But the creative directors who you know go to a new brand and
within a season they're expected to effect great changes, very
noticeable changes. The danger being that the the
heritage of that brand is damaged or if not destroyed.
So you look at some brands where there have been a series of
creative directors chopping in change and maybe 3 or 4 over the
last 10 years, what's left of the original DNA of that brand
after? All that time.
I've never taken a bow at the end of a runway show because why
is that? Because it would.
It seems arrogant and unless every single person in the
company from the chairman to the to the to the cleaning staff
could come out with me and and take a take a bow because
they're the response responsible too.
I. Mean, what would you say is sort
of your the the thing that you're most proud of?
Surviving in the fashion industry for so long.
Today I'm going on a style journey with the supremely
talented British designer and creative director of Max Mara,
Ian Griffiths. Hello and welcome, Ian.
Hello, Amanda. Thank you.
It's very it's a great pleasure to be here.
Oh, it's lovely to have you here.
I must admit I've watched your work over the decades and
really, really been in awe of it.
Because 37 years at Reggio Emilia, yes, Wow.
I mean, is Italy more of your home than London or Britain now?
Finally, after all these years, I have to admit that it is for
years and years I was in in denial.
I guess you'd say. You know, I used to race home
every weekend to here, to London or to our cottage in Suffolk.
And I used to pretend that I wasn't living in Italy.
But finally after Brexit, I had to concede that that was my
home. I'm a resident there now.
I'm much happier because I live and work in the same place.
And so I feel more of a sense of belonging there.
Yeah. And now I'm a kind of style
wise, I think I've turned into a kind of Italian person's version
of what an Englishman's like. If you can, if you if you can
understand that it's. So explain that to me.
Well, I've become a kind of caricature of myself or, yeah, a
caricature of an English person in the way that I dress, in the
way that I behave. I mean, I don't know what an
English person would make of me if I was dressed as the way that
I would be in, in Italy, because it's quite ludicrously,
exaggeratedly English with the Savile Row suits and the Brooks
Brothers shirts and the churches or the Chinese shoes.
I've kind of become like this, this Italian version of, of an
English person. And in a sense, being in Italy
has given me the freedom to to indulge that kind of fantasy.
So do you find that your style becomes it changes as you come
back to Britain? It changes slightly, especially
if I'm in Suffolk where I have the cottage, because there I
look most of the time like I'd slept in a hedge with my inside
out jumpers and my dirty jeans from gardening and my and my
soil encrusted fingernails, my shirts and jumpers with the
holes in the elbows. Love that, love that.
But Max Marra, coming back to that for a second, has this
wonderful reputation of keeping its staff, which speaks volumes
for the company culture. I mean, 38 years, it must feel
like you're really part of a large family.
Yes, exactly. I mean everyone knows that Max
Marra is a family owned company, but Max Marra is a family and
we're not related by blood, but we're, we're close enough to
each other to be able to argue. I mean, that's the difference
between a normal corporate structure and Max Marra, that if
we disagree, we can have a have a really good argument and there
are no, there are no, yes, there are no hard feelings afterwards.
And I think that's one of the reasons why we're also committed
to what we do and why the decisions we make are often the
right ones because we've argued them about.
Them so many times. And so would you say that is the
secret for why people stay so long We're.
Arguing. I mean, in this ageist world
that we inhabit, what would you say is your secret to keeping
the collection ageless and yet so relevant and fresh?
You should put that question to my mother, who's 90, and she
very often points out, I mean, she's my greatest critic.
She very often points out, I mean, she says that there should
be something in every collection that she can wear, and she
insists that there is. But she often points out that
the things that she likes are the same things that my niece
likes. And she's 23.
So I think that really the secret to staying relevant is,
is think young and keep young. And if I take my mother as an
example, you know, the way that she keeps young and the way that
I hopefully keep young, in my mentality at least, is by
constantly reading and talking and having a dialogue with young
people constantly. Yeah.
I mean, do you have a lot of young people in the design
studio or is it a real mixture? It's a real mixture because on
on the one hand I've got people who've been with me for 32
years, so they're obviously not so young.
But then at the same time I've got, I mean, it's quite a small
team. At the same time, I've got
people who've graduated from college within the last to or
even or, or direct graduates from college.
So yes, there's a, there's a, there's a mixture, but I think
dialogue with young people keeps you young.
Our listeners would be fascinated to understand what
your sort of day looks like. It depends where I am.
I mean, inspiration can come from anywhere.
You've just got to be open to it and you never know when it's
going to strike next. I always think that in terms of
a starting point for a collection, the important thing
is never to try too hard. Because I think if you're going
to if you're going to design clothes that are easy to wear,
which hopefully Maximara clothes are, then they have to be easy
to design as well. And anything difficult about the
conception of them will show in the final, in the final product.
So the inspiration very often just happens wherever I happen
to be. So I mean, one example, I was
talking about Suffolk just now, but I was walking with a friend
through the Suffolk countryside, through the woods.
And we we came to Olbra and we stopped outside the house where
there was a blue plaque. And the, the blue plaque was to
commemorate the fact that Elizabeth Garrett had lived
there and she was, as you know, the the first lady mayor of
Obra. But more importantly, she, she
was, she founded the Garrett Hospital, I think the Garrett
wing of the. Hospital.
So I mean, she was a very important suffragette feminist.
And so that was the starting point for a a whole collection.
So you know, everything you do can inspire you or affect you or
influence you in some way, which is why it's so important to go
to the right places because wherever you go, you're going to
be affected. So make sure you go to the the
nicest or the best places. Yeah, I I always have thought
that as a designer, your eyes are like sponges.
You're just constantly absorbing and processing.
Yeah, so I, I've taught a lot and I've always said to the
students, you're a sponge and what comes out is what goes in.
So just be careful what you put in because it you know, it's,
it's all influences and they're all milling around in your head.
