Isabella Blow Exhibition at Somerset House

2014 become instantly à la mode for me, when I visited `Isabella Blow: Fashion Galore!` at London`s Somerset House. The exhibition charts a thirty year career of this very British fashion visionary, who as fashion stylist, journalist and fashion director of Sunday Times Style, Tatler and Vogue, discovered several design geniuses and models. Alexander McQueen; Philip Treacy; Hussein Chalayan; Julien Macdonald; Stella Tennant and Sophie Dahl become her protégés and she skilfully nurtured their careers from the unknown talent to international stardom.

There are flamboyant dresses and accessories on display – over a hundred pieces - which were owned by Isabella, and are now – mostly – in the private collection of Daphne Guinness. My favourite is this lilac jacket by Alexander McQueen from the late 90s, adorned with black lace and embroidery.

Throughout her colourful life, Isabella Blow accumulated a collection of very important late 20^th century and early 21^st century British fashion designs. She knew how to put the rock into baroque, had a unique ability to spot the most incandescent talent and seemed to revel in what life had to offer. She was rightly regarded as an influential patron of fashion and art, and one can understand why, by becoming immersed in her eccentricity (she knew how to push the boundaries of convention), and vision (she once said she treated fashion as her personal armour against everyday life).

Vast majority of the exhibits are displayed without any protective glass so one can come really close and see every stitch and every feather from 360 degrees. Do not bring any large-ish handbags because you would need to store them in the cloakroom, as I was asked to do, when I turned up with this Michael Kors number.  I fully understood the reason once I realised how even unintended but clumsy move can inflict a serious damage to these fragile, but `oh so fabulous` exhibits.