Aside from spitting out vitriol in various verbal forms day to day, I'm a print designer with my own label, Nkoyo. As such I was literally first in line to bag a place at the Fashion and Textile Museum's 'Fashion Heroines' talk with the current queen of print, Mary Katrantzou. Mary has - as one audience members said - 'revolutionised the way the general public view print', and in turn the way print designers approach it. Symmetry, colour, subject matter, yep, in print design terms she's kind of a big deal. Scanning the rest of the print-bedecked contingent, plenty clearly agreed.

Speaking warmly, she admitted she didn't really know what she was doing at the beginning. As every young designer in the room breathed a sigh of relief at this news, Katrantzou went on to describe her background in architecture at Rhode Island School of Design, then coming to study at Central Saint Martins, on a year abroad, and never looking back.

As she verbally walked us though her journey in print from her BA, to MA to NEWGEN to London Fashion Week to Topshop to the red carpet, her tone was jovial and amiable, playing down her extraordinary talent - something oft lacking in fashion spheres. Perhaps she's managed to keep this level of modesty as fashion wasn't her original interest and it still doesn't solely inform her design process. Russian structuralism was actually Katrantzou's first touchstone when asked about influences. Or perhaps she's just a top notch chick.

Unusually, she admitted it took her a while to see herself as a 'fashion designer': "As soon as you work with the 3D figure, you become a fashion designer" she mused, a definition so succinct in contrast to her exquisitely elaborate collections it sounds almost over simplified. Listening to Katrantzou speak you can tell that despite the painstaking final product of her work, and the adoration and attention it receives, her aim is simply to flatter and celebrate the woman. Whether that be in her main line, her Topshop collaboration, or dressing someone for a red carpet.

As the talk comes to an end, she muses over everything from her thoughts on anorexic models to the notion of celebrity to how Keira Knightley wore her design then changed her outlook on how her dresses could be worn.

The one person queries something I'd had in my own head. They ask a head-to-toe black clad Katrantzou whether she wears her own print-heavy, hyper real designs. With a giggle she replies that she has a uniform of black jumper dresses, as working with so much print all day makes her crave the plain and mundane. But as she tucks her hair behind her ear I catch the flash of a multicoloured dangling earring which looks like it could have come straight out of Liz Taylor's jewellery box. It's clear that sparkly, OTT femininity is a huge part of Mary's personal world even if it's hidden shyly underneath her hair.

All images Mary Katrantzou A/W 2012

Posted on May 30, 2012 at 1:28:51 by Alice Nyong