Sometimes you see something and you don't refer to it until
years later, or the relevance of it doesn't strike you until
years after you saw it. And sometimes you can revisit a
a theme. And do you take notes in a
notebook or sketch in a notebook, or do you take lots of
photos? Or is it a combination?
Well, like everyone, I take lots of photos these days and my
phone is, I mean, the number of photos we take now, now is, is
scary. In the old days we used to be
able to take 12 or 24 or 36 exposures at a time, but now we
can take 36 photographs in 5 minutes if we want to.
So my phone has got thousands and thousands of pictures.
I'd like to say that I kept a sketchbook, but I don't.
It all goes into my, into my head.
It's all it's all there mentally.
It's in in your head. It's one big boiling pot of
ideas all bubbling. Up.
I mean, as creative director, do you touch everything from roduct
to visuals to ad campaigns to even storefits?
Yes, I mean, that's all part of the part of the brief really,
because it's all part of the image of the product and the the
product. It works in the context of a
store. It works in the context of a
campaign of a show. It's all to do with the image of
the of the brand and the way people perceive it.
So it's very much in the remit of a creative director to be
interested in all of those things.
Fashion's going through a a very interesting time right now.
You know, we've got you at Max Mara for 38 years and then this
sort of plethora of other creative directors being sort of
moved around the chess board. Yes, musical chairs.
It is musical chairs. Yeah, I don't know how they do
it. I mean, I really sympathise with
them. I don't know how a designer,
because a creative director is a relatively new term.
I tend to think of myself as just an older designer, an old
designer if you like, no, stop it.
But but the creative directors who you know go to a new brand
and within a season they're expected to effect great
changes, very noticeable changes.
The danger being that the, the heritage of that brand is
damaged or if not destroyed and once it's gone, you can't get it
back. So you look at some brands where
there have been a series of creative directors chopping and
changing maybe 3 or 4 over the last 10 years.
What's left of the original DNA of that brand after all that
time? I mean, there are some shows now
where I, I, I can see the personality of the designer more
than I can see the personality of the brand.
And I don't know if that's a, a good thing or a bad thing.
But in terms of Max Mara, Max Mara will always be Max Mara
primarily, which is one of the reasons why I tend to be quite
low key about my job. And are you, are you happy to be
the the man behind the brand rather than at?
The yes, I've never taken a a bow at the end of a runway show
because why? Is that?
Because it would, it seems arrogant and unless every single
person in the company from the chairman to the to the to the
cleaning staff could come out with me and and take a take a
bow because they're the response responsible too, then obviously
not everyone can. So that's never going to happen.
And it would seem like an arrogance to take to take
responsibility for the for the whole thing or to to reap the
rewards of something which is ultimately A-Team effort.
Not just my current team, but all the people who've gone
before me to build the identity of that brand.
Yeah. That's that's fantastically
humble. I mean talking about the
identity of the brand, if I were to ask you what the style DNA of
Max Mara is in three words, what 3 words would those be?
Discreet glamour and elegance. But the the the important thing
is people think that Max Mara women want to be unobserved
because they turn up wearing camel.
But what's discreet or unobservable?
What don't you notice about a woman who walks into a room
dressed head to toe in camel? It's not because she doesn't
want to be noticed. She does.
She wants people to say wow, but she wants it to be a quiet vow.
And that's the reaction you get when you wear Maximara.
Love. That, I mean, over the years
you've obviously evolved the the brand codes and the brand DNAI
mean, what would you say is sort of your, the, the thing that
you're most proud of? Surviving in the fashion
industry for so long. Well, chapeau to that, because
it ain't. It ain't an easy one.
The, the thing that I'm really most proud of, seriously is
hopefully what I've done is I've enriched the heritage rather
than weaken it. You know, if I was talking about
other creative directors who've had the, you know, the dubious
honour of taking over a brand and, you know, doing what they
could within the shortest possible time.
You know, I had a long time to think about Max Murrow and what
it was before I was at the helm of the company and could make
those kind of decisions. So, you know, hopefully I've
made the right decision. So I'm going to leave that
heritage in an even stronger position than it was when I took
over. So the, you know, when I, when,
when I can, I visit our archive and remind myself where we've
come from. And I feel quite proud.
You know, I look back and think, well, I did this and I did that
and sometimes refer back to my own work because, you know, I
mean, I've been at Max Mara now for about 75 years, of Max Mara
this year. And I've been there for nearly
40. That's more than half Max Mara's
life. And Max Mara's been has been
part of my life for over well over half of my life.
Well, really, your entire adult life?
But it has. It has since I was 26.
So, so you know that that's, that's my, my proudest
achievement. I think of you know, what I'll
leave behind when it's finally time to, to stop, which is a
long way off yet because I, I feel I've got so much more to
say. In fact, in some ways I feel
like I'm just getting into the swing of things.
I'm just beginning to learn the ropes of the job.
Yeah. But I, I think that's a lovely
thing about this decade that we're both in, is that there is
a lot of that feeling like we've got all of this knowledge and
now it's about applying it in a new way.
And that's exciting. Yes.
I mean, I think the the keyword is elasticity.
You have to be elastic. And you're asking, you know,
what keeps you young. And that's one of the things you
have to try and work on is to, to not think in a standard way,
to always think in a corporate speak a little bit outside the
box and, and, and keep on being as elastic as possible, being as
open as possible to new ideas and use your experience, because
we do have experience to use your experience in the in the
wisest possible way. I think that that that that, you
know, one thing that that age age does have over youth in a
sense is is. Is the ability to apply your
experience in an effective kind of way, and while younger people
maybe have more energy, more mature people.
Have the ability to use that energy in a way that's more
effective and and waste less time.
And that's something that you learn over the years or the
decades. Work smarter.
Yes, but I'm not, I'm not saying that for for one moment that,
that, that, that more mature people or older people are more
effective than than younger people.
I mean, far from it. I think we've got we can all
learn all the time. From younger people.
Yeah, it's about staying inquisitive and interested,
isn't? It curious curiosity.
