100 Most Influential People in Fashion

Fashion Influential #17: Vivienne Westwood

Vivienne Westwood attends her Anglomania Summer/Spring 2009 Ready to Wear show in Berlin, Germany.

VIVIENNE WESTWOOD
Born:
April 8, 1941 in
Designed for:
The Sex Pistols, Red Label, Gold Label, MAN, Anglomania
Fans:
Gwen Stefani, Patricia Field, Pamela Anderson, Kim Cattrall
Fan of:
Nuclear disarmament, civil rights
Beginnings.
Vivienne Westwood (born Vivienne Isabel Swire) began her ascent into the world of high fashion when she met Malcolm McLaren, the manager of The Sex Pistols. Westwood was an elementary school teacher when she met McLaren, but she gave up teaching to help him open a shop in Chelsea, London: the now-famous SEX (aka Let it Rock). The Sex Pistols wore clothes from the shop to their first gig, and the rest is history.

Career Highs.
With the dawn of The Sex Pistols and British punk rock, Westwood and McLaren's revolutionary rock fashions, from dog collars to expertly arranged safety pins, began to permeate the high-fashion world. Everyone wanted to look like a rock star, and Westwood was responsible for the new "rock" look.
Fashion is very important. It is life-enhancing and, like everything that gives pleasure, it is worth doing well.
- Vivienne Westwood

Vivienne Westwood Picture Gallery.

Career Lows.
None, really. When punk's popularity began to wane in the early 1980s, Westwood expertly incorporated elements of New Wave fashion into her designs, reinventing her signature looks for a new era.

Legacy.
Westwood, with McLaren, changed the look of rock music forever, matching The Sex Pistols' revolutionary sound with an equally revolutionary approach to DIY fashion. She is largely responsible for the rise of Anglomania in the early '80s, popularizing the Scottish tartan skirt for the modern woman and ripping the hems of old Victorian lines.

Vivienne Westwood Red Label Spring/Summer 2009.

Get the Look.
Think British, with edge. Much of Westwood's design aesthetic is about attitude: bringing rebellion to classic cuts and patterns. Pair a tartan skirt with a pair of black stilletto heels; don a sequined tube top with a frilly lace skirt. Think about your personal style aesthetic: then take a razor blade to it.

- Alicia