Are You Hip or Square?

Grace Coddington: Sometimes I’m a little desperate when I feel that what we’re going for isn’t happening.

Berry Gordy: It’s better to have a part of something than all of nothing. Are you hip or square?

Coddington: Oh, totally—and I miss that freedom so much.

Gordy: (Laughs) And, whether I like it or not, I’m a role model, you know?

Coddington: Yeah, with the big sweater and the straw hat and black leotards and my hair in bunches.

•••

Gordy: There are hundreds and hundreds of records. Ideas came to me, like auctioning off some of the master tapes at Sotheby’s because we had so many of them.

Coddington: I had one early attempt that went terribly wrong because I was away too much and they got very neurotic.

Gordy: So they’d buy all over again, whatever it was.

Coddington: Yeah. You can’t suddenly turn a corner.

Gordy: Life is not nearly as complicated as people make it.

•••

Coddington: The guy said he was a male model, but he was also a painter, very nice guy.

Gordy: He could do things, do a spin, and then wink at the girls.

Coddington: The story of how I met him is in the book, but I thought I was going to run into him at British Vogue.

Gordy: He knew what he wanted. But he taught me the wisdom of non-violence.

Coddington: I remember trudging my book along to Parkinson’s, and he looked me up and down and said, “Well, I think you’d be perfect for this job I’ve got on Saturday. It’s nude. Do you mind?”