1936

Barbara Hulanicki is born in Warsaw, Poland

1948

Barbara’s father is snatched from their home in Palestine and assassinated. She moves to London with her mother and sisters Biba and Beatrice.
Her aunt Sophie (a diamond-dripping eccentric, who spent three hours each day dolling herself up) whisked the family to her home – a suite at the Ritz Hotel. Then Sophie moved the family to Brighton – she holing up in a gin palace, the Metropole Hotel, and the others in a flat.

Having moved to London, her work was featured in publications like Homes and Gardens, The Times, Daily Express and Vogue, and she got to sketch the frocks at Givenchy and Balenciaga's couture shows in Paris.

1961

Barbara married Stephen Fitz Simon.

May 1963

Fashion illustrator Barbara in collaboration with Stephen Fitz-Simon launch Biba’s Postal Boutique.

Her long evening skirts with draw-string waists sold moderately well in the Daily Express. 

Biba proper, despite the business still being run ramshackle-style from the couple's flat.

The fashion- palette, in high fashion terms, convention was flouted: Colours were often funeral-like – blackish browns, dark prunes, plus rust and blueberry hues. Barbara realised, as she wrote in From A to Biba, that they were the 'dull, sad Auntie colours I had despised in my young days. They looked better in England's grey light, almost vibrant against the grey buildings and pavements'. Of a particularly successful brown chalkstripe Biba smock she also noted: 'The morning my father left for the last time he was wearing a brown chalkstripe suit'.

Biba’s Postal Boutique struggles to make any impact at all for the first few months, however, thanks to Felicity Green, fashion editor of the Daily Mirror, a promotion was launched through the newspaper for a Biba Pink Gingham dress with a round hole in the back and a matching head scarf. 17,000 are sold at 25 shillings each – immediately netting the pair £14,000.

Sept 1964

Biba opens its doors in an old chemist's shop in Abingdon Road, Kensington. Barbara filled the store with old bronze lamps and an antique Dutch wardrobe, painting the walls navy blue. Rather than embrace modern materials such as plastic Barbara preferred to retain the dilapidated faded character of the premises. There was not even a sign about the shop door – “word of mouth” did the job well enough.

Feb 1966

Biba opens its second store – this time in Brighton (Queen’s Road) however it takes Barbara’s attention away from the London store and closes by the end of the year.

March 1966

Biba moves from Abingdon Road to Kensington Church Street.

April 1966

Time Magazine crowns London as “city of the decade” and Biba as “the most ‘in’ shop for girls”.

Sept 1966

The famous Biba logo was actually it’s third, and was created by John McConnell.

Dec 1966

Amini-Biba opens in Zermatt Switzerland, for the holiday
period.

Aug 1967

Biba wins the Sao Paulo Fabric Fair International Design Competition.

April 1968

Biba launches the first of six mail order catalogues.

Sep 1969

The Biba store moves once again to a former grocery store High Street Kensington. Art Nouveau squiggles, painted in gold by fabric designer Tony Little marked a new Biba store front sign – the interior had specially printed deep red wallpaper and the original grocer’s mahogany shelves and counters were retained. The building's non-lovely fixtures were stripped back to the original Egyptian-topped columns and marbled floors; stained glass and wood panelling was appropriated from a nearby school being demolished; clothes were draped over old hatstands, lit by fringed lampshades; a heavily cushioned area below the stairs would play host to stoned hippies and the occasional tramp.  It was a huge success with customers would little fight to get such were the crowds that would gather each day before opening.
In addition to the new cosmetics range, shoes and boots, there were now household products (everything from Biba wallpaper to Biba baked beans and Biba soapflakes), and mens/childrenswear was also on offer.

Dec 1969

The beginning of the end? Biba Ltd is created – Dorothy
Perkins is the major shareholder.

April  1970

Biba Cosmetics is launched. It goes on to become the most profitable part of the company.

Feb 1971

A Biba Boutiques opens in  New York and Biba Cosmetics open stands in Au Printemps – Paris, Fiorucci Milan, Tekano – Tokyo, Bloomingdales – New York and the Judy’s chain in California.

June 1971

Biba Cosmetics are sold in more than 300 Dorothy Perkins stores.

Aug 1973

Dorothy Perkins is bought by British Land, a property group, who thereby become the majority shareholders of Biba. The  company totally failed to appreciate the intuitive and lucrative methods used with such success by Barbara and Stephen – instead the men in suits brought in cheap mannequins, tacky signs, and fluorescent lighting.

Sep 1973

Hurrah! Big Biba opens – a seven storey 400,000 square foot Art Deco affair in the old Derry  &  Toms Department Store on the High Street,  Kensington – designed by Whitmore-Thomas. It had long since faded from glory, but was still complete with its romantic rooftop garden. The building cost £3,900,000 – Literally hundreds of builders duly prepared the space – working to a budget of £1 million – and toiling around the clock for months on end.

It commands visitors of up to a million weekly. Whilst being the first new department store in London since the second world war it was not so much a mere department store as a kind of spectacular fantasy-land shopping/eating/drinking/hanging out/rooftop garden-perching experience.

One entire floor was named the Casbah - filled with Moroccan and Turkish-influenced splendour

There was even a Biba food hall.

Anyone could sit in the windows - traditional displays were banished

Penguins and pink flamingos lived on the roof

The Rainbow Room restaurant and concert hall - with its pink marbled floors – served 1,500 meals a day on exquisite black china. Performers whom appeared there ranged from the New York Dolls to The Wombles, from Liberace to The Bay City Rollers and the Manhattan Transfer with artist Andrew Logan hosting opulent fancy dress parties.

May 1974

The Biba roof gardens open to the public.

July 1974

Recession hits – the situation becomes untenable between  Barbara and Stephen and the board of Dorothy Perkins / British Land.

Sept 1974

The property crash reduces British Land share prices to just 10%  of their 1974 high.

March 1975

The Menswear and Household departments close.

Sept 1975

Biba closes although Biba Cosmetics continues to trade as a subsidiary of Dorothy Perkins.

Oct 1975

 The fixtures and fittings of Big Biba are sold at auction.

July 1977

The rights to the Biba name are sold – although a new shop opens on Conduit Street, which has nothing to do with Barbara, it closes in less than two years.