PETER TRAVIS
Designer
![Peter Travis, left, designed the Speedo bathing suit modelled by his nephew Jamie Travis on Bondi Beach.](/web/20161231061447im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/d/v/6/a/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gtdv00.png/1483011267725.jpg)
1927 - 2016
Peter Travis, a flamboyant artist with a passion for colour, brought that to many things, including the interior of federal Parliament and the skies above Sydney. Brilliant with ceramics and design, he saw his works exhibited internationally. But he came to widespread public notice when he designed the Speedo swimming brief, in an age where beach inspectors still walked round with tape measures and women in skimpy swimwear were prosecuted. Men, if not wearing a full-body swimming suit, usually had a small skirt over the top of their trunk pants. Travis burst upon the swimming world with a male swimming brief that consigned that, along with the beachside bathing closet, to history.
![The Speedo Golden Sands Series catalog for the summer of 1960-61 introduced a dramatic range of swimwear and beachwear ...](/web/20161231061447im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/d/v/5/b/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gtdv00.png/1483011267725.jpg)
The brief came quickly into vogue from the time he introduced it in 1961. But it was, Travis stressed, designed for ease of swimming. Himself a surfer, he had become tired of the trunk swimsuits which he said were "too big, too long and uncomfortable". The new briefs were fitted round the hips which were stable and moved with the body. "If you lifted your leg as high as you could, that was the shape of the cut," he said. Travis was aware of the enthusiastic reception by the gay community, but said that sexuality aspect was "just a bonus". He was an outstanding ceramic artist, designer and lecturer, consulted for the interior design of prominent buildings and sought after for his works. Even his early swimwear designs were acquired by the Australian National Gallery.
Peter Noel Moncrieff Travis was born in Manly on February 22, 1927, the elder of two sons of John Travis, who was a compositor on the Sydney Sun, and Gertrude (nee Whiteman). He went to school in Balgowlah and Manly, and North Sydney Technical High. He began studies at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, with the aim of becoming a music teacher but was dissatisfied and moved on to study sculpture and ceramics at the East Sydney Technical College. He began his working life in 1947 selling silks at Farmers department store in Sydney, and prided himself as having designed Australia's first teenage fashions. Girls had been wearing dresses that were all the same, top to bottom, he said, and he introduced "mix and match" tops. For a time he worked on radios and television sets for Phillips Electric. He was offered a job in America by Janzen Swimwear but by then, on his account, he had fallen in love and in 1959 opted to join the Australian Speedo Company.
Speedo gave Travis a range of clothing to design, including cardigans, pullovers and bowling jackets. He was then asked to design a version of a Hawaiian swimming trunk in fashion at the time. But he felt it was unoriginal, they could be easily copied, and he had another idea. In 1960 he came up with the idea of a swimming brief, arguing that having the brief anchored higher than the hip was "tying something around your stomach." The new briefs came in 17.5 cm, 12.5 cm and 7.5 widths, the greater the width the greater the allowance for modesty. Initially, men tended to buy the larger size. But it was still a culture shock. In 1961, when some men first wore speedos at Bondi Beach, beach inspector Aub Laidlaw summoned the police, who arrested them for indecent exposure. The charges were dismissed on the grounds that they did not display pubic hair, and the publicity was a huge boost for Speedo. The second year buyers' preference was for the 12.5 cm size. The third year they went for the 7.5 cm style. Sales took off round the world and were sported by the likes of Mark Spitz in the Olympics.
Travis was not at all surprised by the success. But did think there were limits. He thought the practice of people walking the streets in their speedos lacked "decorum". Leaving Speedo, he linked up with his technical college teacher, Phyllis Shillito, who had retired and set up a School of Design, focusing on "basic design and basic colour drawing". Travis became her project director. For several years he was accommodated at the Presbyterian Church in Kings Cross, producing art works and playing the church organ to earn his keep. His creations were featured in art exhibitions throughout the country. Every few weeks in that period he went touring NSW on behalf of the Arts Council of Australia, tutoring ceramics groups. He became visual arts adviser to the council.
![Master kite designer and internationally known artist Peter Travis with MC Maximus the Magnificent at the launch of ...](/web/20161231061447im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/d/v/4/p/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gtdv00.png/1483011267725.jpg)
In 1970, Travis was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to study in England and America and returned to declare that there was a "craft revolution" throughout the world and Australia was not part of it. He said Australia should invest in it. He himself was attracting international fame, invited among other things to exhibit his works in Chicago. In 1972 he was head teacher at the Dorothy Hope Pottery Gallery in Woolloomooloo. In 1973, as president-elect of the Potters' Society of Australia, he represented the federal government at the International Competition of Contemporary Ceramic Art in Italy, where he was awarded the Town of Faenza Gold Medal.
Travis became interested in kite flying, particularly involving kites in distinct shapes and colours. In 1976 he flew five of them high above Circular Quay in commemoration of the US Bicentenary celebrations. He flew them at the Sydney Festival, and in Australia Day celebrations. He was invited to fly his kites at Bondi Beach and from that came the famous kite festival known as the Festival of the Winds. He built large, spectacular kites, which he referred to as "aerial sculptures", which were featured in the lobbies of hotels and galleries, including the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. He produced a public display from the tops of tall buildings, known as his "Sky Theatre". Travis collected folk kites from around the world. In return his own kites gained worldwide recognition. "Kite flying takes you out of yourself," he said. "They are incredibly manipulative. They can be choreographed into stylistic combinations over an entire city."
Travis was approached by Romaldo Giurgola, architect of the new Parliament House in Canberra, who wanted advice on colours for the interior. In pursuit of that, Travis selected the wood and marble. Receiving a $35,000 grant in 1992 from the Australia Council, he kept up his production and regularly exhibited his work at the David Jones Exhibition Hall in Sydney. In 2002 Travis was honoured by a special exhibition at the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras. Travis took up a lectureship at the Ceramics Department of the College of Fine Arts, University of New South Wales, which conferred a Master of Fine Arts degree upon him. In 2008 Travis was appointed a Member of the Order of Australian (AM) for his contribution to the arts.
He died suddenly on November 28 at his home in Glebe, in inner Sydney. His funeral was held on December 9 and a celebratory memorial service will be held on February 22 next year, his 90th birthday. Peter Travis is survived by his brother, John Malcolm "Mal" Travis, his sister-in-law, nieces and nephews and his long-term partner, Emeritus Professor Graeme Clarke, a classical scholar with the Australian National University.