Vivienne westwood biography video walt

(1941-)

Who Is Vivienne Westwood?

Considered one of the most unconventional and outspoken fashion designers in the world, Vivienne Westwood rose to fame in the late 1970s when her early designs helped shape the look of the punk rock movement.

Early Years

Born Vivienne Isabel Swire on April 8, 1941, in the English town of Glossop in Derbyshire, Westwood came from humble beginnings.

Her father was a cobbler, while her mother helped the family keep ends meet by working at a local cotton mill.

At the age of 17, Westwood's family moved to Harrow in the country of Middlesex, where the future fashion icon found work at a local factory and eventually enrolled at a teacher training school.

As Westwood would later recall, her childhood years were far from London's high life.

"I lived in a part of the country that had grown up in the Industrial Revolution," she once said. "I didn't know about art galleries…I'd never seen an art book, never been to th