Curious. Yes.
I mean, what are you would you say you're most excited about?
And at the moment, if your skin feels like it's changed
overnight, you're not alone. What used to work suddenly
doesn't, and new concerns like fine lines, dark spots, or
breakouts appear. Our skin evolves and our
routines should too. Renew and Me creates
dermatologist designed, personalized treatments that
adapt monthly to your skin's needs.
Their advanced retinoid works 20 times harder than High Street
retinols to accelerate cellular renewal.
Smooth, fine lines, even skin tone and boost collagen, all
precisely dosed in a dermatologist approved formula.
Paired with a smart base cream tailored to your skin type, it
maximizes results while protecting your skin barrier.
Expect smoother, firmer, more radiant skin in as little as 12
weeks, all with ongoing guidance from their UK licensed
dermatology team. Start your consultation today
and get your first month of nightly active treatment for
just £4.99 with code SD Glow Well.
Every aspect of the the job is excites me, but the most
exciting thing is to work on a runway show and they, they are
exhausting. And my team and my great team I
have around me, they're they're, they're marvellous.
And but you know, doing a show really takes it out of
everybody. But I I always joke to them and
if I could I would do a show every single.
Week of the year somewhere in the world Glutton.
For I can't wait till the next one because, you know, doing a
show like that is, is, is such a pure expression of, of, of the
brand with no compromise at all in terms of proportion or, or
silhouette or, or it's a, it's a pure, such a pure statement.
And you don't get the opportunity to do that when
you're working on, on, on more, the more, more commercial
aspects of, of, of a collection. I mean, and there's nothing
wrong with that at all. I mean, commercial is not a, not
a dirty word to me at all. I've always believed that
fashion is by definition a commercial and and product is is
what we deal in. But when it comes to a show,
everything has to be in its purest form.
And I and I love that from and I love the image that we can
create using not just the clothes, but the casting and the
hair and the makeup, the music, the lighting to create a total
atmosphere. I think that shows have evolved
now into something like theatre. The only thing that we don't
have is a dialogue. It's like a play without words,
but it's but we can convey such nuanced emotion through the
runway now. And people are so susceptible to
it because of the fact that everybody can see runway runway
shows now as they happen or just after they happen on live feed
or, you know, on on catch up on YouTube.
So, you know, everybody's susceptible to that as an art
form. And it is a sort of contemporary
theatre about the way that we we feel as a culture.
Do you work with an external stylist on the show?
Who do you you know is there? Is there anyone else that comes
in to work on the show with you at?
The moment I'm working with Tony Goodman, who is one of I'm the
legendary Tony Goodman amazing, who I absolutely love.
And you need that. You need a reaction.
You need a person that you trust to say, you know, you ask them,
what do you think of this? And she'll tell me honestly what
she thinks of that. And I will filter it through and
Mull it over and process it and then either modify it or, or not
according to what I think. Or, you know, sometimes it takes
a few days for an idea to, to, to filter through.
But you know, I totally listen to what she says When, when,
when we're bouncing ideas off her.
And, and I've also in the past worked with Corinne Roydfelt,
who is another of fashion's LED. I've been very lucky.
I've worked with legendary people in, in fashion in terms
of stylist, but also, you know, photographers and models.
And Corinne was also like huge influence.
And the thing I got from her was Twytwad.
You know, Corinne has this wonderful French accent.
So I would, I would show something to her and I'd say,
and she would not look up. She'd be looking down on her
phone not noticing the model and say after 5 minutes I would say,
Corinne, what do you think of this?
And she'd be carrying, she'd say, I think it's Twytwad, which
means trying too hard. So now in my design team,
Twytwad is a word that we use for things that are too forced
or or or or or too stylised, trying too hard.
Not effortless. Not effortless, and so as I was
saying, everything should be effortless and should never look
difficult. I love that one.
One more question on on Max Mirror and then I promise I'll
I'll move on. But with the show, do all of
those pieces actually go into production, or are some of those
literally to illustrate the message?
Most of them go into production. I mean, in the old days we'd
moved from a position where the show was the icing on the cake
and not expected to be so commercial.
But now the show is. And it's a 2 edged sword in a
way, because now the, the runway show is a, is a project which
has quite an important commercial dimension too, in the
sense that, and that's why I don't think commercial's a dirty
word in the sense that, you know, it's, it's runway, but
we're also selling it. So whereas once most of the
pieces that were on the runway were there just for show, now
they're there for commercial reasons too.
Fascinating. And I mean, we're living in this
increasingly sort of non binary world.
And I just wondered where Max Mara is on that front because I
think of it as a sort of ultimately feminine brand that's
all about the woman. But I have seen quite a lot of
men wear it beautifully. And I just wondered where where
your thinking was? At well, I I find this very
amusing. People are constantly asking me,
you know, why we don't do menswear.
And you know, this phenomenon of, of men wearing Max Mara,
it's the first time it's ever happened.
As far as I know, in the whole history of, of, of, of fashion
that, that men have borrowed from the female wardrobe.
It's always been the other way around.
You know, women wearing boyfriend jackets or boyfriend
men's and the men's coats, which is where the Max Mara originally
came from. It was a was a the camel coat
was borrowed from the men's wardrobe, but now men are
borrowing them back. It's come full circle.
And it's not just younger men who are asking me when Max Mara
going to do menswear. My uncle, who's nearly 90, came
to visit me in Italy a few weeks ago.
And he was asking because he was saying that he, when he goes to
the Max Mara store with his wife, he, he would like
something that he could look at and, and try on.
So we should do menswear. And I was saying to him, Uncle,
you know, I mean, I don't think that, that the, that the Max
Mara would coat would translate in a way that would, that you
would feel comfortable wearing as a, as an older sort of man,
maybe on a younger skinnier guy, it, it works.
But maybe for you Uncle, it wouldn't.
