I'm not going to go through Biba's history (that's the downside of Internet, you can find that by yourself) but oh I wish it never closed down. It was the ultimate retail fantasy brought to life. The highest achievement of one clever thinking head named Barbara Hulanicki. Truly iconic because it was like nothing else before and she was extremely ahead of her times in terms of retail and shopping. There was a gap and she filled it. It's purely intensely inspirational.

Let's start with the thinkinghead's biography:



Barbara Hulanicki goes in very deep details about the whole Biba's adventure. It's quite amazing how simple and easy it appeared to start a retail in the 60's. Then came the limitations, the capital one needs to expand, the misfortunate associations...



The Biba Experience, covers the whole Biba story from the small shop in Abingdon road til the Big Biba department store. Beautiful pictures



Welcome to Big Biba, the most beautiful store in the world. And damn it was. Focus on the very last Biba store in all its magnificent glamour.

Some more pics that reflects the whole Biba world:









I'm not the only one to think that Barbara Hulanicki should bring the brand back to life. She's sitting on a real hidden gem. It's probably tricky to do but it WOULD work. Instead and unfortunately, some greedy suits -again- made an attempt to get the brand back last year but they got it completely wrong! The prices are out of range for most people for not even really inventive designs. It goes against everything Biba was: A highstreet brand! Google it today, the clothes are almost impossible to find online, Style.com does not even have the current collections. The original designer (Bella Freud) quit it. What is this nonsense all about?

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