History Through Our Eyes: Sept. 28, 1964, fashion designer Mary Quant (2024)

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Mary Quant was already shaking up the fashion world when this photo was published in the Montreal Gazette on Sept. 28, 1964. That’s Quant on the right, wearing one of her own creations; on the left, a model wears another.

Quant had spoken at a press conference in Montreal the previously weekend, sponsored by Ogilvy’s.

“English designer Mary Quant, who rose to fashion fame with her highly successful and widely copied Chelsea look, thinks fashion rules were made to be broken,” the accompanying article began, and it was clear from its tone that our reporter was not entirely sure this was a good thing.

However, in Quant’s view, “by breaking a rule you automatically arrive at something different,” we wrote. The designer said that women should experiment with different looks, that it was wrong to think that only certain colours should be worn together, that one need not wear heels in the evening.

Our reportemphasized Quant’s youthful approach to fashion and her “girlish hairdo styled along the lines of the Beatles, whom she finds elegant.” (At the time, the Beatles’ long hair was highly controversial, and older people tended to detest it.) She was part of the Swinging Sixties scene in London, when the city was on the cutting edge of music and fashion.

Quant continued breaking rules. Some credit her with the invention of the mini-skirt, something she saw as liberating for women as it allowed freedom of movement. She also is associated with the patterned and colourful tights often worn with the skirts.

An exhibition about Mary Quant and her work is underway at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum until February.

Quant is 85.