Books like Alexander McQueen — picked by fans

I have always wanted to dress like a Parisienne and there is no greater inspiration than Karl Lagerfeld’s in-house model.

He chose the French supermodel, designer, and perfumer as his muse because she bore an uncanny resemblance to Coco Chanel. This book inspired me to write my book and taught me that for the French, less is more. 

I think Dior has been my favourite designer since I studied fashion journalism at the London College of Fashion and discovered his iconic 1947 New Look.

I remember going to the Golden Age of Couture exhibition at the V&A in 2007 and being mesmerised by his designs - I now have one of the installations hanging on my dressing room wall.

This book captures the highlights of the museum’s 2019 exhibition Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams, which celebrated the House of Dior from its foundation in 1947 to the present day.

I went home determined to - one day - own a piece of Dior.

Being a Francophile, no book list would be complete without the House of Chanel, which is as renowned for its camellias as it is for its little black dresses and tweed suits.

Every page of this book, which has two achingly beautiful black and white camellias on the cover, is stunning and totally inspirational.

As a former journalist on Tatler and Vogue magazines, I was desperate to go and see the 2016 exhibition Vogue 100 at the National Portrait Gallery.

Not only was it a trip down memory lane but it included two photographs of the Princess of Wales in the exhibition - I was the first person to write a biography of the then Kate Middleton. This book is a reminder of a stunning exhibition and fun day out.

This novel represents a sharp turn for me. Until I snapped up Zero History in an airport bookstore many years ago, the science fiction I’d read seemed like dry, intellectual exercises. The characters didn’t have depth. They never made me laugh (or cry). But Zero History unleashed a passion in me for speculative fiction, and eventually, it turned my own writing in that direction as well. To this day, it’s one of my all-time favorite novels. While it’s the third book in a William Gibson trilogy, it is entirely complete on its own. There’s a pop culture, cool vibe about it as the story taps into the lives of three people with unusual gifts – which a global marketing magnate dearly wants to use in various ways.

A totally unpretentious, rollicking first-hand account, of the events that spawned the mythology of the Swinging Sixties of which Mary Quant was an integral part. Having grown up with Quant as a fashion hero, I was thrilled to collaborate with her on a retail beauty video in the 1990s and researched her professional background by reading this autobiography. (first published in 1966, and recently re-issued to coincide with the Quant exhibition at the V&A last year). Credited with inventing hot pants and the mini skirt, purple lipstick, and striped underwear, this old-fashioned biography recounts how the music and fashion that exploded from London during this era, culminated in the invention of ‘youth culture’ a shifting phenomenon that England continually excels in. Without formal training, Quant’s naive optimism is hugely uplifting and will encourage any aspiring designer to follow their dreams. 

This began as an authorized biography, but Westwood proved such a slippery subject that journalist Mulvagh wisely decided to proceed without the designer’s cooperation. The result is a warts-and-all portrait of the important, eccentric, and often infuriating designer, from her scrappy, sloppy punk roots to her current status as the kooky grande dame of British fashion. She’s surrounded by an equally chaotic and colorful cast of feckless boyfriends, gurus, and musicians; London in the 70s and 80s is a character in its own right. Westwood’s raw talent shines through a litany of bad decisions, controversies, and copycats.

Przybryszewski, a history professor at Notre Dame, had me from the start where she says she’s probably the only person to have spoken to the Supreme court wearing a ’suit that won a blue ribbon at a country fair.” Taking American fashion back to the Home Economics taught at Land Grant Universities and subsequently, at high schools, Przybryszewski argues that knowing how to sew was not just a practical skill, but also made us better consumers.

Making our own clothes might have seemed like drudgery, but it was empowering and now that most of us don’t have those skills, we’re literally slaves to fashion… we can’t tell high-quality from low quality, we can’t put in pockets when we need them… and nothing, nothing is ever our exact size. This is a book that will make you want to learn to make your own clothes… or at least cast a far… show more.

Meticulously researched by brilliant fashion journalist Alicia Drake, this book charts the bitchy, high octane rivalry of two mega egos of the industry, Yves Saint Laurent and Karl Lagerfeld. As a journalist working today in an era of horrendous consumerism known as ‘fast fashion’ this detailed account of how both men were instrumental in shifting the established codes of a refined haute couture system into a faster-paced ready-to-wear market in the 1970s is illuminating. It also documents the evolution of couturier as a celebrity, detailing how YSL used an image of himself to promote his aftershave in 1971, a revolutionary idea of self-promotion at the time, and now a very necessary part of the ‘selfie’ obsessed generation of creatives working in fashion.  

Let’s imagine the English people have decided to abolish the monarchy. We are back in the eighties, and the Windsor family, expelled from Westminster, is relocated to a poor neighborhood of London and is required to work. The ex-Queen tries to cook, Philip is depressed, Diana wonders about her wardrobe and Charles discovers gardening talents...The Queen and I is a book that plays wonderfully on the human and linguistic gap between high society and common people. Funny situations and the satirical tone made me laugh on each page. I recommend it to all the people who are struggling to make a living—they’ll think it could be worse.