GOD
"Kylie and I were so close and worked so well together that it wasn’t like working; it was more like, oh, what should we do now?"
How did you progress from school to being a stylist?
William. My whole career has just naturally evolved due to serendipitous meetings and the people around me at the time. I’ve always learned from those around me, friends, work collaborators, and muses, rather than any formal creative education. I went to school in Manchester and spent more time in the city centre as I got older. It was a great place to grow up and an exciting time to be there; the Madchester music scene, The Haçienda, all that. I met friends and people from going out, a few of whom were studying fashion design at Salford Tech. Through those people, I started learning about fashion and design, and I became aware of an industry behind fashion and behind fashion images.
But it was through being a pop fan that I got into music and fashion and how powerful and intoxifying the results could be when fashion and music were combined. I was a massive Madonna fan, and I loved all the videos and imagery and how it seemed to have depth underneath the surface. But I was a huge Boy George fan. I used to come down to London and sit outside his house. And through that obsession, I learned about the styling and stylist he worked with and the London club scene from which George came and inhabited. I still work with George today, doing various bits and pieces. He is a creative tour de force; he is always doing something.
But I ended up doing work experience with Boy George’s stylist back then, Judy Blame, who became a huge inspiration, mentor, and later collaborator. I also met other people who worked with George back then, like Philip Treacy, who made many of George’s hats and worked closely with Judy. So being a Boy George fan opened my eyes to this world.
Those meetings changed my mind about where I wanted to go to uni and what I wanted to study. I was all set to go to Sussex Uni to do Media Studies. But I changed last minute to study Theology at King’s College London. I’d always been interested in religious studies, the power of religious art, iconography and religious language in particular. But the main thing was getting me to London.
Whilst I was at King’s, I got a Saturday job at Vivienne Westwood’s store on Conduit Street, and that was really the start of my career in terms of how it opened things up. I was walking down the street all cocky like you are at 19, dressed up, heading to Westwood to spend all my student loan on clothes. I started talking with one of the guys who worked there; he said they needed someone for Saturdays.
I got the job and worked between the three London stores. I met my first real boyfriend, Vivienne’s design assistant and collaborator, Murray Blewett. Murray is super inspiring, has an incredible knowledge of fashion history and cinema, and is a massive Biba collector. So, I started helping him out here and there. I was doing stuff at the shop and going to the shows in Paris. It was such an incredible time, a real life-changing period.
I was in the Westwood shop one day, and I met Kylie. I leapt over the counter, told her I had loads of ideas, and asked if she would like to go for a coffee and talk. I must have been super confident, but I didn’t think of it like that then. It was just the naivety of being a super excited 19-year-old kid. Because I wasn’t educated in fashion, I wasn’t intimidated by it; I approached it as an outsider or more like a fan. I wasn’t a Kylie fan, but I always liked what she was doing. When I met her, she was going through one of many identity transitions: changing record labels and doing more dance and fashion stuff.
We went for a coffee, and I bombarded Kylie with ideas, which started my styling with her. I was already styling for a few other musicians for videos and shoots and doing fashion editorials in ID magazine, The Face, etc. But that meeting completely changed my life. It was never something that I thought I would end up doing; there was no deliberate plan for my career.
I was doing a lot of fashion editorials; that was the direction I was heading in, to be a fashion stylist. I’m not very conceptual; I wasn’t necessarily inspired by fashion in and of itself. It was more about seeing possibilities and working with a human canvas that inspired me, transforming and trying to bring things out of a person. I get inspired by clothes, designers and think, how can I apply that to something else? The person was the main thing for me, the main inspiration. Fashion was a tool to help create an image and be a part of a bigger picture, but it’s not the main thing for me.
How did a cup of coffee turn into a job?
William. After a few years, I became Kylie’s creative director. I must have been one of the first creative directors for a pop star. I remember people always asking what a creative director is and does. Well, people still ask that now. It is commonplace for a singer to come with a creative director these days. But then people found it weird that we came as a bit of a package. So, I started working on Kylie’s live shows, directing and designing them and doing the whole creative.
Let’s do a book, so we did, with the designer Mark Farrow. That was a pivotal moment; I started doing more than just the styling. We finished that book, then we did a tour about six months later. Those two things were significant in my trajectory because it was my first show, and that book celebrated creativity in that we worked with many artists and collaborators on it. Everything grew out of a friendship; it didn’t feel like work. There were obviously things that you had to work on and achieve simultaneously, an album coming out or a single release, doing all the shoots and videos for a campaign and all of that stuff. But the milestones came from friendship and wanting to do more and more. We just creatively fed off each other. It was a real creative symbiosis, and we wanted to keep busy and working. Neither of us could sit still for five minutes.
