00:06When I got here it was a feeling of belonging in some way. Immediately I felt it. It's
00:13much strange. Perched on the northernmost tip of the African coast, Tangier has always
00:25looked in two directions at once. This is a gritty port city in balance, fixed between
00:32Europe and Africa, the sacred and profane. It is a melange of every style and every sort
00:40of person here. There's a sort of outspoken elegance, it's a kind of fashion hedonism.
00:46It's quite strong stuff and you either take to it or you don't. In a place where rock stars
00:52and poets have long set out to find themselves, I'm here in search of today's creative expats,
00:58to understand the legendary hypnotic power of this city and the influence it had on their
01:03personal style. My first stop is a place where the past and present converge.
01:10This is the most beautiful embroidery of Morocco. Wow. Perfect from both sides.
01:14Mejid is Tangier's most famous antique dealer, a passionate curator of traditional Moroccan
01:20artefacts, from rugs to caftans and jewellery.
01:25He left behind his hometown of Fez nearly 40 years ago and found himself emptying ashtrays
01:32at the lavish parties of wealthy expats. He saw their fabulous collections and found an obsession.
01:38I didn't choose Tangier, but Tangier chose me. It's gifted me so much beautiful things.
01:44The smell, the atmosphere, there's something about it. I meet people from all over the world.
01:52It's a bouquet.
01:53A friend to the many stars who call Tangier their spiritual home, Mejid's favourite customer
01:59is none other than Mick Jagger.
02:00When I was young, it was the hippie time, it was the clothes, the colours, like you're
02:06fumbling to Bob Dylan to Kurt Stevens to Running Stones. At that time, they appeared names.
02:12But for us, it was like you and me.
02:16What do you think Tangier gave them?
02:18I don't know.
02:19You know, Mathis, I can understand the light. If Salon, I can understand, he got influenced
02:24by the kaftan and the cave. But some people, they come for a dream, but there is no dream.
02:30Tangier became a destination for dreamers and misfits after 1923, when it was recognised
02:36as an international zone, a loosely governed centre for espionage, drugs and an anything-goes
02:42attitude.
02:44The British had the post office and then the French had the roads. Basically, there were
02:48very, very few laws. And it was a fantastically clever experiment.
02:53Photographer Tessa Codrington spent much of her life at her third-generation family home
02:58in the hills of Tangier.
03:00I came here because I was a child and my grandfather lived here. And I did fall in love with
03:04it,
03:04but only as a child, I fell in love with my grandfather's donkey. It was the best thing
03:10that attracted me.
03:11She remembers much of the excitement of a time when the promise of cosmopolitan freedom
03:16attracted the likes of writers Paul Bowles and William Burroughs, as well as fashion
03:21icon Yves Saint Laurent.
03:23Ex-Patriots who came here then were just coming for sex and drugs mostly. The older ones came
03:29because it was the freedom, being able to live how you want to live and not being constrained
03:34by stupid laws were back home. And now that we're all part of Morocco, it sort of goes
03:41on really, that freedom, that sense of liberation.
03:44Weaving through the labyrinths of the old city, I have to wonder, is the creativity that
03:50once flourished here now just nostalgia and romance? Is the vibrant life of the past still
03:56alive today?
03:59Niccolò Baldazzara is a successful Italian interior designer who built his home here on
04:04a whim.
04:05I've always been known to be quite colourful, to the extent of being nicknamed like the
04:11parrot. I adore colours, so I love to mix them. But definitely coming here has enhanced
04:17my passion for it.
04:18How important is fashion and how you're perceived? Would you be happy just wearing jeans and a
04:24t-shirt or does this speak to who Niccolò really is?
04:27Listen, I'm not looking against jeans and t-shirts, it's just I wouldn't feel comfortable.
04:32Moroccans have a great saying. They say that we, Westerners, have watches. They have time.
04:42It's nice to take 15 minutes to dress up.
04:47The time here, it's like time has sort of stood still a little bit and there's still this wonderful
04:51way of life here that, you know, quite frankly, it's delicious.
04:57Paul Bowles once said that Tangier holds added depth of reality, with its past and present
05:02existing simultaneously. Poodle is a menswear designer who seems to bring that statement
05:08to life by combining once forgotten fabrics with modern European cuts and sensibilities.
05:14Everything is sourced here from little shops in the Medina, so you just wander around and
05:20you find these rolls that are just collecting dust and they're all imported from 50s, 60s,
05:2770s to Tangier and that's what I'm tapping into.
05:32Anything that you want to make, it's feasible. You know, you can go to a lovely leather man down
05:37the road and he can put up a sample for a belt. You can go to a shoe man and
05:43say I've got this idea.
05:44All the possibilities are endless on a creative front and you still have that old fashioned elegance
05:52that's very contagious, very inspiring.
06:00I feel comfortable in the classic old fashioned style. Old fashioned. In every sort of colour as long as it's
06:10beige.
06:12That's called the poet's hat. It's from a very old shop in London. An old battered planter's...
06:17Jonathan Dawson is a British journalist who came here 20 years ago to write a story.
06:22But instead of passing through, he decided to stay. Now he lives here full time with his rooster and dog
06:29and has his suits handmade by a tailor just up the street.
06:33You didn't want to adopt some of the Moroccan prints and colour?
06:36No, no. I didn't go native in terms of getting out into Moroccan clothes, which I admire but don't suit
06:42me.
06:43You find a style that fits you and you stick to it.
06:46What is it about Tangier that you think has been so attractive?
06:50It's famous for people coming and reinventing themselves. They start out in a basement in London and end up first
06:57floor in Tangier.
06:58Then towards the end of their lives they invent titles for themselves and they get buried as HRH so and
07:03so.
07:03So I can leave here Lady Leo.
07:05Oh, easily. And it would be totally accepted here and everyone would give a lunch party for you.
07:13I'm starting to realise that in many ways Tangier is still a place of possibility.
07:18To live a life apart and create your own world within the existing one.
07:24Do you think there was just a more romantic period in the 60s and 70s?
07:28No, but maybe still people find dreams now.
07:31I think so. I think still now some people live this stuff.
07:36I enjoy the freedom to go out in the street and be who I am as it were without having
07:43to pretend to be something else.
07:46The brilliant minds and creatives that came before cut a passage for the uprooted of today.
07:53Tangier expat style is more than a type of fabric or a colour palette.
07:57In some ways less tangible and yet entirely immersive.
08:00I think it's the colour, the light. It just gets all your creative juices going.
08:06It's a way of life. It's how you represent your ideal you.
08:10Given the freedom from rules, responsibility or time.
08:15Now there'll be combat, you see.
08:17Oh no!
08:18This goes on all day.
08:20Stop it!
08:21Sorry about this. Come here.
08:22Oh!
08:25Look at him. He's going for more crumbs.
08:28Anyway, I've only got one head but 20 hats.
08:30And that's the end of the show.