Work. And so we went back to my flat
and I was, I had a few Max Mara coats I had made for myself in
my size and he tried one on and he just walked out the door with
it. That was it, that was it.
So men of all ages are asking for Max Mara menswear.
And is that ever a possibility? There's an ideological reason
why it's not, you know, if Max Mara has been there with a
mission to, to, to help women empower themselves over the
years. And I don't think that the, that
that struggle is over yet. I still think the glass ceiling
is in place. The women have risen to to great
heights. But you know that the the the
journey isn't quite over to sudden Max Burrow is one of the
things that women had that that men didn't have.
To suddenly give that to men as well would be taking the
advantage away. One of the few advantages that
women have. So I think that's an ideological
reason why for the time being, Max Mara won't be doing
menswear. And in the meantime, the only
person in the whole world who who has Max Mara menswear is the
man. I'm looking at.
Because I'm lucky enough I get the fabrics and I I go to to to
my tailor, Timothy Everest. So you.
Bring them. Bring them over.
Yes. And he, he makes my, he makes
my, my, my, my suits and my jackets.
And then I have another tailor called Jo Allen in, in Islington
who makes my duffel coats. So I get those beautiful sort of
cashmere duffel coats, double faced, double faced cashmere
duffel coats. Lovely, but you never have
anything made in Italy. No, I don't, ironically, apart
from a few apart. From a few coats that are in the
back of my wardrobe. But are they?
Those coats are more based on a Max Mara.
They're Max Mara sized up so or slightly modified and that's it
was one of those that my uncle went off with a few weeks ago.
I mean, I didn't intend for him to to run off with it at all.
I I, you know, I was quite surprised.
I felt too polite to say actually, I was going to have
you one made if you liked it, but he he was already gone by
that time. Oh, I love it.
I love it. Now today we are here to talk
about your personal style and so we're going on the style journey
together. I'd love you to talk me through
what you're wearing. I'm wearing my blazer, it's one
of my favourite jackets I've got.
I don't know, maybe 60 suits and jackets hanging in my wardrobe
made by the same guy. Timothy Everest in in grey
flannel. And I'm wearing a Brooks
Brothers shirts. I only wear Brooks Brothers
shirts and I've bemoaned the fact they've now got lycra in
them because I prefer them when they didn't.
So if anyone from Brooks Brothers is listening, if you
can do shirts without. Totally.
Without stretching them. And I'm wearing books by those
trousers and I'm wearing some trainers from Todd's.
And this is a kind of relaxed, relaxed day in London look, I
guess. But gold buttons on your blazer?
Gold buttons on the blazer, but they haven't got a Crest on
them. They're just, there's plain gold
buttons and, and over that I have my my cashmere duffel coat.
Your Max Mara. No Max Mara.
Spoke Timothy Everest. No, sorry, it wasn't Timothy.
Everest. No, that's Joe Allen.
Yeah, Joe Allen. Yeah, and my, my, my, my, my
style flourish is always a a pocket handkerchief.
Every day I have to have a pocket handkerchief.
I don't feel dressed without a pocket now.
I had read about that what what is the origins of the pocket
square? The pocket square is just a way
of personalising I actually really.
Nobody wears ties anymore, but I, I really enjoyed wearing them
because they're a way of, of adding a, a personal touch to
whatever you're wearing, particularly something that's
quite classic like a, a shirt and a jacket.
It's just something that can be, it can be quite classic or it
can be quite quaint to you can choose all sorts of patterns and
colours or you can harmonise or you can contrast.
But given that we don't wear ties anymore, not not even guys
in the city wear ties anymore. The pocket square is a way of
just personalizing things in the way that you could wear a piece
of jewellery or a scarf, or it's just something that that adds a
personal touch or a bit of whimsy.
And do you collect them on your travels?
I've got hundreds and hundreds and people sometimes send them
to me because they know that I love them.
So I've got a whole drawer full at home which occasionally my my
my my poor hard working housekeeper attempts to to to to
colour code and within a week they're all messed up again as I
go through but looking for the right one or sometimes not, not
being able to decide. Do you remember when you first
chose to wear a pocket square? No, I can't.
I can't review. It's like antediluvian.
I can't remember that far back. I've always worn them.
But you grew up in Derbyshire? Yes, I did.
Yes. And then went to Union
Manchester. Yes, I did.
But were you very aware of your parents style growing up?
My mother's I was very much aware and in fact I brought a
photograph today I which I found and this shows my my mother and
father. This is just glorious on their
wedding day. On their wedding day in 1957 and
my mother who's still alive and still wears Max Mara, as I say,
this is a dress that she made herself because she she couldn't
afford to to buy many clothes so.
It was a copy of a Balenciaga, but she copied the right things.
And there she is on her wedding day in 1957.
And, and she was, she was my first muse and, and still is
really. And she I spoke to her this
morning and and she always critiques me or she she tells me
exactly what was good or bad. About the last collection that I
did, wow. That's that's something.
But do you, do you remember that moment that you put first, put
something on as a as a child that you felt particularly
dapper in or felt just a bit? Yeah, yes, I do, I do.
And and her mother was involved because she made my brother and
I little Beetle suits. It was the 60s and we were, my
dad was working in London. He was a sort of executive in
the computer industry. In fact he was working in
Putney, just over the the Bridge.
He used to work for a company called ICL International
Computers Limited and we we were coming down to visit him for the
week while he was at work. And she made these little suits,
this grey flannel little shorts, beetle suits with no collar and
little red polar necks to match. And I felt so smart and so
dapper, but it was really snowy. So she said, well, you can't
because your legs will be cold. And I insisted on wearing mine
anyway, even though I was freezing cold.
Because, you know, and that's. Another thing I learned from
her, she always used to say you have to suffer to be beautiful
and. I.
And I always did. Were you wearing knee length
socks? Yes, I was wearing knee length
length socks and little little lace up shoes like a little like
a little Beatles boy with my my hair was cut in little Beatles.
