Jordan Mooney turns heads at the Old Boot in Seaford with her torn Vivienne Westwood jacket, leather wristbands, black net skirt and Ray Bans matching her purple hair. She greets me with a kiss, fusses my dog and insists on buying the first drink. “I never wanted to fit in,” she says. “By the time I left junior school, I knew I was going to do something different with my life.”
Pamela Rooke was born in June 1955, the youngest of three children. “My dad, Stanley, was billeted in Seaford during the war and settled here. My mum Linda was a seamstress – vivacious and glamorous. In many ways, my childhood was like a dream. I used to do the Dance of the Seven Veils to Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite using Mum’s chiffon scarves,” she laughs. At seven, she started ballet at Miss Angela’s School of Dancing in Eastbourne.
“Our parents allowed us to run free. I spent hours on Seaford beach. The sea always feels like freedom to me,” she explains. “If I bunked off school, I would go to the Seven Sisters and walk along the cliffs with my best friend, Sally.”
At Seaford Head Secondary, she was captain of the hockey team. “Other girls wanted to get married and have babies. But I wanted to be my own person and excel at something.”
Inspired by Roxy Music and David Bowie, she started experimenting with her appearance. By 18, Pamela was sent home from school for her outrageous razor-cut pink and red hair. Her mother insisted she keep several yards behind when they went out!
Denne historien er fra September 2019-utgaven av Sussex Life.
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Denne historien er fra September 2019-utgaven av Sussex Life.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
TAKE YOUR TIME
Dean Edwards’ new cookbook features delectable recipes that you can slow cook or stick in the oven. Here’s a selection of the best
Decorative art
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ON THE FRONT FOOT
The rugby legend took the reins at Sussex County Cricket Club in 2017, rekindling his love for a sport that first won his heart on the village cricket fields of North Yorkshire
NAKED AMBITION
In the 1980s, Christine and Jennifer Binnie partied with Boy George and Marilyn and bared all as performance art collective The Neo-Naturists. Now they are working together to gain the recognition they feel they deserve
ROCKET MAN
Astronaut Tim Peake has come a long way since growing up in Westbourne and attending Chichester High School for Boys: 248 miles above Earth, to be precise. But, he says, life on the International Space Station has a lot in common with family caravanning holidays
Revolution man
Lewes’ most famous resident Thomas Paine may be the greatest propagandist who ever lived. But how did a humble customs and excise officer ignite the touchpaper for revolution in not one but two countries?
THE DIARY
17 exciting things to do this month in East and West Sussex
All in a day's work
Meet Tim Dummer, who has helped keep Midhurst’s Cowdray Estate shipshape for an impressive five decades
My favourite Sussex
Bruce Fogle is an author and a vet with a practice in London who has lived in West Sussex with his wife, the actress Julia Foster, since 1989. He recently became president of RSPCA Mount Noddy near Chichester
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Brighton is often rated one of the most vegan-friendly cities in the UK. What these restaurants prove is that plant-based food doesn’t have to be puritanical – at all of these places you’ll find big flavours and a desire to push the envelope
