John Galliano is the subject of our first featured fashion designer biography. The British fashion designer was born in Gibraltar in 1960. His family moved to London when he was a child. Galliano later attended the prestigious Central Saint Martin’s College of Art & Design, graduating in 1984 with with famed Les Incroyables (The Incredibles) collection, which was inspired by the French Revolution; the collection was immediately met with high acclaim.
On his early influences: “I think all that — the souks, the markets, woven fabrics, the carpets, the smells, the herbs, the Mediterranean colour, is where my love of textiles comes from,” Galliano has said.
Despite launching his own fashion apparel line that same year and winning the British Fashion Designer of the Year award in 1987, John Galliano met with financial hardship. This caused him to leave London for Paris in 1990 where he secured a design contract with Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton (LVMH).
Later, in 1995, Galliano was appointed chief fashion designer at Givenchy, becoming the first British fashion designer to head a French fashion couture house. He grabbed headlines with a series of risqué designs aimed to transform the profile and fortunes of the back-dated company.
A year later, in 1996, Galliano was awarded the glittering prize of the house of Christian Dior – Givenchy’s stablemate at LVMH. His first couture show for Dior coincided with the label’s 50th anniversary, 20 January 1997.
Currently, as chief designer at Christian Dior, Galliano is responsible for producing six haute couture and ready-to-wear collections per year.
