Now for something a little bit different, and a post I have been so excited for over the past few weeks. Simon Preen is a London College of Fashion graduate who’s name and collection are deservedly taking off right now. With Jessie J rocking Simon’s look at the MOBO’s, MTV’s Video Music Award AND on last night’s X Factor, Simon has also created her latest tour outfits. On top of this the young London based designer has also been hyped by Disorder magazine and created a collaborative collection for Urban Outfitters.
After falling in love with Simon’s fearless futurist East London warrior looks I decided to get in touch, so here we have it, hannabytes first ever interview with the man himself alongside the stunning new images for his latest collection.
Firstly massive credit to you for the MOBO’s exposure, how does it feel to see Jessie J in your garments?
It’s really great, that particular outfit was something I was asked to design for Jessie especially for her performance on the night. Jessie has been wearing my stuff regularly over the last 6 months, she apparently loves what I do and I have just finished making all the costumes for her UK Tour. It’s fantastic to build a kind of a professional/style relationship with a young, current artist of her calibre; and especially one whose image fits perfectly with my brand.
If you could have anybody as the face of your brand who would you choose and why?
Im finding it really hard to choose – I would have to make this campaign a story with more that one character – really 90’s – strong women. Sandra Bernhard and Polly Harvey, I’ve never thought about this until now but they could totally be sisters. Polly Harvey is the ultimate woman, if you have never watched any Sandra Bernhard solo stuff you should see ‘Without You I’m Nothing’ it’s one of the cleverest comedy performances I’ve seen. Rose McGowan and maybe Winona Ryder too just for the iconic roles they have played in some of my favourite movies. Those 4 all together would be a dream of a campaign to me. It would be good to get Janet Street Porter in there somehow – she is another icon of mine – i’m sure she wouldn’t want to have anything to do with it but it would be good to ask, even if just for her to tell me to fuck off.
How about a sale space, what would a Simon Preen store look like and if it could be anywhere in the world where would it be?
I would definitely like a flagship store in London, maybe in Soho, that would give me an excuse to leave East London once in a while and I like a wander into Soho of a weekday. It would be an illuminated black box with a strict music policy.
Who were your biggest influences when you first started realising fashion was something you wanted to be a part of, are they still important to you now?
I’m influenced by whatever is going on around me and I always have been since I first took an interest in fashion – I rely on instinct but obviously there is a dark pull towards what I like in style – music is always more of an influence to what I do than what the rest of what is going on in fashion ever is.
As a student, like many of my followers, what tips could you share about taking the most out of university?
Well, I may not be the best example as I was a terrible student; I never went to class and when I did I just sat outside smoking and drinking coffee all day, the lecturer would just pass by every hour or so and be like “you still here!” – they never really got on at us about it. Although I didn’t really know my lecturers very well I bumped into one recently (he remembered me, to my surprise) and he said they always knew I’d do something interesting, which is nice to know. I passed my degree, not with the best honours but I don’t think that matters and nobody has ever asked me about it since I graduated. Everyone does the university thing in their own way, don’t fret about it, that’s the only advice I could give.
How did you go about making the transition from student to independent designer, did internships help you to get to where you are today?
I did a few internships and most were not that helpful but then I went to work for Pam Hogg which proved to be an invaluable experience. Pam had just returned to fashion after a ten year hiatus and it was the run up to her first show in London Fashion Week since the break, it was a pretty small operation and that meant that I got to know her really well as a person and see every angle of the business at a scale that I could understand. It was that experience as a whole, which ultimately gave me that confidence that I could do it myself, and that was when I decided to start working on my own label for real.
Following your collection for Urban Outfitters are there any other brand you’d like to collaborate with, whether fashion or otherwise?
I don’t know about other brands in fashion or otherwise, I never really look at any brand and think of it in those kind of terms. I would like to work on more music videos and movies – more film and photographic projects.
Outside of the online world of blogs and webpages, what excites your sartorial senses and inspires your creativity?
As I mentioned before music is a huge inspiration to me, I co-run a club night in east London called Reeperbahn, it’s a cold wave/synth party, the crowd it attracts are quite inspiring style-wise, very new wave, minimal, goth. It’s hard to say where exactly my inspirations come from sometimes because I don’t make mood boards, and I can’t ever focus my ideas in my head, I just try and read as much as I can (currently reading Janet Street Porters ‘Life’s Too Fucking Short’ – it’ great) and take in as much culture as time will allow and things just come together – I don’t even decide on the name or the theme of the collection is until its finished – maybe that’s because of the gaps in my education through not going to class.
And finally, what can we hope to see from you in the near future?
I have promised a menswear collection, which I am working on but the release has had to be put back because of issues with time and the fact that I am still a really small operation. I am planning from here on to produce smaller collections, more often, I’m not sure that I like the way fashion works, and I feel some big changes are due. Look at London Fashion Week, I don’t really know much about the fashion industry as such but it seems like it’s totally screwed, but maybe that’s actually a good thing, I like to think so.
A great interview, so a huge thanks to Simon and I really hope you enjoyed the blog post. I think we can expect to see a lot more from this great young British talent. You can check out more and hit up some of the amazing new pieces check the links below. Personally i’m saving up for the purple mesh skirted dress, perfect for the Warehouse Project in a few weeks.
