“Fraîcheur is taken from my 2025 ‘The Curve: Constantin, Azzedine, Thierry, Claude’ collection. This collection is based upon my fascination with Brancusi and his sculptural genius. My love of his art is combined with an exploration of my prior collaborations with the giants of Parisian fashion. Fraîcheur is an ode to my artistic process with Azzedine Alaia. It references the toile as a hat as the hat is a literal toile; whilst the sweeping fabric used across the top is a vintage Alaia fabric used in one of his 90s shows. It is both old and new and a perfect tribute to this collaboration that still lives in my memory. This piece is testament to sustainability in principle, design and material making it perfect for this exhibition.
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“Having been a milliner for almost 50 years now, I think sustainability is a process that needs to be valued.
To me this process means to be evolving the way my team works and designing to encompass a new way forward. In our studio we have a vault of materials from my many years working and we always dip into this vault every season to ensure we can make use of the fabrics we have available. Not only this but for our SS25 collection we hand dyed our hats in the studio to ensure it was not outsourced and each piece was as unique as possible.
I have a trusted team who always find innovative ways to make sure our hats are sustainable, and we have the least waste possible. I am learning new tricks everyday and the possibilities of the future of hats and sustainability excites me greatly!
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Born in Cheshire, and schooled in Liverpool, Stephen Jones burst on to the London fashion scene during its explosion of street style in the late seventies. By day, he was a student at St Martins; after dark he was one of that era's uncompromising style-blazers at the legendary Blitz nightclub - always crowned with a striking hat of his own idiosyncratic design.
By 1980, Jones had opened his first millinery salon in the heart of London's Covent Garden. Those premises soon became a place of pilgrimage and patronage, as everyone from rock stars to royalty, from Boy George to Diana, Princess of Wales, identified Jones as the milliner who would help them make arresting headlines. Forty years later, Jones's era-defining edge continues to attract a celebrity clientele which includes, Rihanna, Mick Jagger, and the Princesses.
Now, as ever, at the forefront of fashion, his beguiling hats routinely grace the most celebrated magazine covers and enliven window displays of the world's most stylish stores. From runways to race-courses, from pop-promos to royal garden parties, millinery by Stephen Jones adds the exclamation mark to every fashion statement.
