I'm Derek, proprietor of Lewis Leathers.
I'm Horst Friedrichs, photographer.
We did the book Together Pride and Glory, The Art of the Rockers' Jacket.
It's not the way it's from bricks.
Yeah, it's breaking in now.
The Lewis Leathers archive has jackets from the 50s or even dated back to the 30s, I guess.
If you look at all the aviation jackets and race suits,
and then I was particularly interested in the rockers' jackets, and it was amazing.
You could find all the years, the 70s, the 50s, the 80s,
and that's where the whole thing started, Pride and Glory, The Art of the Rockers' Jacket.
We put the history together of Lewis Leathers, that is in the book.
There's an introduction on rockers' jackets,
but mainly this book contains a lot of pictures from just leather jackets,
but also people wearing the jackets.
So it's also a fashion book.
My involvement with Lewis Leathers goes back to 1991,
when I was working with a company in Japan who wanted British-made motorcycle jackets
with sort of rock and roll connotations,
and I immediately suggested Lewis Leathers because of the whole connection
which the brand had had with youth cultures, motorcycling and music during the 50s to the 70s,
and that involved me going down to Portobello Market, buying three or four pieces,
getting patterns made, giving it back to Lewis Leathers,
searching the correct linings, etc.
In a year or two we had a mini-range which was really exciting for me,
21 years of collecting, later on I'm still here,
and that included buying the brand back in 2003,
so I'm now actually running it as well as putting it all back together as well,
as a punk rocker, mid-76.
And I remember seeing a photograph of possibly the Clash playing guitar, wearing a leather jacket,
and I noticed the little zipper, which this model doesn't have,
and I realised, wow, they're wearing Lewis Leathers,
and it kind of lent an air of authenticity to the whole thing,
which for me punk was a very authentic street level movement,
and to be wearing Lewis Leathers instead of something cheaper,
I thought that was really cool.