All the catalysts in my working life have been accidental or driven by wanting to do more. But if I had been educated, I would definitely have been more considered, reserved and guarded and less gung-ho. Because I had some inner confidence, I saw no real boundaries to what I could do. A bit of a jack of all trades sometimes. People often like you to do one thing and can’t deal with you doing a bit of everything. The creative industries can be very snobby and cliquey in that way.
How did you move into directing shows from working on Kylie’s tours?
William. While working on the shows and tours, it became apparent quite quickly that live performing was something she was very good at and loved. So, we did more and more of them, more shows, more tours, and put more and more energy into each production. Creating these fantastic worlds and working with dancers, visuals, staging, and costumes was so exciting and rewarding. I loved being able to tell a story on stage, present things theatrically, and take the audience on an emotional journey. As she became more successful, so did the shows and the budgets increased, and we had more to play with. We loved putting the shows together. There was fashion, dance, choreography, styling, graphics and video. They were the embodiment of everything that we did together. I’m so proud of them, and through the success of those shows, I started working with other artists, doing other pop shows, and just building up my knowledge and confidence.
I worked with Alan MacDonald, a production designer and one of my best and closest friends; sadly, he’s no longer with us. He worked a lot in cinema, on films such as The Queen and Love Is the Devil: Study for a Portrait of Francis Bacon, amongst other things. He was probably the most unique and talented person I have ever known. In many ways, he was the wisest. I asked him to work with us on some of the Kylie shows quite early on around the Fever album and tour time. Alan taught me a lot. My approach has always been to scribble ideas onto a serviette. There was always an element of chaos with my ideas. I’d just splurge them all out. Whereas Alan planned properly, he was old school and didn’t use software, but he’d figure things out meticulously on graph paper with a pencil and ruler. I remember him saying with a fag in hand and an arch-raised eyebrow after one of my creative splurges, well, how do you expect to do that, dear?
There are many other people I’ve worked with closely and repeatedly over the years, including Steve Anderson, Kylie’s musical director. Nick Whitehouse, a lighting designer who I work a lot with and is now more of a creative production partner with me. Ashley Wallen a choreographer who recently did The Greatest Showman and has been working on the Robbie Williams biopic. I’ve met and worked with many great, amazing, talented people, and I love being part of a team. Creatively I find it hard to do things independently; I prefer to bounce ideas off a creative group of talented people.
When I stopped working with Kylie, I felt like 25 years had just passed. I’d look back, and half my life felt a bit of a blur. I only thought about the passing of time afterwards because the work was constant and all-consuming. It was my life; I didn’t do anything else. I also worked with many other artists simultaneously, but it was mainly focused around Kylie. That’s when I realised I’d lost touch with many friends. I didn’t have much of a life outside that work. It was a fantastic time, but I’d lost touch with real-life things.
What did you create together within 25 years as Kylie’s creative director?
William. Such a diverse collection of things. I directed a documentary feature called White Diamond, about her recovery from breast cancer and the journey back to the stage, which I’m really proud of. We worked on two or three books, and I also started taking photographs and working on all the videos, shoots, styling and live shows and tours.
When Kylie was recovering after she was sick, she didn’t want anyone else to take her photographs for a while, so I was made to pick up a camera, which was typical of how we used to work. We knew what we wanted; I didn’t know my way around a camera, but I had assistants who taught me what to do, where to position lights and all that; that’s how I learned. I always had great assistants who have gone on to be super successful in their own fields. My assistants contributed so much to everything and really added something to my own mix. So I was lucky in that way.
I still don’t call myself a professional photographer, even though I can manage my way around a camera and lighting. I’ve always had a bit of imposter syndrome. That comes from not being formally educated in fashion, photography, or stage and making it up as I go along. These things all happened by serendipity, really. Photography was an element of my creative directing role, encompassing everything: directing, styling, photography, film, graphics, etc. I’m lucky in that I can combine all these things in what I do, but at the same time, I often feel like a fraud! I am not particularly interested in cameras or the technical aspects of things. You need an understanding of the technology to achieve what you want; it’s always been more about creating an image and the process, the relationships.
I have been lucky to work with the best. I assisted stylist Isabella Blow when I started out for a while, and she gave me the best bit of advice anyone has ever given me, always work with people that are better than you. And that is something I’ve always carried with me and been keen to do because that is how I’ve learned and educated myself. And I learned as a stylist the importance of teams and teamwork, working with hair and make-up and the photographer. All create something striking and memorable, which is the same with everything I do. It results from like-minded people working together to achieve something and to learn and grow simultaneously. Working with Kylie and the other artists I’ve worked with over the years, The Killers, Jamiroquai, Boy George, Rhianna, Britney, Outkast, Tricky etc., enabled me to work with the best people in the industry, so I’ve been incredibly fortunate in that way. I’m aware that I had the opportunity to work on massive projects that other people spend their whole careers trying to be part of, but it meant I was always thrown in the deep end, and that’s how I learnt.
