How Mary Quant revolutionised s fashion
By the mids, Quant was being described as the leading fashion force outside of Paris. She exported to the United States for sale in JC Penney department stores and created the Ginger Group to mass-produce and distribute her more affordable designs.
She later moved into makeup and household goods, which became her main focus throughout the 70s and 80s. In , a Japanese company bought Mary Quant Limited, and Quant resigned as director.
Quant stood out because she had an eye for strong marketing, as well as an innovative approach to materials like PVC. And she embodied her own ideal customer: slim, with a short and angular Vidal Sassoon haircut, always on the move.
Browse through the Mary Quant objects in our collection and you’ll see how she was both a design and retail trailblazer.
Mary Quant
Who Was Mary Quant?
Immortalized by fashion iconography as the originator of the miniskirt, Dame Mary Quant had an art school background and began designing and manufacturing her own clothes in the late s. The London designer had one distinct advantage over previous designers: She was a contemporary of her clients, rather than of an older generation. Convinced that fashion needed to be affordable to be accessible to the young, she opened her own retail boutique called Bazaar on the Kings Road in , introducing the “mod” era and the “Chelsea look.”
Quick Facts
FULL NAME: Barbara Mary Quant
BORN: February 11,
DIED: April 13,
BIRTHPLACE: London, England
SPOUSE: Alexander Plunket Greene ()
CHILDREN: Orlando
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Aquarius
Early Life
Barbara Mary Quant was born on February 11, , in London’s Blackheath neighborhood to Welsh teachers Jack and Mildred Quant, who were originally from mining families. From an early age, Mary knew she wanted to work in fashion. She told an interviewer in that she didn’t like her hand-me-down clothes, feeling “they weren’t me,” and tried to make her own clothes from the age of 5.
She went to Blackheath High School befo
Mary Quant: The miniskirt and PVC pioneer
Miniskirts, shift dresses and PVC are three fashion staples you'll spot in any high street store - but they probably wouldn't exist without Dame Mary Quant.
She will be remembered as one of the most innovative designers in British history, after her death aged
Quant changed women's fashion forever with her vision of chic clothes that provided both comfort and practicality.
Her aesthetic was influenced by the dancers and musicians who hung around in London's Chelsea, and the Mods who were synonymous with London's youth culture in the late s.
Mods, short for modernists, wore Italian sportswear rather than structured clothes, something Dame Mary replicated in her first collections.
She wanted those who wore her clothes to feel relaxed in them - rather than outfits for big occasions, her clothes were designed for everyday life.
The appeal of her clothes for a new generation of women who wanted to shake off the shackles of post-war utility clothing.
Dame Mary once told the Sunday Telegraph that after World War Two, there were "10 years of gloom an
Inventive, opinionated and commercially minded, Mary Quant ( – ) was the most iconic fashion designer of the s. A design and retail pioneer, she popularised super-high hemlines and other irreverent looks that were critical to the development of the 'Swinging Sixties' scene. Our fashion collections include examples of her famous designs from across the s and s.
Fashion is a tool to compete in life outside the home.
Mary Quant
Mary Quant was born and brought up in Blackheath, London, the daughter of two Welsh schoolteachers. Following her parents' refusal to let her attend a fashion course, Quant studied illustration at Goldsmiths, where she met her future husband, the aristocrat Alexander Plunket Greene. She graduated in with a diploma in art education, and began an apprenticeship at a high-end milliner, Erik of Brook Street. In , Plunket Greene purchased Markham House on the King's Road in Chelsea, London, an area frequented by the 'Chelsea Set' – a group of young artists, film directors and socialites interested in exploring new ways of living – and dressing. Quant, Plunket Greene and a friend, lawyer-turned-photographer Archie McNair, opened a restaurant (Alexand
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