Mary Quant, 1930-2023
Emily Zanotti
The name Dame Mary Quant may be unfamiliar to many on this side of the Atlantic, but her influence is everywhere Americans look, now that the warm summer months are approaching. The British fashion trailblazer, who died last week at the age of 93, pioneered a revolution in women’s clothing that embraced both postwar cultural upheaval and the advent of street style.
In short, quite literally, the world now mourns the woman who popularized the miniskirt, as well as the other iconic Mod trends from Britain’s “Swinging Sixties.”
AIR AND THE PROFESSIONAL SPORT OF MARKETING
Born between the world wars to working-class parents in London, by the time she went to college, Quant knew she wanted to pursue fashion. Once she broke in, she was perpetually unsatisfied with background roles in the industry, first as a hatmaker’s apprentice and then as the owner of a boutique that largely sold clothing from other designers. Inspired by the women Quant saw on the streets of downtown London in the years following World War II, she began designing clean-lined, comfortable, and minimalist (but effortlessly chic) separates in bold colors, including the barely there skirts worn by women in cutting-edge British subcultures.
She refused to take credit for inventing any microscopic bottom, however, telling an interviewer in the 1960s that the credit belonged to those taking risks, wearing their audacious styles in London’s boutiques and cafes, especially in the relentlessly hip Chelsea district where models, actresses, and rock stars were frequently spotted.
She and her Chelsea boutique, Bazaar, however, were absolutely essential in democratizing the daring style, and by 1957, Quant had two locations for Bazaar and was on the verge of inking a deal with retailer J.C. Penney, which was, itself, democratizing fashion, offering cutting-edge British trends to American households through its catalog and, later, retail stores. Quant’s name experienced a surge in popularity just this year after Miu Miu and other high-end brands featured miniskirts in their 2023 spring/summer runway shows and micro-minis began appearing again on fashion influencers — the modern version of street-style queens.
In a way, it is that first catalog deal, which brought Mod styles to Americans hungry for their part of the “British invasion,” that also makes Quant the first designer to embrace the concept of “fast fashion,” which now makes street and runway styles immediately accessible and affordable to global consumers.
“Snobbery has gone out of fashion, and in our shops, you will find duchesses jostling with typists to buy the same dress,” she said of her business strategy.
To Quant, the miniskirt represented freedom and liberation, but also comfort — her clothes were a definite reaction to decades of structured dresses and heavy styles — as well as a political statement that she described as “arrogant, aggressive,” and most of all, “sexy.”
“I was making clothes which would let you run and dance and we would make them the length the customer wanted,” she told the Guardian in 1967. “I wore them very short and the customers would say, ‘shorter, shorter.’” And despite the obvious controversy and attendant complaints, Quant noted that customers “poured in” to buy her designs.
Quant was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire based on her contributions to fashion in 1966, and she was made a dame in the 2010s, well after she had solidified her legacy. None other than 1960s British fashion icon Twiggy led mourners in response to Quant’s passing.
“She revolutionized fashion and was a brilliant female entrepreneur,” Twiggy wrote on Instagram. “The 1960s would have never been the same without her.”
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Emily Zanotti is a writer and editor living in Nashville, Tennessee.