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What they really, really want is a sophisticated new image for the next millennium. Rebecca Lowthorpe reports exclusively for Elle on how a hot young British design team has reinvented the Fab Four.
So, you think you know the Spice Girls? Pouting Posh, Baby in bubblegum pink, Sporty in her go-faster stripes and Scary, well, just being scary?
Well, those caricatures belonged to another era, of zigazig ha and cartoon costumes. The Spice Girls are now Spice Women. They have been through the mill together. They have seen the world. They've grown up. Two are married with babies. Three have struck out with successful solo projects. They are said to be worth £26 milion. Each.
Now together again after a year doing their own things, they want an image that screams confidence and sophistication. It's not that they regret their platformed past ("It's what made us," says Posh). But they have changed and need a new look to reflect that.
Julien Macdonald is their man. The Welsh fashion designer who thrives on high-impact glamour, gloss and a good deal of theatrics has been given carte blanche to come up with a new look, which will be unveiled on their Christmas tour. It's a match made in Spice heaven. Macdonald is the Donatella of the London catwalk scene with his sexy, bright, embellished clothes. The tabloids went positively ballistic at Macdonald's last catwalk extravaganza in September, when Posh, Baby and Sporty took their front-row pews to watch Scary strut her stuff down the runway. It was a coup. No other fashion designer has ever acheived a full complement of Spice Girls. Not even Donatella.
When the girls saw his catwalk spectacle they looked at one another and declared simultaneously that they had to have him. Designer Spice was, naturally, delighted.
Today, the Spice Girls don't look like their Spice Girl persona. They are tired and quiet. It's 11.30am at Elstree Studios, the girls' base while they rehearse for their Christmas tour dates. I'm whisked into a nondescript room filled with bags, coats, mountains of make-up and clouds of hairspray. Sporty sits patiently having her hair done. She looks very rock'n'roll in a customised studded vest she bought on Carnaby Street. "Hello, pleased to meet you," she says, getting up to shake my hand. Noted: she is the consumate professional. She is also a lot prettier in the flesh. Baby's hair is being froufed. "Hiya!" she smiles from under the hairdryer. Someone fusses around Scary who is talking, fairly quietly for her, into a mobile phone. In walks Posh in a Gap sweatshirt, jeans and trainers. No Gucci. "I've got really bad flu," she snuffles.
Whilst we wait I ask Macdonald about the new image he has created for the Spices. "They want to look more sophisticated. But they won't wear anything they don't want to," says Macdonald, who has already spent a day showing the girls his sketches of their tour outfits, which are being run up as we speak. There will be three costume changes. In the first, the girls' faces will be obscured, 'like chic black witches', in burnt peacock and bird of paradise feathered coats, until they whip them off to reveal electric suede ensembles covered in crystals. The second is the rock'n'roll-cum-cowgirl look with lacquered black denim covered in silver studs. Stephen Jones, the miliner supremo, has even designed a 'crystal cage stetson' for them. And for number three, the girls will resemble 'glamorous Christmas princesses' in scarlet velvet, devored in a cracked-ice pattern. It's all a long way from Buffalo trainers and hot pants.
"they just want to look sexy. It's like with Ema, she's fed up with her candyfloss, lollipop image, so I've put her in pencil skirts and heels. Victoria just loves clothes as long as dresses are tight and heels are high. She's a style icon anyway, a designers dream. She even got David in with the baby the other day to show him the sketches. I've made mel G look much stronger and more polished. And for Mel C? she won't ditch the trainers, so we've had to 'crystallise' them."
Sporty is the first to materialise in the dressing room. The first thing I notice as she unselfconsciously strips off is that she has translucent skin and proper muscles. Mel C is, and always was, much closer to her Spice Girl alter-ego than the others. A real tomboy, she is covered in tattoos - a big blue bird on her back which she had done in LA ('it's part phoenix, part thunderbird - a genetically modified cross-breed!'). And there's a new addition - a dragon which snakes the length of her calf. Sporty says she likes to wear trousers because she is self-conscious about her pins, ever since her dad told her that she had 'footballer's legs'.
But she is easy to please, happily leaping into a pair of silver strides ("ooh, They're a lovely fit!") and, surprisingly, slipping on steep snakeskin heels.
Sporty is so excited about her new look that she dashes upstairs to show the others. Moments later, all the Spices descend on the dressing room and mayhem reigns. Emma grabs a pair of pink vinyl trousers and scoots into the loo to change. Baby is no doll, but a ballsy young woman. "what's going on?" shouts Scary. She does a lot of shouting. "Julien, don't forget I want my tits out more," she barks, holding aloft a pale blue suede top with a relatively demure neckline. "I want my tits out more too," echoes Baby from the loo. " Sorry, Julien. I'm so tacky me, but I love it," roars Scary, nudging Designer Spice in the ribs. I ask Scary how she feels about ner new on-stage clothes. "It's a grown-up Spice image ... He's got me in a skirt, but I'm wearing it with big, biker boots. [Macdonald's face drops.] I don't want to feel tottery. Victoria does the lady stuff, not me."
Meanwhile Sporty practises mincing in her Gina heels and Baby inspects a pair of exquisite pink shoes. "I've got those in white," says Posh, still snuffling. "I'm so ill. I look terrible," she says to Scary, who replies in true Girl Power style: "Think positive." Posh promptly gets on the mobile to david. "Oh, he's so brilliant. He's coming round to drop off loads of flu pills, medicine and stuff." Scary picks up a gold boot and Sporty says: "You must have been a rich arab in a former life." Scary laughs, "Have you seen my bathroom?"
I feel like a fly on the wall of a twentysomething's bedroom, watching a gaggle of young women getting ready to go out on the pull. Singing along to their new album, they even do the moves to match the words. (Scary: 'We're not being tacky listening to our own music, but we have to learn the words.') And then there's the chatter - an endless stream, punctuated with their polished posing.
When the girls look at the polaroids of themselves (snatched from the photographer's hand), they scrutinise their images. 'I'm sorry, I look really crap. You've got to make me look good,' Victoria tells the photographer. 'I look great in all of them, I'm fine,' sparkles Scary.
When the shoot wraps, Sporty dives off to film Top Of The Pops and the others scurry away. I only have time to grab one Spice, so it has to be Posh. She is, after all, the most intruiging.
Posh is a clothesaholic. 'I get frustrated when I go shopping and I don't buy anything. Actually, David does a lot of shopping for me. He's got the most brilliant eye.' I mention how surprised I am to see her in trainers and sweatshirt: 'well. I'm working. I've got to be practical,' she says seriously The conversation swiftly returns to designers. She tells me she was in Rome the other day having lunvh with Valentino and he gave her lots of clothes from the new collection. 'I've become more sophisticated. I know a lot more designers and I wear a lot more designer stuff.' Like who? 'Dolce & Gabanna and bits of Gucci. I did use to wear some dodgy gear.' She says she has given Macdonald a list of things she'd like from his collection. One particular dress - a gold beaded and crystalled creation - she intends to wear to Elton John's millenium party. " I'll give Liz Hurley a run for her money in that!"
I grab my coat, say my goodbyes, and as I'm leaving, I overhear Posh asking Angie (from Gina) if she wouldn't mind letting the Sloane Street branch know that she'll be popping in on Saturday to pick up some shoes...