Rebel: 30 Years of London Fashion – Design Museum

London adventures with Ali Clifford and Ruth Eaton

We strolled up towards Kensington High Street from Earls Court and are thoroughly recommending spending time in the ‘Rebel: 30 Years of London Fashion’ exhibition at the Design Museum.

As both of us are touchy-feely designers, it was a total privilege to be invited to get our hands on fabrics from Feben’s 2023 satin Red Twist dress and Richard Quinn’s 2018 rustly foil frock (see instagram stories for the ‘sound on’ experience).

The British Fashion Council

This exhibit celebrates the British Fashion Council’s @britishfashioncouncil influential NewGen programme, which has been instrumental in launching many promising careers in the fashion industry. It’s a delight to discover and enjoy the work of over 100 of these original fashion talents and change-makers.

Guest-curated by BFC Ambassador for Emerging Talent Sarah Mower MBE and co-curated by Design Museum Senior Curator Rebecca Lewin. Rebel: 30 Years of London Fashion comes to a close on February 11th 2024. (sponsored by @alexandermcqueen).

I will definitely find time to share some more on this next week, Faustine Steinmetz needs a post all of their own! However if you get a chance to book in, Sarah Mower will be at the Design Museum for an impromptu tour Friday 9th at 11am and Saturday 10th at 12 midday. (@sarahmower_ on instagram)

Interesting to see the iconic swan dress worn by Björk at the 2001 Oscars, created by Marjan Pejoski, prominently showcased in the exhibition on the way to the CLUB … that was fun, great music Brown Paper Bag by Roni Size & Reprazent, also shazammed Life on Venus (Trey Mirror Remix) by Awkward Moments) and Replay Silence by Elektrostyle to save you doing it…

Grab your tickets here via designmuseum.org.uk. #RebelFashion

Further listening

Over on the Design Museum podcast episode – ‘On Learning and Teaching: Evolving Fashion’. Orsola de Castro guides a conversation with NEWGEN star designer Kazna Asker, professor and designer Nabil El-Nayal, and enterprise manager Gracie Sutton who discuss how fashion industry professionals learn, unlearn, produce and share knowledge, and how fashion education syllabuses and systems operate and evolve. Listen to the episode in full via Spotify here.

With thanks to Ruth Eaton for the photographs, I took a LOT of video which you’ll find over on my instagram reels here.

Sign up to my emails

I’ll share more on Molly Goddard’s shockingly blue, seven-tiered tulle dress too… so make sure to subscribe to my emails to see that mega frock floating proudly above the ‘Art School’ section, under which the designer looks back at her days as a student: ‘I remember my tutor Sarah Gresty saying, “Just go bigger, explore!” It was very much fun, realising there was no kind of limit.’