But when did your passion for fashion get really ignited?
That would have been around in the late 70s when I was kind of
16/17/18, the latter years at school when I discovered I was
very bright at school. But at a certain point, I became
a little bit less interested in the academic side and more
interested in the, the club scene and, and the, the, the,
the punk scene, which was just happening in the 70s.
And I went from being an ideal student to being a rebel just
about overnight. And that's when I was driving my
poor parents absolutely mad. And as I fell into the, the punk
scene and the, the club scene and started wearing the most
outrageous outfits, which got more and more outrageous as we
moved into the late 70's, the early 80's, the new, what's
so-called new romantic scene? I mean, so-called, I, I hated
the word and we all hated the word new romantic because it, it
kind of dumbed down what was actually a very creative and
inspiring way of dressing. But some of my outfits were
bizarre to say the least, very flamboyant.
And my, my, my poor mum was taking down the, the curtains in
the, in the sitting room one day and I was at home for the
afternoon, about to go back to Manchester where I was at
college. So I was in, in Derbyshire and
she was taking down the curtains.
There was some gold, a gold brocade fabric.
And I said, Mum, are you, are you going to throw this away?
She said yes. Before she knew what I'd done.
I'd I'd made them in. I'd whisked them up on her
sewing machine. Like zip zip.
Zip, zip 4 seams and made like a little, a little suit and I, I,
I, I, I, I skipped down the the drive and caught the bus back to
Manchester to go clubbing that evening.
So that was a typical, a typical moment from those from those
years when they were so creative.
And that's when my, my interest in fashion really, really
manifested itself. Even though I was studying
architecture at the time. Not for long because I was very
quickly encouraged to leave architectural school and and and
and full became a full time clubber for a couple of years at
Pips in Manchester and then the Hacienda when it opened and that
it was a great time and then finally went back to college to
to study fashion. To much much to my parents
relief. I can remember sitting on a on a
park bench in Norwich with my mum, waiting for the train back
to Manchester again, my poor long-suffering mum, and
explaining to her that I was thinking of going back to what
was then Manchester Polytechnic to resume my studies in fashion.
And she was so relieved that I was going to do something
worthwhile. I think they were so worried
that I was going to end up just being an ageing club kid forever
do. You remember what you wore for
your first day at Fashion College.
I wore a blue leather suit. Had you made?
It yes, of course, yes. Everything I made, we, we always
made our clothes ourselves. I mean, I used to feel sorry for
people who, who had to buy their clothes from a shop because,
because I thought, you know, they, they didn't have the
creativity or the originality or the, OR the technical skills to
make their own. But hang on technical skills.
Blue leather suit? That's not straightforward.
How did you learn the sort of pattern cutting of that before
you were even at college? Well, I mean, it's not brain
surgery. I mean, to become a brain
surgeon, you know, you have to know what's happening inside
people's heads. But to make a jacket, all you
need to do is take an old jacket and take it apart and you can
see how it's cut and constructed.
And clothes are around us all the time.
You know, they're not, they're not hidden.
So it, it, it's quite easy to learn for yourself.
I discovered, you know, one of the reasons I went back to
college was because I thought there was some great technical
secret that I was going to be taught.
In fact, there wasn't. And I knew just about everything
already. I I just learned how to do it
with a little bit more finesse. And was that disappointing?
No, it wasn't. It wasn't disappointing at all.
Reassuring. It was reassuring, yes, because.
I mean, there's a lot to be said for doing something with
finesse. Although I knew how a sleeve was
set in or how a dart worked, you know, I learnt how to do it
accurately and I learnt the finer points of, of, of cutting
a pattern or, and even now, you know, as a, as a person who
designs, but I don't have to make the clothes myself, you
know, the ability to, to spot precisely what's wrong with
something. I mean, you know, a millimetre
here, a millimetre there makes all the difference.
So that's what I learnt when I was at Manchester.
And it was in my third year there that Ozzy Clark came along
as a tutor and he was the one that encouraged me to apply to
the Royal College of Art in London here.
And so he. Spotted your talent?
Yeah, he was. It was because of him that the
whole thing started. If if it hadn't been for him, I
would still have been up in Manchester clubbing away
probably. And then you came down to the
Royal College. Had your style evolved?
It had to. It had to because.
The. The, the, the, the shock head
punk look had to go eventually, which it gradually did.
And things become a lot, a lot tamer after 1985.
But we were still in the 80s. We still had five more years of
the 80s. So you know how that was an age
of great excess. And when I came down to London,
when in fact slightly before and during the holidays, I used to
work at Browns in South Malton Street.
So great credit to Joan Burstein who was, you know, one of the
big influences in my, in my style DNA life because I learnt
so much from her. And you know, my image when I
was working at Browns had had to change.
I still made my own clothes. But it was it that by this time
we were wearing, if you remember, it was all sort of
Paisley jacquard shirts and quite, quite, quite rich looking
Paisley prints and little tiny cashmere patterns.
But it was a. Still, a lot of hair and makeup
was going on. And were you still making most
of your own? Wardrobe.
Oh yes, I was. Yeah, yeah.
And. Where were you getting your
fabrics from? Well, in those days they used to
come from, from anywhere that I could find them, but Soho had a
lot of shop. I'd probably want leftover
fabrics from your from your from your house because they they
would, they would, they would sell designer off cuts or
remnants. So you I would use those or
things from the market. Or sometimes there were there
were old curtains, or old saris, or things from jumble sales.
Saris were great. Saris were great because the
fabrics were so opulent. Would you design something in
your head and then go and look for the fabrics, or would you
look for the fabrics and be inspired as to what you were
going to make? It would be the fabric that I
would start with the fabric and think what can I make from this?
But it had to be quick. I mean, shirts never had buttons
on them. I used to pin them shirt.
So if, if if if you moved uncomfortably during the day,
you'd scratch yourself because you didn't have you didn't have
buttons, the pins would scratch you.
