Philip Treacy
Philip Treacy
Philip Treacy OBEis an Irish milliner and designer based in London...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionDesigner
Date of Birth26 May 1967
CountryIreland
design hats imagining kept love majesty minds
What I love most about Her Majesty is that she has kept hats alive in people's minds for more than 60 years. You can't think of her without imagining her with a hat or a crown. I would, of course, love to design one for her.
Hats are really for ultimate occasions, so when I make one, I try to do something different, something noticeable.
attend life occasions royals twice ultimate worn
Hats are for life's ultimate moments. They're worn at races, at weddings. Occasions many of us, who aren't royals and celebrities, only attend once or twice in a lifetime.
attached best hats lives people special
Hats are attached to special moments in people's lives - weddings, or the races. In difficult times, people still get married; they still want to look their best.
bringing develop either fruition gives laborious love people tactile
Hat-making is laborious and time-consuming. It's a very tactile medium, and you can develop the skills, but it's one of those things: you either have it, or you don't. I love bringing something to fruition with my hands that gives people pleasure.
gain sort
I was just, as a child, very different from the others, and didn't really care what they thought because you know, a child doesn't really have inhibitions; you sort of gain your inhibitions later.
enduring grew local sand west year
I grew up in the west of Ireland, and Galway was our local seaside resort. We'd go for one day of the year during the summer, and I have enduring memories of the sand and the sea.
allowed fabric fascinated feed joining needle sewing
My mother had a sewing machine. I was never allowed to use it, but I was so fascinated by this little needle going up and down joining fabric together that I'd use it when my mother went out to feed the chickens.
people
People are dressing like stars, which is kind of fantastic.
buy
People, when they buy a hat, they can't explain why they want to buy it or why they want it, but they do. It's like chocolate.
best error trial until
Try on 100 different hats if you can, until you find the one that suits you best. It's a trial and error thing.
architecture balancing designing wearing
There's a technicality to designing and wearing hats. A hat is balancing the proportions of your face; it's like architecture or mathematics.
classic elizabeth epitome excess forties image major taylor ultimate worked
The classic hat image was during the Forties and Fifties, and Elizabeth Taylor was the epitome of that; she was the ultimate celebrity of excess and glamour, and she worked major sun hats.
came conformist people
Not long ago, a hat was a conformist accessory. Then the 1960s came along, and young people didn't want to wear hats.