The Big Issue – August 20, 2018

W

hen he’s feeling sad and low, Alan Smith-Allison knows

where he’s gotta go – straight to Spice Girls songs. “It

doesn’t matter what kind of mood you’re in, just get the

Spice Girls on – cheesy feel-goodness, nothing too serious,”

he advises.

Smith-Allison is one of the most prolific collectors of Spice

Girls memorabilia, amassing thousands of objects, from scooters

to crisp packets, that form SpiceUp – the Exhibition, shifting to

Manchester this week after sell-out success in London.

The Spice Girls played an important role in Smith-Allison’s life.

Growing up in the Scottish village of Houston, west of Glasgow, he

had a dicult home life.

“I was 15 years old when Wannabe was released,” he

remembers. “Like anybody in the 1990s with worries about their

sexuality, there’s angst involved, it isn’t the perfect life. Then

these girls came along and said: ‘You know what? You can be who

you want to be.’ I couldn’t relate to girl power massively, but what

I could relate to was that it’s all right to be diferent, it’s all right

to be yourself.”

After the relationship with his father broke down, Smith-

Allison became homeless. “I had nowhere to live, relying on

friends to help me until I eventually got a little flat sorted through

the council.”

He trained as a chef and worked as a classroom assistant but

the Spice Girls remains his true calling. In 2007, Mel B – aka Scary

Spice – held a charity sale and since then, Smith-Allison has been

obsessed with collecting everything he can, spending up to

£200,000 at auctions.

SpiceUp – the Exhibition gives him the opportunity to share

his love with other fans, and visitors to the exhibition have similar

stories about how the group inspired them.

“All five girls were diferent so everyone had someone to relate

to. We speak to people who are leaving the exhibition they will

come up and say: ‘These girls changed my life. They made

me believe in myself.’ That’s exactly the influence they had

on me.”

What they said is true: all you need is positivity.

SpiceUp – the Exhibition opens at Manchester

Central on August 24. spicegirls-exhibition.com

Words: Steven MacKenzie

Photographs: Will Ireland

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story from A to Z

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OUT OF HOMELESSNESS

Five become 51

Walkers released 51

Spice Girls-themed

packets of crisps – 10

for each member of

the band and one for

the group. They were

regular flavours, rather

than special tangy

Ginger or sweaty

Sporty flavours.