The Conrans: A Genuine Dynasty

By Liz Nickson/London

Isn't Sir Terence Conran busy enough for one family? After all, he runs a 900- store empire on both sides of the Atlantic, selling furniture, housewares and clothes that bear his imprint. But no, other family members have got into the act. His son Sebastian, 31, runs an industrial-design firm, and has created products ranging from baby carriages to hangars. Another son, Jasper, 27, is one of Britain's hottest clothing designers, whose clients include Princess Diana and the Rolling Stones. Sir Terence's sister Priscilla oversees the development of new products for her brother and still finds time to create such things as her own line of pots and pans. Oh, and don't forget Shirley Conran, Sir Terence's former wife. She wrote the steamy best seller Lace and has finished Savages, an equally lubricious tale to be published in the U.S. in September.

As busy as his relatives are, Sir Terence, 55, is still the most industrious. No one has had a greater impact on modern British housewares and furniture than Conran, but he seems intent on conquering America as well. He runs 15 Conran's outlets in the eastern U.S. and plans to expand to the West Coast. He operates more than 200 Mothercare stores, selling maternity and infant clothing. His three decorating books, The House Book, The Kitchen Book and The Bed & Bath Book, have sold more than 250,000 copies in the U.S. Conran travels to America at least four times a year, conferring with advisers and checking up on his stores. Says he: "America is our biggest opportunity for the future."

Son of a resin importer, Conran displayed a passion for his craft at 14, when he excelled in metalwork and pottery at the exclusive Bryanston School, in Dorset. After studying textile design at London's Central School of Design, he free-lanced as a furniture maker before opening a home-furnishings store, called Habitat, in London in 1964. From its rows of white crockery to assemble-it-yourself pine beds and tables, Habitat offered products designed in the modernist tradition of the '30s, a kind of Bauhaus for our house: less is more, natural is better, simple is best.

Conran's taste proved so popular that by 1977 Habitat had grown into a chain of 32 stores in Britain, France and Belgium. That same year, a confident Conran opened his first shop in the U.S., but the British-made goods did not always fit the new market. The tumblers and wineglasses were too small, the beds needed to be enlarged, and customers thought the toast racks were letter holders. Conran eventually worked out the kinks, and his U.S. stores made $4 million in profits last year.

In 1981 Conran bought Mothercare, a group of some 400 stores worldwide. Priscilla and Sebastian shook the dowdiness out of the Mothercare line, emphasizing colorful clothes made of natural fibers. "We wanted to get rid of that cynical attitude among mass-market retailers who say, 'Oh, these people don't have any taste, why bother,' " explains Conran. "People can only buy what they're offered, so their taste is made by what they're offered."

Espousing no elaborate theories, Conran favors things that are simply wrought and well engineered. "So much of what is wrong with the things we buy is that they have been 'designed-up,' given unnecessary frills," he says. "Good design is 98% common sense, 2% aesthetics." Conran's skill may rest in clever retailing as much as in a good eye. "By making design affordable," says Witold Rybczynski, author of Home: A Short History of an Idea, "his stores have also made it accessible. You can walk into his shops as you would a supermarket and not be intimidated."

The heart of Conran's empire is the Design Group, a 250-member staff whose headquarters is an Edwardian stone pile in London's West End. The studio, where the average age is well under 40, not only creates for Conran's chains but also handles everything from interior decoration to advertising for dozens of outside clients, including Virgin Records, Canon and Pizza Hut. Conran leaves his team pretty much alone, though he does review products at twice-a- year showings and often advises on tiny details, such as pointing out that the handle of a cup is set too high.

One of Sir Terence's more talented competitors is Sebastian, who left Mothercare in 1985 to set up his own design firm. Sebastian complains that working at his father's company made him feel like the "son of God." He tried to escape the family shadow early in his career by joining a rival company, but Dad retaliated by buying into the enterprise. Today Sebastian oversees a staff of seven but is happiest when designing. One best-selling creation: a stroller, called Via, in which the baby faces the person pushing the contraption. "The most important thing to me is function," he says. "But charm also comes into it."

Function and charm are also the aims of Jasper, a precocious clothesmaker who founded his own company when he was 19. Trained at New York City's Parsons School of Design, Jasper is known for his updated, elegant versions of traditional English tweed and cashmere outfits. "What I learned from my father is how to be the ultimate consumer," he says. "The idea is to sell." Dubbed the "tiny terror" by a British Vogue editor, Jasper has been known to % sob uncontrollably after a fashion show; such emotional displays have not hurt his reputation -- or his bank account. His firm grossed $3.5 million last year, up from $2.6 million in 1985.

Shirley Conran says she is pleased by the success of her former husband and their two sons, even though Sir Terence's perfectionism contributed to their 1963 divorce. "When I was married to him, I felt robbed of confidence," she recalls. Shirley took up writing the same year, producing several nonfiction books about women coping with career and marriage (including Superwoman and Superwoman in Action) before striking best-seller gold with Lace (3.5 million copies sold worldwide).

Family members profess to be fiercely independent of one another, but some of it is pretense. Jasper, for example, contends that he began his business on a bank overdraft, yet his father dryly notes that "I guaranteed his overdraft initially and lent him a house for his office. He tends to forget that." Sir Terence's present wife Caroline, whom he married in 1963, seems the most grateful for the family tie; no slouch in the kitchen, she coauthored The Cook Book with her husband.

Sir Terence's latest project may be the one closest to his heart: the world's first museum devoted exclusively to modern industrial design. Located in the dockland area of London, the four-story building will be finished in 1989. Sir Terence is already planning the exhibits, but do not look for roomfuls of extravagant furniture or wacky-looking appliances. Expect the sort of simple, utilitarian pieces that have helped make Conran a household name -- and have helped make the Conran household a dynasty of design.