Keep Calm and Listen to Paul

Celebrating his 50th anniversary, Paul Smith launches a foundation imparting his wisdom to young talents, in the hope of cultivating good manners and good times

- Rosana Lai

Paul Smith apologises for standing me up.

“Sorry about yesterday—that was a nightmare!” he says, palming his hands together in a prayer position. “It never happened to me before, but we were doing live TV to Russia and their technology was—I don’t know what happened. I was horrified when I had to cancel on you. I’m so sorry.”

Smith, as his legions of friends and fans know, takes good manners very seriously. The legendary 74-year-old British designer, renowned for his impeccably tailored suits imbued with a touch of humour, beams at me through the screen behind his tortoise-shell spectacles, wearing a navy turtleneck under a windowpane check suit jacket of his own creation.