Walking with Elvis in Memphis

A highly engaging homage to the iconic style of Elvis Presley, who shook up the world of music and fashion triggering a cultural revolution that stopped 1950s America in its tracks.

Born into poverty, his voice of liquid gold and show-stopping appearance propelled him into a life of extreme wealth. Elvis’s extraordinary story, told through a fashion lens, celebrates the shy, lonely boy who awakened an entire generation to forbidden fruit. The defiant hair, the sultry looks, the controversial moves, the gender-ambivalent outfits – even the famous sideburns – of the man who would be King are all considered in loving detail.

From impoverished scamp and teenage antihero in pink, through Hollywood heartthrob and sensual leather-clad rock star, to caped superhero in Vegas jumpsuits, the author describes his clothes with as much joy as she does his journey through the decades.

A contemporary take on the evolution of Elvis the Showman, featuring interviews with people who knew, met and dressed him, and analysis of the 2022 hit movie, Elvis.

The fascinating rags-to-riches tale, forged in the hardship and music of the poor South, it personifies the American Dream, retold with style by an author raised on Elvis’s songs and movies and who walked in his shoes through Memphis to discover they really were two-toned.
Set in a fascinating period in time, it also looks at his powerful legacy, preserved by his devoted fans, and the films and tributes still being produced in his honour today.

Lorraine Gibson is an award-winning journalist and freelance writer, widely published in print and online.
Author of Elvis: The King of Fashion, the must-have book about the man who was and remains the most iconic solo performer on the planet, she has a passion for fashion, history and, well, Elvis.
Raised on her parents’ Elvis records and watching his films in the school holidays, she was fascinated with his outfits and unconventional appearance and as a grown up, decided to write about how his clothes defined him as much as the music that surrounded him did.

Her research led her to Memphis to meet the people who knew him – including Hal Lansky, whose father was known as ‘the Clothier to The King’ – and to follow in Elvis’s footsteps. Hal advised on the outfits for Baz Luhrmann’s 2022 film, Elvis and wrote the foreword for Lorraine’s book.

The result is Elvis: The King of Fashion – a fresh, insightful, humane and immensely-readable take on the life of the man born to be King. Like its subject, it relishes stylish details and resonates with a backbeat of the music of the South, the country, blues, gospel and soul that Elvis fused into his own unique sound, a sound that shook up the world.

Elvis: The King of Fashion follows Lorraine’s acclaimed debut book, Robert Baden-Powell: A Biography with foreword by Bear Grylls OBE, an examination of the light and shade that surrounds the controversial and wildly eccentric founder of the Scouts. Both books are published by Pen and Sword.

Lorraine lives in Dorset with her husband and two daughters.