," says Dutton. Don't even mention puffer jackets.
Cox will be glad to see the back of suits that look as if they've been shrunk, with trousers cut short at the ankles. As for matador pants and too-skinny jeans, he says they're just not a good look on older men. "Guys, no no! Don't wear those."