The Pop Corporation

Born in a Derbyshire village in 1941, little did the residents of the High Peak village know that a legend had been born. Vivienne Westwood left Tintwistle for the big smoke to attend art school, but she only lasted one term, because frankly, formal training wasn’t needed for what she was about to give the world.

Self-taught is a fancy way of saying Do It Yourself, and while the punks have always been lauded for writing snotty songs with as few chords as possible, there’s something magical about a young woman turning fashion on it’s head with a head full of ideas, the will to do it, and a pure love of how clothes could look. As a teenager, Westwood followed patterns and took apart secondhand clothes and rebuilt them. It’s doing her a disservice to say that she simply destroyed to remake – she wanted to understand the cuts and construction of garments, so she could twist seams out of shape, and make things hang more uniquely from a person’s frame.

Of course, Vivienne will forever be associated with UK Punk, given that she made a name for herself at a number of boutiques at 430 Kings Road in London. SEX was born from Let It Rock, and alongside Malcolm McLaren, she produced clothes that were daring, exciting, influential and playful. A thick line had been drawn in the dirt for Post War culture.

It wasn’t just one-trick punk ponying though – while many of the scene floundered, Westwood grew and expanded, never satisfied to sit still. A huge influence on the New Romantics, Dame Vivienne blurred the line between fashion, music, visual art, politics and anything else she put her formidable mind to. She became internationally known. A working class woman who never lost her accent or her attitude, a revolution in design and form.

Ever the imp, collecting some gong from Queen Elizabeth II, she went in a glorious outfit but also, without pants, twirling for photographers and looking better than she’d imagined when the images were splashed across the papers: “I wished to show off my outfit by twirling the skirt. It did not occur to me that, as the photographers were practically on their knees, the result would be more glamorous than I expected.”

Walking to her own beat, Westwood always had a vibrant idea. Want to protest against fracking? Drive a literal tank to David Cameron’s house. Campaign for anti-consumerism and preempt the criticism of contributing to people spending too much money on stuff? Undermine your own business: “I just tell people, stop buying clothes. Why not protect this gift of life while we have it? I don’t take the attitude that destruction is inevitable. Some of us would like to stop that and help people survive.”

“I don’t feel comfortable defending my clothes. But if you’ve got the money to afford them, then buy something from me. Just don’t buy too much.”

She also created a manifesto called Active Resistance to Propaganda which looked at art in relation to climate change. In her manifesto, she claimed that it “penetrates to the root of the human predicament and offers the underlying solution. We have the choice to become more cultivated and therefore more human – or by muddling along as usual we shall remain the destructive and self-destroying animal, the victim of our own cleverness.”

Naturally, musicians were drawn to Viv, from the ’70s to present day. We know about the punks getting dressed by her, but remember Pharrell’s massive hat? That was Vivienne. Other artists include FKA Twigs, Madonna, Harry Styles, Lady GaGa, Olivia Rodrigo, Adele, Lana Del Rey… the list is long and achingly current.

And while so many boring people simply want to break a thing to see what happens, there was always more to Vivienne Westwood. She said of punk: “It changed the way people looked. I was messianic about punk, seeing if one could put a spoke in the system in some way. I realised there was no subversion without ideas. It’s not enough to want to destroy everything.”

Ever wondered why Adam Ant looked so utterly gorgeous?

From the thrilling cuts during Punk, to the lampooning and elegance of her Pirates collection which looked toward French aristocracy and the upper classes, to using Victorian styles, to forcibly pushing women’s sexuality to the fore and tohellwithit, using witches as a source of inspiration, to the climate… it’s little wonder that Westwood’s popularity never really waned, and that her work has been the subject of many, many major museum retrospectives.

Effortlessly individual, never dull, never grey, Westwood died “peacefully, surrounded by her family” in Clapham, aged 81. In a short statement: “The world needs people like Vivienne to make a change for the better.”

A counter culture icon. A pop-culture legend. Unique. Controversial. Not always right, but never a bore. RIP.