Matilda Etches

• Name — Matilda Etches • Birth Name — Muriel Matilda Etches • Born — 1898 • Birthplace — Rotherham, Yorkshire, England • Died — 1974 • Occupation — Fashion designer and couturier; film and theatre costume designer • Children — 1 • Relatives — Robin Jacques (son-in-law)

Etches was born in Rotherham, Yorkshire. She was the daughter of Charles Thomas Watkins Etches (1874–1964) and Agnes Helena Etches (nee Woollen). Her father was a captain in The King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry during World War I.

Etches started a dressmaking business in 1934, but financial problems led to it being dissolved the following year. She started a new business in the late 1930s, and had widespread fame in the 1940s. According to a feature in Vogue, "Her clothes philosophy is for undating simplicity, for an elegance which relies on cut rather than trimming and above all for comfort: this last, an unusual and very welcome viewpoint." Her clients included the actress Vivien Leigh, Margot Fonteyn, Glynis Johns, Constance Collier, Christine Norden, Paulette Goddard, and Valerie Hobson. Etches was also a costume designer for theatre and film, and worked with theatre designer Sophie Fedorovitch, and extensively with Cecil Beaton. According to the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A), "Matilda Etches is now almost entirely forgotten except as a theatre, ballet and opera costume-maker. However, she was an extremely talented couturier, whose fashionable clothes were innovative and very carefully made."

In 1919, Etches married the engineer Robert Bamford, who founded a company that became Aston Martin. They had a daughter, Patricia Bamford, who married the illustrator Robin Jacques. In 1950, she married the American economist and economics advisor, Paul Homan. She spent her later life at 19 Abbey Road in Brighton. After her death, Cecil Beaton wrote an obituary.

• The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), with Joseph Buto • Caesar and Cleopatra (1945) • Beware of Pity (1946) • Gaiety George (1946)