Aileen Kim (11) | STAFF REPORTER
Queen of British fashion, Vivienne Westwood peacefully passed away on December 29, 2022. Vivienne Westwood will forever be iconic as she has always used her collections and runways as a platform to campaign for positive activism and brought punk and politics to the elevated high fashion world. She was never afraid to speak up with her art and make bold statements. Her seven-decade career is filled with so much meaning and art.
Dame Vivienne Isabel Westwood was born on April 8, 1941, in Tintwistle, United Kingdom. Her first-ever boutique was started with her second partner in 1971, Malcolm McLaren, and it was called Let it Rock. The boutique sold 1950s memorabilia and dandy suits, and also made teddy boy trousers, drape oats, and mohair sweaters until they got to style the 1970s punk band the Sex Pistols. Around that time they began selling slogan T-shirts with colourful words styled from chicken bones, trousers with zips from front to back, and trampled-on tie-dye tops. The shop was recognized with various new names over the year such as, Too Fast to Live Too Young to Die in 1972. Before Westwood and Mclaren parted ways, they designed the iconic 1981 New Romantic-inspired “Pirate” collection together under the World’s End label.
A few years after her first Paris show in 1983, Westwood was credited with the revival of the British fashion scene as fashion critics called her designs “the British answer to those of Christian Lacroix in Paris.” Her art got so much recognition and the recognition just kept growing.
Westwood has won several awards. She won British Fashion Designer of the Year in 1990, 1991, and 2006 from the British Fashion Council. In 2007, she was handed the BFC Award for Outstanding Achievement in Fashion Design, and in 2018, the Swarovski Award for Positive Change, for her constant climate-change activism.
Westwood’s runway shows were always her political platform and expressed her opinions on political matters. In her 2006 collection, there were t-shirts that read “I Am Not A Terrorist, Please Don’t Arrest Me”, and in her fall 2008 show, models carried signs demanding fair legal trials for Guantanamo Bay prisoners. In her spring 2013 show, she called for a climate revolution. She has also shown support for political parties and environmental charities, including Cool Earth and Greenpeace, and the Occupy demonstrations in 2011. In 2014, Westwood even shaved off her hair to raise awareness for climate change. At her spring 2016 show, where there were placards that read “fracking is a crime” and “austerity is a crime”, Westwood told Women’s Wear Daily backstage – “We’re trying to tell everyone the end of the world is here”.
There is no doubt that Vivienne Westwood is one of the most iconic, creative, and respectable designers in the fashion industry. She used her platform and art as a voice to spread awareness and positivity. She passed away at the young age of 81, but she will always remain an icon – not only in the fashion world but in history.
