For her first collection since stepping out from the Fashion East umbrella, Westminster grad Louise Alsop went back to black, getting inspired by abstract expressionist painter Ad Reinhardt and installation artist Tobias Buche for her AW15 collection. Creating clothes for the outsider who would have been too cool to join any high school clique, her designs include punk-inspired photo patches and DIY, hand drawn graphics, warped through an app on her mobile phone. “The collection is predominantly black,” she explains, “so its really the different levels and tones of black which build it” – the colour is explored through dark leather, glossed typography (“CRY LATER”) and fabric in varying transparencies. It’s a darker turn from the spaghetti strapped shifts, belly chains and fake dreads donned by her 90s girl gang last season, so it’s no surprise that Alsop had hardcore punk band American Nightmare (now Give Up the Ghost) on in the studio. Oh, and Taylor Swift – you need something to counteract all that black after all. 

Photography Anna Victoria Best; styling Lola Chatterton; hair Nicole Kahlani at The Book Agency using Bumble and bumble; make-up Lucy Bridge at Jed Root using M·A·C Cosmetics, model Sophie O’Neale at Select; casting Mischa Notcutt

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Louise Alsop SS15 at Fashion East

Louise Alsop AW14 at Fashion East

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