Belinda Bellville, a designer of special occasion clothes for her own wealthy, well-connected social group, was pregnant in 1958 and in urgent need of a temporary assistant in her London atelier. She found David Sassoon, a Royal College of Art student, and offered him a job after seeing his degree show. Bellville was old-style class, Sassoon was the new meritocracy, and what became their joint firm, Bellville Sassoon, succeeded for over half a century.
Sassoon, who has died aged 92, recalled how Bellville inducted him to her strata. She taught him how those attending the royal enclosure at the Royal Ascot race meeting, a highlight of the social season, pronounced “Ascot” – with very clipped vowel sounds. She explained how to be patient with clients’ non-model figures, and age and status fears, made introductions and led him through the Buckingham Palace tradesman’s entrance to fit the young Princess Anne with a bridesmaid’s frock, Bellville’s first royal commission. Following etiquette, Sassoon stepped backwards away from Queen Elizabeth II and put his foot in the corgis’ water bowl.
