This virtuoso fashion illustrator was designing fur coats at age nine – a few years on and he’s mastered the art of making a few simple, definite lines reveal more than a camera ever could.
What are the best and worst aspects of what you do?
The small sense of ownership evoked by capturing what interests or inspires me in visual form is extremely satisfying. I’m a magpie by nature – it’s like a type of collecting.
The successful translation of ideas, in all their vivid clarity, into reality is endlessly frustrating: there will never be enough time, apparently.
What’s hanging on your walls?
Rather a mix, as I’m between moves. Three postcards from a charity shop: a 1970’s view of Manhattan from the Empire State Building at dusk; a flock of flamingos by an African lake and one of Mount Everest. Also present: a picture of Terry De Gunzburg’s New York apartment from W Magazine, a colour photocopy of some zebra print ponyskin and one of my drawings of a dining room from a recent issue of Elle Décor Italia. Another drawing, from a Celine collection, has fallen down behind my bed.
How did your interest in fashion illustration arise?
I always loved drawing clothes as a child – I still have fur coat designs from when I was nine – and I think I’ve always been concerned with quite particular concepts of style. Trying to realise these on paper remains at the root of my interest. I remember too, seeing the Kenneth Paul Block portrait of Lee Radziwill for the first time and realising how powerful an illustration could be: just a few, basic lines can highlight notes invisible to a camera.
What are you working on right now?
A new scrapbook – I’m forever tearing things out of magazines so I’ve always got one on the go. They’ve become an archive of personal reference, influencing my own ideas and designs. The idea initially was to save space too, but they’re piling up as quickly as the magazines used to. I’m going to have to start scrapbooking the scrapbooks.
Tell us a trade secret.
I don’t know any… rather than resorting to idle gossip, the phrase ‘just keep drawing’ is one I can attest to as sound advice.
What have been the best and worst reactions to your work?
All positive reactions are the best. The worst was a tutor at university who commented that it was a shame all my work was traced. I don’t trace.
Are you conscious of, or do you try to cultivate, a particular drawing style in your work? What role does style play in fashion illustration?
I’m more aware of own style now than I used to be, so I feel I’m more comfortable with it, though I like to think it hasn’t settled into a definite groove entirely and that there’s more I could add to it.
Style does play a role in fashion illustration but often to the detriment of the subject matter – things can get lost in too much reinterpretation.
Tell us about the piece of work you’re most proud of.
I’m quite inordinately proud of a particular sketchbook of drawings I did on holiday when I was nineteen or so. It was the annual family trip to Brittany; every time I look through them I’m transported back so vividly. I try to draw as much as I can when travelling, entirely for this reason. Often you don’t realise what you’re seeing until you’ve moved on.
What’s the biggest challenge of working in the way that you do?
Not to compete with photography. In hindsight, my favourite works are the more spontaneous and loose, rather than those where I’ve gotten caught up trying to mimic the image too closely.
If you could collaborate with anyone, who would it be?
I recently saw the Dries Van Noten retrospective in Paris, which was exquisite. His work is so wonderful to draw and also quite illustrative in its own way: full of narrative. Likewise, with designers such as Nicolas Ghesquiere and Miuccia Prada – they really capture my imagination as their work contains such a wealth of ideas. Jean Philippe Delhomme is a constant inspiration too; I’d like to just visit his studio.
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