Victoria Grant: The United Kingdom's Haute Hat-Maker

All Images Credit Victoria Grant

Fashion’s shaken escaped of a fifty-year slump. Hats are hotter (and haut-er) present than ever before, and the creation of millinery has yet reared its well-dressed head. While Princess Diana is often credited with the hat’s resurgence successful popularity, appreciation indispensable spell to the British milliners who are, to this day, keeping the commercialized live and ceaselessly inventive. An icon among these artisans is “Mad Hatter” Victoria Grant, who sat with JustLuxe to sermon her work.

Established successful 2011, Victoria Grant is simply a British milliner who conjures wickedly theatrical hats arsenic if from bladed aerial — each she needs is the close occasion. She describes them, playfully, arsenic “almost one-offs”, arsenic immoderate of her pieces tin beryllium recovered sitting beauteous successful Harrods, but each 1 is inactive made-to-order. Even if you deigned to prime a portion from her catalogue (instead of booking a bespoke consultation with the Mad Hatter herself), it would inactive beryllium made from vintage materials on-hand astatine the time. Handcrafted and hand-dyed, this ensures not lone an ethical and sustainable accessory, but 1 that is wholly unique.

 WHO IS VICTORIA GRANT?

Credit_Anthony Lycett Photography

Victoria Grant’s communicative begins with her father, a subordinate of the Honourable Artillery Company and a Pikeman with the Pikeman & Musketeers. Involved successful regimental ceremonies and parades from the property of 18, her begetter had ever been an enthusiastic advocator of the British military. For Victoria, it was each astir the uniforms, “The exquisite fabrics and tassels, that richness of texture that you don’t rather get anymore - oh, and the golden buttons!” She reaches retired and rolls these phantom fabrics betwixt thumb and forefinger arsenic she talks. “And I’d ever loved trying connected my dad’s subject caps arsenic a child.”

In the aboriginal stages of her career, Victoria was a inferior stylist who benefitted from the mentorship (and computers) offered astatine the Portobello Business Centre. While doing a photoshoot inspired by the Pearly Kings and Queens — an iconic awesome of cockney civilization and London’s “other royals” — she bought a £5 flat-cap from Portobello Market and embroidered her grandmother’s pearl buttons onto them. From here, she discovered that hats were the lone canvas susceptible of satisfying her experimental spirit.

Self-trained, her archetypal large occurrence was astatine Michiko Koshino’s store successful Soho, wherever her madcap flat-caps were showcased. This was soon followed by her archetypal personage client, Annie Lennox, for whom she designed a patent leather trilby fedora. That aforesaid portion was displayed astatine the V&A’s “The House of Annie Lennox”, an accumulation exploring the costumes and accessories that shaped the popular star’s illustrious image.

Victoria Grand with Madonna

Now, Victoria invents internationally-beloved pieces for the likes of Beyonce, Dita Von Teese, and Madonna, successful that aforesaid country astatine the Portobello Business Centre — transformed into her idiosyncratic studio.

THE SIGNATURE KISS BERET

Victoria Grant is champion known for her signature Kiss Beret which, embellished with goose pointers and a glimmering crystal veil, was voted “Best Hat” astatine the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. It’s taken connected a fewer forms since then; the Leopard Kiss Beret was worn by a brooding, smoking, black-and-white Cara Delevigne for VOGUE Italia.

 THE LADIES’ TOP HAT

The Royal Ascot Millinery Collective lone allows creatives to enactment connected showcases each different year. Victoria Grant was capable to bash it for 2 years consecutively, and it’s each acknowledgment to the Ladies’ Top Hat. Combining a accepted silhouette with the flair of a fascinator, the Ladies’ Top Hat was specifically requested past twelvemonth successful an effort to marque the Royal Ascot much inclusive and up-to-date.

 CHAMPAGNE CONSULTATIONS WITH VICTORIA GRANT

Whether it’s a bridal veil oregon a enactment hat, a consultation with Victoria Grant is simply a ineffable affair. Patrons are invited to her Notting Hill atelier for a 40-60 infinitesimal session, lone to find themselves falling down a rabbit spread of champagne, strawberries, and sincere conversation. Victoria prides herself connected moving arsenic overmuch with a client’s property arsenic she does their look signifier and colorings. “A chapeau should ne'er deterioration you,” she explains, “So that solid of champagne lets maine tune into the quality and sensitivity of the idiosyncratic I’m with.” To her clients, then, Victoria is little the Mad Hatter and much a Fairy Godmother, fashioning magical, perfectly-suited pieces that — thankfully — don’t vanish astatine the changeable of midnight.

With her glamorous, provocative designs and a genuine affection for heritage, Victoria Grant is a cardinal subordinate successful millinery’s enduring appeal. For good implicit a decennary she has graced the heads of immoderate of the chicest figures successful fashion, proving that a classical ne'er goes retired of style. 

Article Written by Dea Jusufi