The Chelsea Girl
By Jessica Graham
BELIEVE it or not, King’s Road during the 1960s was home to one of the most influential fashion movements in London. It was where you found the most beautiful clothing that you had ever seen. What was once fresh and representative of freedom during the challenging 1960s, is now all about commerce and real estate.
Chelsea was once the home of the fashion evolution that really mattered, and birthed both punk and postpunk. King’s Road was filled with hippies and mini-skirts which became so popular it heralded a movement both politically and socially. Then came Led Zeppelin whose record label was based on King’s Road, and even Starbucks, which opened its first branch in 1998 at 123 King’s Road. These were the times that truly symbolized the beginning of making a difference. And it created an attitude. Being a Chelsea Girl symbolized something extremely powerful for the youth at the time, but still somehow manages to ring a similar bell today, only with more power than ever before.
It all started with Mary Quant’s founding of the world’s first independent fashion boutique in 1955. She and her miniskirts, along with Anello & Davide and their Chelsea boots, played a huge role in the pop and fashion revolution which created the image of “swinging London”. This first fashion revolution shook the fashion and entertainment businesses at the same time as the Beatles and other British invaders were making their mark. Then designers such as Dior had to acknowledge the rulers of the market, teenagers, and give their businesses a revamp. This is where Quant came along with her husband, Alexander Plunket Green. Green was well-known for his style which included pajama tops and slim-fit trousers. Quant opened her shop, Bazaar, which continued the trend created by Balenciaga seven years earlier; the skirt above the knee. This was so bizarre for its time, and really represented the colorful group of fashion forward thinkers who would anger the elders and cause all sorts of cries in the street.
The Chelsea girl was a girl who flaunted new fashions and independence, causing all sorts of controversy and provoking her elders. This was also a time of miniskirts, peasant tops, flares and boy caps all of which still feel relevant today. Even still, the Chelsea girl never seems to disappear from the catwalk, and just this season, designers such as Christian Dior emphasized the 1970s mid-punk, mid-hippies period with leather berets, and coordinated velvet suits and denim jumpsuits. While designers such as Miuccia Prada and Mulberry displayed a more flamboyant take on the era, with retro graphics, browns and oranges and structured jackets. Then there’s Gucci, which can’t seem to get enough of the salute to the 1970s, by creating clunky oversized sparkling glasses and geometric suits every season since the reign of Alessandro Michele.
Now, the King’s Road & Sloane Street is home to luxury high fashion brands like Louis Vuitton or La Perla. A store employee from the Sloane Street Zadig & Voltaire describes her customers as, “mostly regulars from the area who are very educated and very friendly.” She goes on to say that the most popular item that these Chelsea Girls are buying is a t-shirt, which prices start at £80.
The difference between the powerful revolution of the Chelsea girl in the 1960s and the Chelsea girl of today, is her worth. According to April’s WWD, marketing expert Pam Danziger believes that by 2035, millennials will have the potential to become the largest spending generation in history. The most exquisite high fashion garments today are made for the upper-class millennials, such as Chelsea Girls, because of their social media superpowers and expensive tastes.
The modern rich kids of Chelsea may not be revolutionaries, nor are they even close really. They are simply children born and bred from wealth, elitists who have the power to use their clothes for political beliefs that can cause controversy. Uncertainty in politics or society is what pushes youth into fashion, to provoke and disrupt. And with the help of fashion, their message is highly visible and used as a tool of protest.