And did you ever did you ever buy vintage at that stage?
I would buy it to adapt it. I never wore vintage as it was
as as as I bought it. In fact.
Do you remember when you used to buy really flared trousers from
the 70s? We tried to take them in.
But when you try and take in flared trousers, the tweak the
seams all twist around your legs.
Yeah. Remember that well.
I used to buy those from jumbo sales and things.
So yes, I was working at Browns by this start, this stage and I
was still making my own clothes and, and, and, and, and what
Brown's taught me was that even expensive designer clothes are
still commercial products. The 1st morning that I was
selling at Brown's I was working in the men's department first of
all, and a customer came in to try on a pair of Catherine
Hamlet trousers which I thought were great and he said I'll have
them. I nearly fainted because I just
didn't. It hadn't occurred to me that
people actually bought these clothes.
I just thought it was like a museum and.
Did Mrs. B ever see you in something and say, God, that is
really good, Ian? She did, she, no, she often did.
She often did and, and, and, and sometimes, in fact, when we were
doing the Elias store, she was the first, I mean, she was, she
was a pioneer in so, so many ways.
We were the first to have her as Dean Elias store in London and
she she wanted me to work in in the Elia store, but she thought
I had great legs. So she so she she wanted me to
wear the Elia leggings and so I did.
So I used to wear Elia leggings with a sort of you, you always
luckily in every collection, I didn't have to wear a body.
And she, they, they just did quite I know she he always did
sort of a little boxy sweater. So he used to wear a little boxy
sweater and these Elia leggings and, and wore them with doctor
Martins and, and and white socks and the customers loved it.
And I think she, she, she really, she had her finger right
on the button because she realised that, that because Elia
was such a new thing and it was so body conscious, she, she very
much felt that a lot of customers would trust the advice
of of a boy because there would be no element of sort of
jealousy there. She felt so, so I think I used
to be quite successful at selling a liar and it, and it
wasn't so easy, you know, because it would, it was so it
was so tight and body conscious. It was.
It was totally new. Yeah, and very expensive.
It was very, very, very expensive, but of course, and
you know, which didn't bother many Browns customers.
I mean, again, it was a big eye opener to me to see these
products bought as commercial products.
Now we've talked about your, how your style evolved, but if I was
to ask you, if you were could only dress in two brands, 1 High
Street and one designer or Taylor, which two would those
be? Well, Taylor has to be Timothy
Everest and, and the, the, the High Street brand would have to
be Uniqlo. And that's the only, that's the
only High Street brand that I do actually wear mostly went for,
you know, downtime when I'm, I'm, I'm very fortunate in
having a cottage cottage, a villa in Tuscany now.
So when I'm there, I wear Uniqlo and when I'm here in, in, in
Suffolk doing my slept in a hedge look, that's mostly stuff
from Uniqlo too. I think that it's it's well
designed and it's good value. It's good quality and it's kind
of quite anonymous. You can't tell where it comes
from. I don't like to wear things that
look obvious or with any kind of obvious design detail on them at
all. I don't like anything that you
could you could tell without looking at the label where it
comes from. Yeah, yeah.
Do you have a style icon for you personally?
Not for the Max Mara brand, but for you personally.
Well, I have to say my mum again.
I, I keep referring back to her, but you know, because I mean,
she is the, the, the, the, the person at the back of my mind
when I think about fashion. Because she's got strong views
on how you should dress or how does how does her influence?
Well, she did have strong views on how I should dress when I was
wearing her old curtains. And she, she, she would have
said anything but what he's wearing now.
And, and luckily she, she proves of the way that I, I, I dress
now, but I, I, I can't, I can't think of fashion in terms of you
say, you know, my own personal style icon, but I can't
differentiate between my style and Max Mara style.
I mean, after all these years, the two have conflated so far.
So it becomes impossible for me to, to do that.
So I'd say that she was the, the, the, the biggest influence
in terms of always being as smart as you can possibly be
when, when she was a teacher. I mean, everyone knows that
teachers her a reputation for being so shabby sometimes.
And she would always, although she was making her own clothes,
she'd always wear these these really smart pencil skirts and
she'd always wear heels, always heels and smart blouses and or
dresses that she'd made herself that were tightly belted.
And she always looked really well turned out and smart.
And that's been a huge influence.
But on top of that, there are all these other women I've met
over the years who in some way or another or some aspect of
have formed this kind of conglomerate image of, of, of of
a Max Mara woman composed of all these different composite parts.
And they're all there in the back of my mind of some kind of
schizophrenic conversation going on in my mind when I'm
designing. But so if I were to ask you to
describe your style DNA in three words, which three would you
choose? Tailored Anglo Italian if I can
use an extra word. Hopefully elegant.
I try, I try, I try for elegant. We'll sneak the Anglo Italian.
Even when I was a punk worker yes, tailored Anglo, Anglo,
Italian, elegant love that I you know, even when I was a punk, I
was I tried to be an elegant punk.
I hated I hated ugliness. So when I would see some some
goth funks on the King's Road and here we are in Chelsea, but
I reminded of those those Goths in the King's Road and I hated
the ugliness of some of their style.
I always wanted to a lightness and an elegance.
But so I would have thought that when New Romantics came in, that
that did have more lightness to it, didn't it?
It could have more lightness apart from the tons of makeup
that we wore and the hair, the tons of lacquer and hair.
You know, when people when people used to say to me, you
know, you look so much better without makeup.
I say the same thing to young people now.
And you know, at the time you can't see it, but you know, you
know, I probably did. But you know, the makeup and the
hair are all part of it. And and funnily enough, the the
inspiration for the last collection, Max Mara collection
sort of springs from the from revisiting that whole new
romantic period because it was all inspired by the 18th
century. And this this year I went back
to the Rococo after many years and revisited some of the the
looks that were the the first outfit that I ever made.
For example, was one of the the the key looks on my mood board
this year for the latest collection.
God, how lovely do you carry a handbag?
