Beno Dorn was a Polish-English master tailor known for providing the Beatles with their first suits out of his shop in Birkenhead, England, [1] [2] [3] suits that are often mentioned as part of the rebranding that contributed to their breakthrough in 1962. [4] [5]
Life and career in England
His first shop was at 19a Grange Road West in Birkenhead – now on the Beatles Magic Mystery Tour, because it was here that the Beatles had their very first suits made. [6] In episode one of the Beatles Anthology documentary, Paul McCartney recalls: "We all went quite happily over the water to Wirral, to Beno Dorn, a little tailor who made mohair suits. That started to change the image". [5] Brian Epstein, the Beatles' manager and an old friend of Dorn, [7] has been credited with replacing the group's leather "teddy boy" outfits with mod mohair suits, the subsequent famous collarless suits were produced by Douglas Millings of Old Compton Street, Soho, [2] as part of an image change that led to their breakthrough. [4] [8]
Dorn lived at Gourley Grange, Gourley's Lane in West Kirby until about 1973.
Later life
In about 1973 Dorn moved to Israel with his family. He kept running the tailoring business for a while, despite living abroad, until he retired.
Around 1991, during his retirement, Dorn moved to Worthing, West Sussex, to be nearer family in the UK and lived there until he died in the mid 1990's.
References
- ^ Lewisohn, Mark (2013). The Beatles: All These Years (Extended special ed.). London: Little Brown. p. 1083. ISBN 978-1-4087-0478-3.
- ^ a b Rucker, Leland (23 December 1994). "Radio Free Beatles". Colorado Springs Gazette-Telegraph. Retrieved 27 March 2017 – via Newspaper Archive.
- ^ Harrison, George (29 March 2015). "@thebeatles play The Odd Spot in Liverpool, with their new Beno Dorn suits". Twitter. Retrieved 27 March 2017.
- ^
a
b Hewitt, Paolo (2015). Getting High: The Adventures of Oasis. Dean Street Press.
ISBN
978-1-910570-04-3.
Nineteen sixty-two was a significant year for The Beatles. It was the year they were turned down by Decca and signed by EMI, the year that the tailor, Beno Dorn of Birkenhead, was asked to supply four brushed-tweed suits to replace the group's leather jackets, jeans and plimsolls, and the year that they would have their first Top Twenty hit with ' Love Me Do/ P.S. I Love You'. It was a year for laying the seeds of success.
- ^
a
b The Beatles (2000). "The Early Years". The Beatles Anthology. Chronicle Books. p. 73.
ISBN
978-0-8118-2684-6.
We all went quite happily over the water to Wirral, to Beno Dorn, a little tailor who made mohair suits. That started to change the image
- ^ "Beatles Across the Mersey Map" (PDF). Visit Wirral. 2002. Retrieved 27 March 2017.
- ^ Taylor, Alistair (2011). "The Contact". With the Beatles. John Blake Publishing. ISBN 978-1-85782-692-0.
- ^ Sandler, Martin W. (2014). "Chapter 3: How Hamburg Changed the Beatles". How the Beatles Changed the World. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. ISBN 978-0-8027-3565-2.