Philip Treacy (Q7739)
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
Philip Treacy is a fashion house from BOF.
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | Philip Treacy |
Philip Treacy is a fashion house from BOF. |
Statements
1999
shop assistant
Editor’s note: This collection was originally presented on February 26, 1997, in London, and has been digitized as part of Vogue Runway’s ongoing efforts to document historical fashion shows.The milliner Philip Treacy enjoyed out-of-the-box success. Before his 1990 graduation from London’s Royal College of Art he landed an internship with Stephen Jones. And not long after it, he was taken up by the stylist and fashion savant Isabella Blow, who wore one of his hats for her wedding. “The whimsy is highly sophisticated,” she once said of his chapeaux, and it was on a tip from Blow that Treacy was invited to create hats for Chanel in 1991; after that, the commissions never stopped coming.About a month after creating the toppers for Alexander McQueen’s debut at Givenchy haute couture for thespring 1997season, the much-in-demand Treacy staged his own madcap fashion show during the fall 1997 ready-to-wear season in London. His outing was presented at the Hippodrome nightclub in London on a cast abloom with English roses—Stella Tennant, Honor Fraser, Naomi Campbell, Iris Palmer, and Jodie Kidd, among them. They wore the hatter’s fantastical creations, which ranged from a sort of cubist fedora to an enveloping shell-like construction. “Each, as ever, was a work of art, in sometimes alien, often organic, form,” noted theEvening Standardat the time.These marvels were executed in all manner of materials, artificial and natural, including Treacy’s favored plumes. “I grew up with chickens, pheasants, and geese, so feathers are in my psyche,” the milliner toldVoguein 2013. “You can create incredible graphic shapes and lines, and that’s what hats are about. They’re all drawings–and I draw with feathers.”
2 January 2023
It was a scene. Packed into a kitsch pink Paris nightclub, the throngs of Philip Treacy fans—including Valentino and his entourage, the milliner’s muse, Isabella Blow, andherentourage—quaffed gin cocktails, posed for pictures and waited for the happening. Eventually, Naomi appeared with a can of Campbell’s soup on her head (get it?). It was punning and pop art all the way, as models took turns at a bit of amateur pole dancing while Treacy’s jokes quivered on their craniums.The homage to Warhol began with the literal: stacks of Brillo boxes, a banana, and 2-D-cutout images of Marilyn Monroe, Elvis, Liza Minnelli and Tina Chow. The show got funnier—and cleverer—as he stretched the idea to include a gallery of today’s pop icons: David Beckham, Kate Moss, Joan Collins and Calvin Klein’s pinup hunk Travis. There were moments of pure fashion fantasy, too, like a head completely submerged in a cloud of multicolored airborne butterflies, and a white feather poised on Alek Wek’s forehead like some unidentified jungle insect.But the show ended, as it began, in laughter, when Treacy sent out a doubly self-referential hat: a miniature version of the pink Plexiglas satellite frequently worn by Blow—complete with a photo of her attached to the hat. Across the room, naturally enough, the real-life Blow was sporting exactly the same thing.
21 January 2003
A look at any issue ofVoguefrom the 1950s makes it quite clear that hats were once essential accoutrements for any elegant woman. What a shame that modern fashion, in its obsession with efficiency and utilitarianism, has all but done away with these time-honored instruments of seduction. Enter Philip Treacy. With outstanding technique and originality, the Irish milliner is keeping his delicate craft alive and well, creating pieces that are nothing less than modern sculptures.Using extraordinary fabrics and embellishments such as black pearls from Tahiti, Asprey & Garrard diamonds and Yokohama chicken feathers, Treacy created perfect complements for the gowns that he borrowed from such designers as Valentino, Alexander McQueen and Olivier Theyskens. There were various plumed masterpieces of balance, an eye mask with curled feathers reminiscent of the Carnival of Venice, and an optical spiral ideal for an impromptu hypnosis session. A silver half-moon was elegantly poised on Erin O'Connor's forehead, a mantilla was crafted out of holographic lace, and a surrealist arrangement of feathers spelled out the word "Hat.""When a woman wears a hat, she feels like a million dollars," said Treacy after the show. "Hats are power."
9 July 2001