She was born Vivienne Isabel Swire in 1941 in Glossop, Derbyshire.
In 1958 she moved with her family to London. As an autodidact she started designing
with support from her second husband Malcolm McLaren .They both opened up a shop in 430 Kings Road in Chelsea / London in 1971.The shop changed its name several times.

She is one of the most important fashion designers, she is associated with the punk subculture in Britain in 1970s and has been instrumental in reviving the British fashion companies. She is a joyful, crazy, ingenious, international fashion designer with an enormous popularity. She began working with „Teddy Boy Suits“ and the following collections were rocker , s/m-outfits as well as punk fashion. What this style was all about were punks wearing clothes of the aristocracy. For most people punk is a musical style but not really a way to develop creativity in fashion design. Copies of real historical clothes, corsets from the Rococo period and Victorian style, 18th century men’s dandy clothes for women., even her own version of Dior’s New Look.
The first catwalk sensation were a „ Pirate Look“ and „New Romanticism Look“ collection in Paris in 1981 with which her career as a couturier began. Three years later she had become a famous designer. She is daring, vocal and dead on. The amazing thing about Vivienne Westwood is also that she combines different epochs and refreshes them for our new century. She has broken society’s ethics and has not only changed our viewpoints but has also opened up our minds for new influences and bold ventures.

What is so phenomenal is her love of the arguments she feels for making these clothes and her understanding not only of tailoring. For example: her Harris Tweed suits from the 40s actually flatter the figure and give a comfortable feeling. But her knowledge of using and mixing shapes and colours reflects her own times.
In 1984 she split up with Malcolm McLaren and became independent with her collections. Now she is an inspiration for others and has accepted the offer to teach her knowledge to students at the Academy of arts in Berlin.

Also Queen Elizabeth II awarded her with the `Order of the British Empire’.
In every season Vivienne Westwood’s collections are the highlight of fashion shows all over the world.
She is the most unusual, eccentric and humorous designer in the 20th century.

Vocabulary
amazing - erstaunlich
autodidact – jemand, der sich selber etwas beibringt
couturier – Schneider
daring - gewagt
dead on – total “in”
develop - entwickeln
ingenious - genial
joyful – freudig
shapes - Formen
society’s ethics – gesellschaftiche Vorstellungen
subculture – Subkultur
to be instrumental – zu etwas beitragen
to refresh - erneuern
to revive – wiederbeleben
to tailor - schneidern
vocal – laut (auch im übertragenen Sinn)

By Florentine Beyhl and Hanna Behrendt

Sources

Lehnert, Gertrud: Geschichte der Mode des 20. Jahrhunderts. Köln: Könemann, 2000.
Loschek, Ingrid: Die Modedesigner. Ein Lexikon von Armani bis Yamamoto. München: Beck, 1998.
Mulvagh, Jane: Vivienne Westwood - Die Lady ist ein Punk. München: Miriam von Schröder, 1999.
Seeling, Charlotte: Mode - das Jahrhundert der Designer. Köln: Könemann, 1999.

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