anna.yhshihMary Quant is the iconic British designer presenting the style of the 1960s with her signature mini skirt, bob hair and thick mascara and daisy logo. Her successful dominance of fun design, visual branding and marketing strategy still works today.
An exhibition was held in Taipei Fine Art Museum in collaboration with the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A), which presented Mary Quant’s fashion works from 1955 to 1975. Her design impacted contemporary fashion deeply.
At the beginning of the 1960s, the elegant, ladylike styles were inherited from the previous decade; people still went to tailors to customise their clothing and fashion was still highly influenced by the trends from Paris. But Mary Quant creates a younger and swing style for youths through her name brand. She also input the idea of mass production and ready-to-wear to make more people can wear her designs.
Here are some ways her brand adopts to get success in that generation, and they are still working for small brands as their brand strategies today.
Vivid brand concept and image
Her brand was targeting on youth generation. Compared to the ladylike of the British aristocracy, bringing a good girl style with upper-class elegance, her brand focuses on giving women a powerful and independent inspiration to find their styles.
She also kept challenging traditions like the scandalous miniskirt at that period, including provocative styles like tomboyish cropped hair, sporty masculine tropes of waistcoats, suits, flat caps etc. She reflected a trend of growing moments toward gender expression and sexuality.
” I aim to create a total look but one with so many variations that each girl can select and reject, to find her permutation.” –Mary Quant, 1966
Cross-over marketing campaigns
She worked with many young talents like models, fashion editors, photographers etc., which made the brand lively and energical. Music is also an essential element of her brand. Her shows always came with live music like jazz or live bands, which now we see much common during fashion shows.
And she also worked with models to get more attention, which we know music is a critical part of fashion to create an immersed atmosphere. Her youthquake marketing campaign in 1965 to tour with young models and bands in the US made American teenagers fall in love with British pop music and her Chelsea girl style.
So today, we can see some luxury brands name famous singers or influencers as their brand ambassadors to increase their impressions on social media.
A lifestyle inspiration and affordable price products.
When customers still went to tailors to customise the latest style from Paris in the 1960s, she produced affordable clothes through massive production for more customers.
She also focused on inspiring shoppers by offering a wide range of product lines, including clothes, make-up and accessory. It was successful in bringing inspiration for the shoppers to immerse in a comprehensive lifestyle.
She also knew how to make products more fun. For example, she launched her cosmetic box with clear instructions to teach customers how to use these products. She also named the product interestingly to connect the product’s function, like Naked foundation, which customers could relate to as light and clear.
From the point of view of today, it can help to easy to reach the SEO setting to boost impression when customers put keywords searching on the internet.
British eccentric design
” I want free-flowing, feminine lines that compliment a woman’s shape…I want relaxed clothes, suited to the actions of normal life.” –Mary Quant, 1966
Her gently feminised and casual versions of masculine tailoring provided girls and women to create a style of their own. So you can find dresses with ribbon and lace, a pair of hot shorts with a shirtdress, but also can discover office style suits, trousers waistcoats which she borrowed the idea of adopting menswear elements like military uniform or ” bank of England” suit style.
She also brought ideas from America of intimate wear and loungewear to Britain to break the traditional boundaries.
Innovative material development
Like a sprayed dress of French fashion brand Coperni which went viral on social media in their 2023SS show, we can see people’s eagerness for innovation.
Mary Quant was also a leading material user in her collection in that generation. So we can see a wool jersey dress heat-bonded to an acetate back to provide colour and a solid silhouette. Or ‘Q-Form’ underwear made of Lycra to give a comfortable feeling for the movement.
Also, one of her famous colourful raincoat series collaborated with a Manchester weatherproof coat manufacturer, Alligator Rainwear. She relaunched the collection with them after the idea began from her “Wet Collection” in Paris in 1963, which was made of PVC (polyvinyl chloride) but was too easy to get sticky. And the relaunched one solved the problem and also combined fun and functionality.
Licensees to expand fashion territory
When Mary’s brand became a successful business in the UK, she started working with equivalent retailers in Australia, America, Canada and Europe. People could buy her trademark, the daisy emblem, outside the UK from these licensed manufacturers or wholesale partners.
Furthermore, when the economy and politics became uncertain in the 1970s, she focused on the profitable licensing trade and other lucrative cosmetics and hosiery.
Even nowadays, many brands prefer to adopt D2C (Direct-to-customer) business model, thanks to the internet. However, the collaboration between brands still brings more impressions. Brands can also expand their markets quicker to others through business partners.
To conclude, Mary Quant, a renowned fashion designer, chased her love and interest and shared them with others through her excellent business management, which included setting up a clear brand value and proposition, interesting marketing strategies, and product development. It was not only an inspiration for people in that generation. The concept of the attitudes of expressing yourself, the definition of gender roles and the visualisation of the brand are all still working in this quickly transformed industry today.
“Fashion, as we knew it, is over; people wear now exactly what they feel like wearing.” –Mary Quant, 1967
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