Vogue designer Vivienne Westwood dead at 81

British designer Vivienne Westwood, identified as fashion’s “high priestess of punk,” died on Thursday, December 29 at the age of 81.

Westwood’s namesake vogue house tweeted that she handed away “peacefully and surrounded by her family, in Clapham, South London.”

The model also shared the unfortunate news on Instagram, crafting, “Vivienne ongoing to do the matters she cherished, up until eventually the previous instant, planning, doing the job on her art, producing her ebook, and switching the globe for the much better. She led an wonderful existence. Her innovation and affect above the past 60 a long time has been immense and will carry on into the upcoming.”

Westwood’s a long time-long layout career began in the 1970s — shortly following she satisfied Malcom McLaren, who would go on to deal with the Intercourse Pistols. Collectively, Westwood and McLaren opened their popular Sex boutique on King’s Street in London, which sold provocative fetish-encouraged fashions befitting its title (of which it’d cycle by means of numerous in excess of the yrs).

“It transformed the way individuals seemed. I was messianic about punk, viewing if one particular could place a spoke in the process in some way. I realized there was no subversion without the need of thoughts. It is not plenty of to want to demolish almost everything,” Westwood the moment reported of her function.

She and McLaren started exhibiting their have collections in the early 1980s, mixing the edgy punk references they realized and loved with factors of new romanticism her now-signature corsets and the “mini-crini,” a shorter and captivating edition of the Victorian crinoline, exemplified this aesthetic.

And Westwood’s habits was as subversive as her style in 1992, she arrived at Buckingham Palace to get an an Buy of the British Empire (OBE) from the Queen, twirled for the cameras — and discovered she was going commando beneath her seemingly conservative skirt suit.

Though certainly eye-catching, Westwood’s creations — which have ranged from T-shirts printed with naked breasts to pirate hats — have sometimes sacrificed practicality for influence. Through her legendary 1993 “Anglomania” display, she despatched out models donning platform heels so perilously higher, Naomi Campbell famously took a tumble correct on the runway.

In much more new a long time, Westwood’s draped and corseted styles have turn into favorites of celebs together with Kim Kardashian, Bella Hadid, Dua Lipa, Hailey Baldwin and Olivia Rodrigo, to identify but a number of.

When Dita Von Teese married Marilyn Manson in 2006, she did so dressed in purple Westwood Princess Eugenie donned a few unique looks by the designer for Kate Middleton and Prince William’s royal wedding day in 2011.

A Vivienne Westwood wedding day dress was famously featured in the 2008 “Sex and the City” movie, with Sarah Jessica Parker’s Carrie Bradshaw deciding upon a voluminous strapless gown by the designer for her marriage ceremony to Chris Noth’s Mr. Major — and though not all viewers loved the bridal type, probably that was the position.

“The only cause I am in manner is to destroy the word ‘conformity’,” the flame-haired designer wrote in her 2014 biography. “Nothing is intriguing to me except if it’s obtained that ingredient.”