Mary Quant: The Dame Who Made Miniskirt Very Popular
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Mary Quant is back, to put herself in the headlines 60 years after the swinging 1960s in swinging London. The miniest of miniskirts are being sported along the King’s Road and Carnaby Street to promote a new show at Victoria & Albert museum.Dame Mary QuMary Quant: The Dame Who Made Miniskirt Very Popular
Mary Quant is back, to put herself in the headlines 60 years after the swinging 1960s in swinging London. The miniest of miniskirts are being sported along the King’s Road and Carnaby Street to promote a new show at Victoria & Albert museum.Dame Mary Quant, as she now is, is being feted at the age of 85 with the eye-poppingly bright exhibition. It is a fest of sexy hot pants, high-neck and high-cut dresses, vibrant pantyhose and dainty shoes. There are hairstyles from Vidal Sassoon pageboy bobs to huge hippy curls. The visitor can admire 1970s maxi dresses, PVC coats, floaty blouses and tailored trousers that symbolized a new age of feminism that was starting to emerge.Quant herself is often credited with inventing the miniskirt. While that is arguable (the Parisian Andre Courreges is often mentioned), nobody doubts that she made it very popular. As Quant famously said, “The whole point of fashion is to make fashionable clothes available for everyone.” Quant designed for the models Twiggy and Pattie Boyd, and singer Cilla Black, though she was using mass production to make a new look for all women, famous or not. In June last year, the V&A asked the public to track down vintage Quant garments and this makes for one of the most fascinating aspects of the show. The museum got more than 1,000 responses and selected 35 objects from 30 individuals, along with their personal stories and photos of them wearing the outfits.The exhibition runs from 1955, and Quant’s experimental shop Bazaar on the King’s Road, through to 1975, by which time Quant was a worldwide brand. She had diversified into lingerie early — miniskirts did not work so well with stockings so she made tights as well as other hosiery. This was followed by cosmetics, with everything packaged with her distinctive daisy logo, and even her own Daisy dolls, a rival to Barbie.The show is the latest V&A fashion event, following other displays about underwear, shoes and the London catwalk, and it is an interesting counterpoint to the Christian Dior exhibition also taking place.The author Ernestine Carter famously wrote in the book “Fashion of a Decade”: “It is given to a fortunate few to be born at the right time, in the right place, with the right talents. In recent fashion there are three: Chanel, Dior, and Mary Quant.”The Dior show is totally sold out in all timeslots through to the end of its run. While nobody could argue with such a success, some fans have suggested such a sell-out should be extended or opened for longer hours to cope with demand. A very limited number of Dior tickets are on sale each day at 10 a.m. The V&A has also made a name for itself in recent years with shows about David Bowie, Pink Floyd and more, with visitor figures of such sizes as to sweep away concerns from the snobby few who have accused the museum of dumbing down. Years ago it had moved on from the worthy-but-dull, fusty, gray image it had when Quant was working her colorful magic in the 1960s. Could the V&A do it again with this fun show? It deserves to.“Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams” is sold out and runs through September 1. “Mary Quant” sponsored by King’s Road opened on April 6 and runs through February 2020.This column appears in the May 2019 edition of BlouinShop. Subscribe at www.blouinsubscriptions.comhttps://www.blouinartinfo.com/ Founder: Louise Blouin Read more