Vogue Festival 2014 - Part 1 Phoebe Philo

For the third year, Queen Elizabeth Hall at London’s Southbank Centre opened its doors for the prestigious and ever growing in popularity VogueFestival. This year, the event’s main sponsor was luxury British department store Harrods.

The sunny day started out a little wobbly for me if I’m completely honest - we missed our first seminar; ‘The Power of Two in Fashion’. After waiting for Hanny to turn up at Waterloo station (25mins passed, with my excitement and impatience ever growing) she showed - hoorah! - a flurry of excuses pardoning her lateness later, I decided not to be too annoyed about it (because anyone who knows me knows that I’m usually the late one) and not let it ruin our day. I will say that I felt like crying when we were refused entry into the auditorium. Although, we were 15mins late, so I can’t say it completely took me by surprise.

Since our next seminar wasn’t until 2:30pm, we decided to take the early afternoon to grab some lunch and explored the street food stalls along the South Bank.

Just so happened to stumble across an impromptu photoshoot on the veranda outside, with the stunning Karlie Kloss!

Our next talk was arguably the most sought after ticket of the two day event - Celine’s Phoebe Philo in conversation with Alexandra Shulman. Known for shunning and shying away from any kind of press or media attention, I was intrigued more than anything to hear what Philo had to say.

When speaking with the Editor in Chief of British Vogue, most would be nervous; some could be charming or maybe even a little complimentary. Not Philo, she was alert, sure of herself and maybe a little abrupt, blaze or sharp at times. At one point, she confidently stated that she doesn’t read or follow blogs or magazines (cue mass gasp from the audience and a little awkward laughter from Shulman).

One of my favourite things Philo said in the whole interview was that she made it her mission to ‘change Celine back from a brand to a house with a sense of quality.’ Perfect. Mission, fashionably accomplished.

Explaining why she went to Celine and taking her three year break to be with her family after leaving Chloe, Philo explained that it was a long process of talks and discussions with various members of the LVMH council before she made the decision; ‘I found Celine attractive because it wasn’t iconic. I could go and do what I wanted to with the brand. All it stood for at the time was quality, which was liberating... I went to Celine because of the fact that I have complete creative control.’

Another question Philo was asked is what her thoughts were on the iconic brand being replicated on the high street, to which she answered that ‘it’s mostly flattering and exciting, occasionally a bit too close to the bone, but on the whole it’s great!’

As one of the only few fashion houses left to not have an ecommerce platform, Philo was asked the question of what has gone into the decision of not going ecomm, to which she answered that she believes ‘a customer should experience Celine clothing by touching, feeling, buying... In a store, you get a sense of the materials, atmosphere etc, that’s what makes it.’

It was somewhat of a fantastic talk. I felt like I’d come away from it not knowing Phoebe Philo as a personality, but as an extremely headstrong foreword thinking creative who is sure of herself and her brand - and the beauty of it all is that Celine really is her brand. Where other Creative Directors take on the role to continue the essence of a fashion house or brand, it was the relatively blank canvas that gave Philo the opportunity to take the heart and core of Celine, add her intuitive creativity and passion, mix it all up and produce an iconic fashion house.

Such an opportunity that not many have or will ever get a chance to experience was one of those things where you only realise how lucky you were afterwards. To see one of fashions most focussed and intriguing individuals talk about her life and experiences (so far) was rare.

I’ll be blogging about what else this year’s Vogue Festival had in store in a ‘Part 2’ including those coveted gold bags, Valentino and me meeting Manolo Blahnik (I know!!).

In the meantime, have a look at my thoughts on Victoria Beckham when I saw her seminar at last year’s Vogue Festival, or why the Roll Up Clutch from the Celine SS13 collection made me swoon.