French Riviera Hedonism

The high season was flip-flopped before. In the 19th century, European royalty and high society took their civilised holiday at this coast in the winter, playing cricket and lawn tennis and taking gentle walks in the mild climate (which, as a side note, was touted as highly remedial for British patients in the 18th century and many travelled here for “climato-therapy”). But the Côte d’Azur first came alive - in the lively sense - in the 1920s. Though a convergence of circumstances arguably sparked the decade or so of hedonism and decadence that descended upon the hilly coastline at this time (including post-war modernity and a sense of frivolity, a weak franc to the dollar, Prohibition, and the subsequent influx of Americans), it is Gerald and Sara Murphy, a couple from America with inherited wealth, who are most famously credited with securing the French Riviera’s status as a fashionable summer destination. With them came jazz, lounging, dancing and sunbathing, and a style that lent itself perfectly to these activities.

Just after World War I, a huge wave of change rose in America, and the Murphys (with three young children in tow) rode it out into Europe. Some argue that they were fleeing the strict social norms of their upper-class American lives, but whatever the case, they arrived in Paris in 1921 and immediately immersed themselves into the fantastically vibrant culture there. Paris, also in post-war recovery, was just entering “Les Années Folles” (or The Crazy Years) – a period characterised by an explosion of creativity and modernist ideals.

It was here that a group of young, forward-thinking ex-pat Americans and Europeans cultivated an exclusive club of sorts, a bohemian glitterati, where ideas were exchanged and inspiration flowed as steadily as the wine. Members included F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, Ernest and Hadley Hemingway, Gertude Stein, Cole Porter, John Dos Passos, Sergei Diaghilev, Pablo Picasso, Rudolph Valentino, Man Ray, Jean Cocteau, Ezra Pound, Igor Stravinsky and Fernand Léger. Social chairs were Gerald and Sara. The hospitable couple held dinners at their ultramodern, minimalist apartment, threw elaborate parties and captivated their European friends with a highly stylized life, sharing their American ways of dancing, music and cocktail-making.

They may have set the stage, but the Murphys did not really start the play until 1923. Having spent a winter break on the Côte d’Azur, they were so enamoured of the area that they persuaded the old, traditional Hotel du Cap, which sits on a 25-acre pine forest bordering the sea in Cap d’Antibes, to keep a floor open for them during the summer so they could entertain and enjoy the good life. “It was a hot summer,” wrote Gerald Murphy, “but the air was dry, and it was cool in the evening, and the water was that wonderful jade-and-amethyst color. We bathed there and sat in the sun, and we decided that this was where we wanted to be.”

Shortly afterwards, the Murphys bought and carefully redesigned a nearby villa overlooking the sea, fittingly christened it “Villa America”, and proceeded to draw much of their illustrious coterie south. Others joined and the area was soon teeming with summering socialites, musicians, artists and writers.

Villa America was shockingly unique for the time – no stuffy Rococo salons here – there were black floors and zebra rugs and large mirrors, and previously unseen innovations such as screen doors and stainless steel bathroom fixtures were installed. There was a garden terrace with grey and white tiles for cocktails and dancing (Gerald, a jazz aficionado, had an immense record collection containing original jazz/blues/ragtime pieces which he shared with his friends), and perhaps most startling in design for the times, a flat roof that served as a sun deck. Sara fashioned artistic floral arrangements everywhere, while below Villa America, Gerald tirelessly raked piles of seaweed and debris from a patch of beach that had never before seen leisure. To the shock of the locals, the Murphys and their guests would swim, sunbathe and have lavish sherry-saturated picnics in the sand. Even Picasso relaxed in his bathing trunks and a black homburg.

But otherwise, what were they wearing?

Firstly, a tan. Gabrielle (Coco) Chanel is largely credited with making the tan fashionable, but she brought it back to Paris after a summer holiday in the South of France. The Murphys were already there. Indeed, Chanel, a close friend of Picasso’s, was a part of their extended circle and was also said to have been inspired by Gerald’s adopted summer uniform of striped sailors’ jerseys, loose cotton shorts and trousers, knit caps and espadrilles. Gerald, who loved a costume, was known to approach dressing like an artist and had such a passion for the look that he would hand out striped tops to party guests.