The GTO's

The GTO's were a "groupie group" that consisted of Miss Pamela, Miss Sparky, Miss Lucy, Miss Christine, Miss Sandra, Miss Mercy and Miss Cynderella.
The group hailed from the Los Angeles area in the late 1960s, with most of the girls being regulars of the Sunset Strip scene. Their only album, Permanent Damage, was released in 1969.

Miss Pamela (the best known of the group, as well as one inspiration for Kate Hudson's character of Penny Lane, lead groupie of the "Band-Aides" in Cameron Crowe's Almost Famous) met Miss Sparky while they attended Cleveland High School. Miss Christine had travelled to LA from San Pedro with Miss Sandra, and both lived in the basement of Frank Zappa's log cabin in the mid 1960s. Miss Christine was the live-in nanny for Zappa's children, Dweezil and Moon Unit, before Miss Pamela took over the position during the late 1960s. Miss Mercy had emigrated from the Haight Ashbury hippie scene to LA due to "boredom", alleging she "couldn't be a hippie forever".

Originally known as The Laurel Canyon Ballet Company, they changed their name to The GTO's on the advice of Frank Zappa, their financial supporter and producer. "GTO's" was an acronym for the full band name "Girls Together Outrageously", but at one time the 'O' could stand for a variety of words, such as 'Openly', 'Only', etc. Performances by the group were sparse, although they created a strong impression at their 1968 performance at the Shrine Auditorium. A mix of theatrics, off-key singing and dance were staples of their act. The songs are mixed in with conversations had between the members of the group, friends, and others, including Cynthia Plaster Caster and Rodney Bingenheimer. The album features songwriting contributions from Lowell George, Jeff Beck and Davy Jones.

Excerpts from a Rolling Stone article offer some impressions:

"Mercy is a heavy girl, with a predilection for loose-fitting clothing made from antique (sometimes rotting) cloth, boots, and black eye makeup looking as if it were applied with a canoe paddle.
[Miss Cynderella says:] 'I don't know how old I am, I'm from everywhere, I have no fave raves.' Cynderella is a little 'spaced,' by somebody else's terms; gentle and sad... she has chopped blonde hair and likes diaphanous mini-dresses.
'We talk about groups a lot,' [Miss Christine] said. 'That's because it's glamourous and because we're very young. If you have a fave rave in a band, it's like having a soldier in the war; you write him letters and you worry about him...
Mercy and I sent the Velvet Underground a dozen roses with our pictures on the back,' she said. 'You can't be subtle.'
Miss Christine loves clothing and makes all her own, which can only be described as junkshop harlequin. The night of our interview she was wearing a knitted patchwork jump suit in a hundred colors, colored pipe cleaners coiled into her frizzed character; not a bad description.

"The GTO's in all their freaky splendor are... outasite. Each has a personality all her own, and together they are not to be believed--tummeling, chattering, laughing, telling stories, leaping about. The visceral reaction is full freak, but once you get into it, you don't even notice." (Rolling Stone, February 15, 1969)
























The GTO's with the Flying Burrito Brothers:






Miss Pamela:








Miss Christine:




Miss Sandra:


Miss Mercy:


Miss Sparky:

Flower Girl

Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy 1970-71, David Hockney


"Muse of David Hockney and partner of Ossie Clark, Celia Birtwell is and was the most important textile designer of her generation. She has been described as the face that launched a thousand prints. In 1956 she met designer Ossie Clark and they later married.
From 1967 to 1973 Celia and Ossie were the toast of the fashion industry and dressed everyone from the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Paloma Picasso, Talitha Getty, Pattie Boyd, Twiggy and Marianne Faithfull all the way to the British Aristocracy. It was during this time that Dave Gilmore drove a van for Ossie before he found fame in his band, Pink Floyd.
With the collapse of her marriage in 1973, Celia left the fashion industry to raise her children and teach at colleges across London, including Chelsea School of Art. She continued to be painted and drawn by David Hockney and it was with his help and support that, in 1984, she decided to start designing again."
(from celiabirtwell.com)
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Celia Birtwell is the queen of the Floral Print. And although the basis for her designs came from/are rooted in concepts she created forty years ago, they can't exactly be categorized with your stuffy Great Aunt's floral curtains or tacky wallpaper. Instead, her style evokes much more of a romantic, whimsical sensibility and a free-spirited hippie-chic aesthetic. The prints she designed that were turned into long flowing dresses and light airy pieces by husband Ossie Clark, and up through recent times in her line for Topshop, seem more apt for lounging around in beautiful places, walking through a leafy tree-lined street or park, and basking in the warm, gauzy glow of all that is vibrant and alive in the world.















Jane Asher, Paul McCartney's girlfriend at the time, in a paper dress by Ossie Clark/Celia Birtwell

Celia's sketches:







Dress with the Mystic Daisy pattern












Blouses from the line for Topshop - Mystic Daisy and Little Rock patterns






Portraits of Celia by David Hockney:



Ossie & Celia