Yes, I do. What is it?
It's a Whitney bag. Of course it's a Whitney bag.
Max Mara's Whitney bag is, is, you know, I've got various sizes
and shapes at the moment. I've got a Whitney tote, which
is great. And it, it's a very
architectural bag. It was designed in, in
collaboration with Renzo Piano Building Workshop.
Oh, lovely. When we when we when we
sponsored the reopening of the Whitney downtown in New York for
the relocation down to the Meatpacking District in 2016, we
commemorated that with a collaboration with Renzo Piano
and that spawned the whole generation of bags.
And there are various shapes and sizes, but at the moment I've
got a brown Whitney bag that people very often stopped me and
asked where I got it from. I'm not, I'm not surprised.
It's so striking. Obviously we're in this era of
it bags being telephone numbers, sort of enough to buy a small
car. What's your view on that?
I don't really know if I should have a view or if I do have a
view. I mean, if people can afford it
and people want to spend their money that way, then I think
that anything that people buy should have alive, it should
work for them. You know, I hate to see money
wasted, but if if a material costs that much and the and the
manufacturer is that great, then then I don't I, I, I don't
resent anyone for for wearing it.
Max Mara clothes are renowned for not not being overpriced.
Absolutely no. And I, I wasn't referring to Max
Mara, but the, you know, there are some of the mega brands out
there that have massive margin in what they're doing from cost
price to selling price. Well, in terms of that massive
margins, I think every product has to, to merit what, what goes
into it. I, I don't believe in obscenely
inflated prices. And one of the, the, the things
about Max by which I've, I completely concur with is the, a
slightly democratic aspect of the product, which is that, you
know, it's within reach. Having said that, I'm conscious
that I've once nearly caused a Twitter storm on the Today
programme because I said that, you know, a teddy bear coat was
reasonably priced at €2000, which, which Today listeners
found totally outrageous because they, they presumably they're
very frugal and they would think that perhaps, you know, 100 lbs
would be, would be quite sufficient.
But, you know, the Max Bara philosophy has always been that
it's within reach from the days of the the founder, Akili
Maramotti. That was his idea.
You know, it wasn't designed for, in his words, princesses
and countesses. It was designed for what at the
time were the, in his words, the, the wives of the local
doctor or the local lawyer. And that was back in the 50s.
And he realised those were women were going to be the ones that
within 10 years they would, they would be a lawyer or a doctor
themselves or eventually a judge or the, the, the, the CEO of the
local health authority. So, you know, he, he, he foresaw
the the emergence of this class of women as being a major
economic force, but always felt that the clothes should be
within reach. Expensive, not cheap, but within
reach. And they last for so.
Long too. And they last for so long.
I mean you rarely find and Max bar a coat in a charity store
because they don't wear out. I I love that.
I really love that. Let's spin on to grooming.
Is that important to you? Haircuts, facials, any of that.
Yes, I I for a long time I, I used to come back to London to
get my hair cut and sometimes I'd come back only to get my
hair cut. With a specific Barber.
Yes, in Islington San O'Hare in Islington Taco at San O'Hare
would cut my hair and and now I've had to concede that I can't
come back every time my hair needs cutting.
But I have a a a a hairdresser in in Reggio Amelia.
But yes, grooming is terribly important.
But having said that, am I standing against?
Am I sitting against the light? Have I got hairs coming on my
ears or something? Not, not at all.
It's just it's a question I always ask and I'm always
fascinated by the answer. I mean tweakments, buttocks,
fillers, any of that. I, I, I, I've never done any of
those things, but I, I do believe in a, you know, daily, a
daily ritual as much as you can. I mean the the, the, the the
problem any any man over 45 or even younger will tell you is
men start to sprout hair from all over the place and that
becomes a a constant battle. Let.
Me tell you women do too. But if you wear glasses, it's so
hard to see them as well. Magnifying mirror.
Magnifying. I've got one of those but it's
always smudged so I can never actually see in the the the
image clearly. Oh, I.
Mean you talk about travel a lot because you're always on a
plane. Do you have a particular look
that you revert to to for travel?
Or is do you just seamlessly go from Italy to London to Shanghai
in your Brooks Brothers in? Your.
Timothy. Evost most of my travelling is
is to places that I already have a, a base.
So, so if it's here in London or Suffolk or in Spain, Italy, I
have places there. So I've got a wardrobe there.
But then everything ends up in the wrong place because you have
to travel in clothes. The ideal thing would be if they
gave you like a either if you could travel naked or if you
could just have this thing that you put on at the airport, which
is like a sort of bin bag that just covers you up so that you
don't have to take anything with you.
So everything stays in the correct place.
How do you remember what you've got?
Where or are you different personas?
In Spain to Italy to Suffolk to London.
Slightly different personas. That's slightly, but not not not
not. I mean, it'd be unusual to wear
a tailored suit in in Suffolk or in my, well, my Bay.
Maybe you could, but but they, they tend to overlap very much
so. And as I say, everything always
ends up in the wrong place anyway.
What luggage do you use? I I bought a set of Rimowa
luggage last year. I'm very happy with it.
Colour. Silver, the classic one.
Absolute classic. Is there anything that you feel
you've got an excessive amount of in your wardrobe?
Clothes. No.
So on that note, are you are you good at doing a wardrobe edit?
No, I'm not, I'm not. I'm very, I'm rubbish at it.
I can't edit and one of the the I've been through that phase now
where you try to travel light and edit.
Now I travel heavy and don't edit, so I take everything with
me that I might possibly need. And are you a planner or are you
a mood dresser? I, well, it, it doesn't make
much difference because wherever I happen to be, if I'm getting
up in the morning, I'm going to work there.
There are, there's the 60 jackets and suits.
I just choose one of them. Or if I'm in Suffolk, there they
are all the sweaters with all the elbows worn out.
Or if I'm in Marbella, it's all the, the beach wear and the
stripy shirts. So there isn't much, there isn't
much leeway within that for, for, for mood dressing.
