Vivienne Westwood
historic fashion Icon: Vivienne Westwood
Vivienne began by designing and making Teddy Boy clothes for Malcolm McLaren and in 1971 they opened a small boutique called Let it Rock at number 430 Kings Road, Chelsea in London. By 1974 the shop was renamed Sex, a shop “unlike anything else going on in England at the time” they used thThe collapse of the Sex Pistols and the adoption of punk by the mainstream left Vivienne disenchanted. In 1980 the shop was refitted and renamed Worlds End, which is still the name that’s in use today.e slogan ‘rubberwear for the office’.
The year 2016 marked a new and exciting chapter for the house, as Vivienne and her long-term husband Andreas Kronthaler began producing separate bi-annual collections. In 2018, the Vivienne Westwood collaboration with Burberry launches, in joint support of UK-based non-profit Cool Earth, who raise money to help protect the endangered rainforests, combat global warming, protect ecosystems and provide employment for local people.
The 1981 ‘Pirate’ Collection was Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren’s first official collaborative catwalk show. It informed the aesthetic of The Worlds End Boutique with its pirate’s galleon and ship features. This collection was filled with romantic looks in gold, orange, and yellow which burst onto the London fashion scene, ensuring its place in the house’s history of influence.
The Vivienne Westwood Ethical Fashion Initiative Bags are “Handmade with love” in Nairobi. Produced since 2010 in collaboration with the Ethical Fashion Initiative (EFI) of the International Trade Centre – a joint body of the United Nations (UN) and the World Trade Organisation (WTO) –which currently supports the work of thousands of women micro-producers from marginalized African communities.
Vivienne receives an award for Fashion Designer of the Year for two years in a row in 1990 and 1991 by the British Fashion Council.During this period Vivienne’s heroes shifted from punks and ragamuffins to ‘Tatler’ girls wearing clothes that parodied the upper class. A chance encounter inspired one of her most important and influential collections, Autumn-Winter 1987 ‘Harris Tweed’. “My whole idea for this collection was stolen from a little girl I saw on the tube one day. She couldn’t have been more than 14. She had a little plaited bun, a Harris Tweed jacket, and a bag with a pair of ballet shoes in it. She looked so cool and composed standing there.”
The period from the 2000s was characterized not only by the designer’s growing influence in the fashion industry but also by her social and political activism and her battle against climate change. “Climate change, not fashion, is now my priority,” she told The Guardian in 2014 – a message that started being vehicled throughout her different collections. Everything she released had underlying social and political messaging. From garments bearing slogans (a wink to her punk days), to runway protests about Brexit, global warming and free speech, criticizing politicians, and so on.