"My photographs would be the complete opposite of documentary photography. It’s manufacturing a fantasy, which goes back to my theology degree and my love for religious art."
Through my experience in live shows, I started directing more theatrical productions; we did Rent in the West End, myself, Steve, the music producer, and Terry and Ashley, a choreographer. Then we did a burlesque review, The Hurly Burly Show, with burlesque artist Miss Polly Rae, also in the West End. These shows all combined the visuals and music. So it has always been about that combination.
Directing theatre shows takes a lot of work. It’s one of the biggest challenges that I’ve come up against. I learned that the hard way because I always approached a project based around a pop star. I had to focus on telling a story while dealing with actors; it was a real learning curve.
I learned it’s not about me. What I mean by that is when you are putting together pop concerts, it’s all based on my creative vision, which I’ve developed with the artist. So, it feels very personal. But with a theatre show, it’s not about me; it’s about the story, the characters; it’s a craft. I could be difficult, I was probably a nightmare to work with sometimes.
I did have some diva moments. I’d directed talented creative people for 25 years to achieve the artists and my combined visions. It was often like being a captain of a ship. So there were moments when I wasn’t grounded in reality, and eventually, I became aware that I wasn’t very happy. I think Kylie and I had gone as far as we could at that point. We had begun to repeat ourselves, and some things felt a bit stale or uninspired. Time just took its course. Learning new things had always been important to me, like directing a show or photography or creating a brand, just something new. When the learning stopped, it became more like a job, and certain parts of that job became less and less rewarding, and we were friends first and foremost; we are still friends.
What happened next?
William. We parted ways around four or five years ago after some Christmas Shows at the Albert Hall. I always hated Christmas, so they were particularly torturous for me! It was obviously a massive change to my lifestyle and everything, and it wasn’t easy. I felt quite lost and rudderless for a good few years.
At the same time, Kylie and I parted ways creatively, Alan MacDonald passed away, and he was one of my dearest closest friends as well as a true mentor. Then Judy Blame died six months later. It was a period of massive loss and change. Those were the three people I would see most days, so it was a tough, emotional and destabilising period. At the same time, I was trying to figure out what I was, what to do next, and who I was/am.
I started working again, on a personal project a photography book, and I got a job working on a big theatrical production in Berlin at the Friedrichstadt-Palast, so I spent quite a lot of time over there for a couple of years. It’s a large Vegas-style show with 80 dancers and a live band on the biggest stage in Europe. I loved working on that. And I did The Killers Wonderful Tour, an extensive world tour.
Then lockdown hit, and it all went tits up for a bit as live entertainment ground to a halt. Before lockdown, I’d also been spending more and more time in Israel, and I always loved it there. I am not religious, but I’ve always been fascinated by it. Still, I feel connected to something there. So I started a photography project to understand what it is about the place that I loved so much despite the obvious problems there. I was taking portraits of people, and I met this skateboarder, Gal Shahar, and we hung out for a bit. I’ve always loved skateboarding, its culture, and its aesthetic. So out of boredom over lockdown, we decided to do a skateboarding-inspired clothing brand together. I loved how skateboarding brings people together all over the world, regardless of religion, background, sexuality, gender or whatever and enables people to connect in some way. So often, people have trouble connecting in other areas of their lives. We called it God to honour its holy land roots and our meeting there.
I felt like I’d done London, and my life had changed beyond all recognition. I guess I was looking for some sense of peace or a more chill life. I love being by the sea and the St Leonards On Sea area. I had some old friends who had moved here, so I decided to move.
How has God, the skateboarding brand, developed?
William. So, the God store is part of 25 London Road in St Leonards-On-Sea, which I have with DJ Princess Julia. She wanted a bolthole down here, as we have many mutual close friends here, so we decided to look for somewhere. We saw 25 London Road, the old bookshop, and loved the building. It has this crazy Dynasty grand staircase that we instantly loved. It had been a bookshop for years; I heard the owner was a real character. I have his photograph, so he is still here in spirit. The building was in a complete state when we got it; that was a challenging year, doing it up slowly; I’m not very patient and had never done a day’s DIY in my life.
Then suddenly, we had this space, and ideas evolved. Julia loves art and is an artist herself, and she was keen to embrace and showcase the young new artistic talent that she knows. We wanted it to be a versatile project and exhibition space that changes and evolves. I need a creative space to work, and it made sense to have somewhere with an area to sell God here as well, as Source Park (see RyeZine No.5) isn’t far away, and there’s a sizeable skateboarding community down here. So that is how I ended up here!
William Baker
Creative Director
_williambaker
God Skateboarding
25 London Road, TN37 6AJ
www.godskateboarding.com
god_skateboarding