Me & George
Drawing on conversations with George Myristis which focused on his entrepreneurial beginnings as a young man new to London, ME AND GEORGE involves a series of short texts, fragments of moments and fictions, written during a period of time in the factory office. Standing, sitting, breathing and reading in his flat desk landscape, the work suggests the authority of a presence that once inhabited the space. The work explores ways that the intimate connections and different physic states are suggested through body and language.
Commissioned By Air Studios
Having left Cyprus in 1958, George Myristis set up Wearite from a basement below his brother’s restaurant in Royal College Street, Camden in 1961. He bought Lawrence Works in 1976 for his production base and ran a successful business from the site until 2016 when the pressures of global trade and increased local rates made it no longer viable to run his factory in the UK. Wearite employed over 100 machinists, some for over 40 years – from Cyprus, Turkey, Ireland, Somalia, Ghana, Mauritius, China – who made English country clothing, horse blankets, sleeping bags and the first duvets sold in the UK. Wearite continues to run a shop next door selling bedding and clothing made in China and Cyprus.