That's my uniform for wherever I happen to be.
Yeah, yeah. Let's talk about sustainable
fashion. What's your approach to that?
Well, I think that one thing that people underestimate is how
the fashion industry as a whole is organising itself.
And that's really is the way forward.
And we, we, we hear about initiatives from individual
brands who tend to, to, to boast about the, whatever they're
doing, whether it's happens to be nylon made from recycled
bottles or whatever it is. And, or, or in our case, it's,
it's a wadding for pufferjack. It's made out of recycled
cashmere or, or camel. Those are individual initiatives
that won't solve anything on a industry wide basis or in the
long term. But what people aren't aware of
is that, you know, the industry is organising itself and there
are now norms which are becoming more and more stringent with
eventually, you know, huge fines for, for products which aren't
sustainable or can't be traced in some way.
And that is the future. I really believe in, in, in
industry based initiatives, but in terms of design and our
responsibilities now, I think it's important that we're
designing products which you have a life, whether whether
they're, you know, I was talking about Uniqlo.
Obviously I've got no interest in Uniqlo.
But you know, if if I had to come play High Street brands,
then I would choose the ones that you know, that don't over
design and the clothes can be used for years and years rather
than a brand which which makes gums which get thrown away after
one wear or two wears or maybe you don't even wear them at all.
They'll end up on landfill. And I think that is ethically
questionable. But how does the industry
control that? Because you know, I think the
Max Mara's of this world, yes, beautiful product made to last a
lifetime, all of that. But then we've got these
probably more fast fashion that they just want to pump out more
and more and more. Well, eventually they too will
have to sign up to these, to these initiatives, which which
mean that they will have to be able to certify where the fabric
comes from, how it was dyed, what dyes we used, if it, if
there's any kind of cultivation of any fibres, you know, what
the annual of the plant was fed on and where that comes from,
how it was transported. Eventually and and and hopefully
sooner rather than later, this thing will spread across the the
whole industry. But coming back to you, what do
you do with your clothes when you've had enough of them?
I never I never have enough of them, but it but if they become
so worn out to the point where I I can't even, you know, bear to
look at them anymore, or you you were saying earlier, what do you
have too many of in your wardrobe?
And I said clothes. But the second thing is moths I.
Have too many moths in my wardrobe so things do get moth
eaten sometimes. So.
That they get taken to the cleaners and then anything which
I can't wear anymore goes to the Max Mora archive, of course.
So there's a little section of the archive which is my old
clothes and not, not just recent ones too.
Have my old leather biker jackets in there and a few other
things from the 80s. Not the new Romantic Curtain
period, but from shortly after that they've all fit.
Ended up in the Maximo Archive. God, what a dreamy place to
visit. I mean, do you have a piece in
your wardrobe that means the most to you?
On a personal level, no. I, I, I, I I don't.
But again, well, it's in my niece's wardrobe now.
The first coat I ever designed for Max Mara, it's in her
wardrobe via again my mum. I gave it to her with the
prototype to her and then my sister stole it from her and
then my niece stole it from her. So it's in the third generation
now. So it's not in my wardrobe, it's
in, it's in hers. Can you describe it?
To me it's it's a collarless camel coat, so it wraps with a
belt with a slightly dropped sleeve and it's in wool cashmere
with patch pockets. It's very, very simple.
But it was a new proportion for the time and it stood the test
of time. It's a bit shabby now.
I mean the moths have been at it, but it but it's still
presentable. I mean, I really believe in
clothes and anything really designed.
Generally I think things have to be capable of being worn.
And I always say to whenever working with an architect on a
new project for a house or anything, I always say, you
know, I would like. This table or this room to to be
able to be to wear gracefully, and the same thing applies to
clothes. Same thing applies to people.
We should all we should all grow old gracefully and and the the
the signs of wear and tear should be worn like a a badge of
honour. Yes, right.
Let's spin on to some quick fire questions.
What fashion advice would you give your 20 year old self?
Leave off the curtains. What fashion or trend or era
would you most like to see make a comeback?
The 80s, because everything was totally original.
I mean, now we recycle, we recycle ideas.
Everyone owns everything, so the idea of originality is
different. So it was then in the 1980s,
everything that you saw in terms of fashion, culture, music, art
was totally new. And there was a there was a an
enormous excitement and energy around.
It's different today, but I would love to go back to that.
Fashion or beauty trend that you would consign to Room 101.
Botox. Your last impulse buy?
Whitney bag, but it was free anyway so I don't know if that
counts. That doesn't count views on
tattoos. I love one of the people, but
not too many. I think they have to be used in
moderation. I don't have any.
It's too late for me, I think. The grooming or well-being
treatment you couldn't give up. Well, I was talking about my
hairdresser in Islington Sano and I can't go to him regularly,
but occasionally when I'm back in London I just have to go and
see him. Hop in there.
Yes, high end or High Street. High end without question.
Savile Row or Levi's both double breasted or single breasted.
Double breasted Crocs, cute or puke?
Fuch. Sports Lux or Rock'n'roll?
Rock'n'roll. Cashmere or cotton?
Well. Cargoes or chinos?
Chinos for me, cargoes for the runway.
Trend or style? Style.
Colour or monochrome? Monochrome Camel.
Camel. I live in Camel Andy, don't
forget that. Print or plain.
Plain. Hoarder or editor?
Hoarder because I never throw anything away.
Charity shop or resale? Charity shop.
Budgie smugglers or board shorts?
I think you got the wrong person here.
I mean, most definitely board shorts.
And finally, traditional last question at the end of the day,
what do you or don't you wear in bed?
Don't at all. Fantastic, Ian, what a pleasure
to have this conversation with you.
Thank you for slipping over to Chelsea and spending this time
with me. It's been really, really
wonderful. It's a pleasure.
It's been really fun and I've really enjoyed it.
Thank you very much, Amanda. Thank you.