Vivienne Westwood, an influential fashion maverick who played a key role in the punk movement, died Thursday at 81.
Westwood’s eponymous fashion house announced her death on social media platforms, saying she died peacefully. A cause of death was not disclosed.Westwood’s eponymous fashion house announced her death on social media platforms, saying she died peacefully. A cause of death was not disclosed.
As her stature grew, she seemed to transcend fashion, with her designs shown in museum collections throughout the world. The young woman who had scorned the British establishment eventually became one of its leading lights, and she used her elite position to lobby for environmental reforms even as she kept her hair dyed the bright shade of orange that became her trademark.
In her punk days, Westwood’s clothes were often intentionally shocking: T-shirts decorated with drawings of naked boys, and “bondage pants” with sadomasochistic overtones were standard fare in her popular London shops. But Westwood was able to make the transition from punk to haute couture without missing a beat, keeping her career going without stooping to self-caricature.
She approached her work with gusto in her early years, but over time seemed to tire of the clamor and buzz. After decades of designing, she sometimes spoke wistfully of moving beyond fashion so she could concentrate on environmental matters and educational projects. Westwood was a self-taught designer with no formal fashion training. She told Marie Claire magazine that she learned how to make her own clothes as a teenager by following patterns. When she wanted to sell 1950s-style clothes at her first shop, she found old clothes in markets and took them apart to understand the cut and construction.
The shop changed its name and focus several times, operating as “SEX” — Westwood and McLaren were fined in 1975 for an “indecent exhibition” there — and “World’s End” and “Seditionaries.”
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