Vivienne Westwood’s private wardrobe goes below the hammer—with a nod to Keith Haring

The non-public wardrobe of the late trend icon, Vivienne Westwood, will go below the hammer at Christie’s this summer time, that includes clothes impressed by artists similar to Keith Haring. The sale is led by Westwood’s husband and design associate, Andreas Kronthaler; a part of the sale proceeds will go in the direction of Westwood’s personal charity (The Vivienne Basis), Amnesty Worldwide and Médecins Sans Frontières.

Vivienne Westwood: The Private Assortment can be offered at two auctions: a stay sale happening in London on 25 June and a web-based public sale (14-28 June). Greater than 200 heaps, together with jewelry and equipment, have been consigned, spanning 4 a long time. The objects will go on view at Christie’s headquarters in London in a free exhibition (14-24 June).

“One of many earliest collections by Westwood, Witches, autumn/winter 1983/84, was impressed partly by witchcraft and Keith Haring’s graphic code of magic symbols,” a Christie’s assertion says. Writing within the Monetary Instances, Alexander Fury says: “Establishments worldwide will likely be preventing over objects from landmark collections similar to Harris Tweed (autumn/winter 1987), by which Westwood reintroduced the corset, and On Liberty (autumn/winter 1994), by which she reinvented the bustle.”

As a part of a posthumously-launched venture by Westwood to boost funds for the environmental charity Greenpeace, the designer created a collection of prints in ten portfolios primarily based on taking part in playing cards she designed. The primary set of prints, offered in a linen-covered hand-embroidered field, can be provided at public sale as a part of the stay sale (The Massive Image–Vivienne’s Taking part in Playing cards, est £30,000-£50,000).

Westwood died December 2022. Within the obituary for The Artwork Newspaper, Jane Mulvagh wrote of Westwood’s inventive inspirations: “[She] spun Kolman Helmschmid’s early Sixteenth-century swimsuit of armour right into a Harris tweed jacket padded with armoured panels, printed Boucher’s putti from Venus and Vulcan (1754) throughout corsets and raincoats, and used Keith Haring’s New York subway graffiti of 1980-81 on cotton streetwear”.

Mulvagh additionally stated: “It’s little marvel that crowds snake across the block to see her museum retrospectives, together with the present placed on on the Victoria and Albert Museum, in London, in 2004, earlier than it toured the world. It’s no marvel that her classic items value hundreds of kilos.”