Next Of Quinn

After That Instagram-breaking Front-row Moment Last Year (Featuring The Queen), Richard Quinn Has Catapulted Onto The Fashion Industry’s Radar. As His Moncler Genius Collaboration Drops, Elle Gets Acquainted With London’s Rising Star

- Grace O’Neill

THERE ARE MYRIAD ways to get your fashion brand noticed. Maybe Rihanna wears one of your designs, or an influential Instagrammer posts about you. But having the Queen attend your fashion show has to be up there among the most significant endorsements going. “Yeah, it’s kind of hard to top,” laughs Richard Quinn, the UK designer who found himself in this exact position last year when Her Majesty perched front row at his AW18-19 show. She was there to present the up-and-comer with the inaugural Queen Elizabeth II Award For British Design, and caused something of a social-media sensation in the process. To put it lightly, it made 28-year-old Quinn, a recent Central Saint Martins graduate, a household name.

Perhaps what was most striking about the Queen’s visit was the stark contrast between the immaculately put-together royal, in her powder-blue skirt-suit and gloves, and the comparatively casual Quinn. With his unbuttoned flannel shirt and baseball cap, you’d be forgiven for thinking the Queen’s presence took him by surprise (it didn’t). The runway show also contained decidedly un-royal elements. While statement florals, voluminous gowns and mix-and-matched scarf prints (all very Your Majesty) are part of the Quinn MO, so is sending models down the runway in what’s best described as botanical-printed gimp masks and lashings of latex. That Quinn stayed so true to his aesthetic in the presence of royalty only went to cement the fashion industry’s fascination with him. Alexander McQueen comparisons — and there have been some – aren’t entirely hyperbolic.