Dame Vivienne Westwood’s son has called for his mother’s “dear friend” Julian Assange to be freed during an address at the late designer’s memorial.
In a tribute delivered from the pulpit at Southwark Cathedral, the activist Joseph Corré praised his mother’s clothes, their relationship and her legacy. “To Vivienne, punk was a political idea not a social one,” he said, before criticising the “trumped up accusations from a corrupt establishment” that had meant that, despite the family’s best efforts, Assange was not present at the service.
In a memorial that was equal parts political statement and fashion veneration, several hundred guests from both camps turned up to celebrate the life and political legacy of the designer, style icon and environmental activist who died on 29 December aged 81.
Among the speakers were the former Greenpeace executive director John Sauven, who praised Westwood’s efforts to bring attention to the climate crisis and environmentalism.
Westwood’s second husband, Andreas Kronthaler, whom she married in 1993 after they met when she was teaching fashion design at the University of Applied Arts Vienna, where Kronthaler was a student, also spoke. Wearing a Westwood kilt suit, the designer and creative director of her company was visibly moved as he recalled their secret trysts in the late 80s.
Helena Bonham Carter also delivered a eulogy in which she described herself as a “Westwood worshipper”, and attempted to incite Kate Moss into declaring a national day of dressing up as Westwood. The actor said she had “an obscene amount of clothes, which Vivienne would not have liked with her ‘buy less’ manifesto”.
She also recalled buying a Westwood pirate shirt aged 15 so she could look like Adam Ant, and said she always wore the designer’s coquette dresses (she owns seven) to red carpet events. “They are instant body engineering, an aesthetic protest,” Bonham Carter said. They also meant she could have “a full-fat English breakfast” before getting dressed. “If it wasn’t for Vivienne, I’d be naked.”
The Rev Andrew Nunn praised the turnout, revealing that King Charles and the queen consort had been “unexpectedly” due to attend (it is thought they cancelled on health grounds). Westwood designed her polemic God Save the Queen T-shirts in protest at the silver jubilee, but later accepted an OBE.
Sitting on the second row for perhaps the first time in their collective careers were the Vogue editor, Edward Enninful, the US Vogue editor, Anna Wintour, designers Victoria Beckham and Marc Jacobs, and Westwood muse Kate Moss. Also in attendance were Christina Hendricks in a tartan wrap coat, Joely Richardson and Vanessa Redgrave in camel-coloured jackets, Stormzy in a black suit and Richard E Grant wearing a fascinator.
The guests mostly wore black and plaid versions of Westwood creations, though a dress code – which was sent to everyone and based on Westwood’s mantra of “If in doubt, dress up!” – was closely followed by guests in “mini-crinolines” and clan tartans, which shaped her most famous work.
Jonathan Ross wore a No Future blue jumper by Westwood, Bob Geldof was in head-to-toe Westwood beige tartan, Zandra Rhodes wore a red jumpsuit and leather jacket, and Bonham Carter came in a red Westwood two-piece she had previously worn to collect her CBE.
The cathedral was decked out in Highland-inspired bouquets dotted with mimosa. The service began with Abba’s Slipping Through My Fingers played by the Arnfield Brass, a band situated just over the river from the Derbyshire village of Tintwistle, where Westwood grew up.
In between the eulogies and tributes, Nick Cave performed a moving rendition of Into My Arms at a grand piano, and Chrissie Hynde sang Raining In My heart, which she dedicated to “her friend”. Hynde met Westwood while working at her Kings Road shop, Sex, in the early 1970s.
Speaking in a filmed tribute months before her death, Westwood said activism was her priority, and fashion was her therapy: “I just liked doing it,” she said. Corre also revealed that Westwood had been working on a book before her death, and that she had also become a follower of Taoism, though he added the designer “was not a religious person”.
Often described as the enfant terrible of the fashion world, Westwood burst on to the fashion scene in the 1970s, dressing Adam Ant and the Sex Pistols in leather jackets, pirate shirts and safety pins. She later moved into catwalk and couture, creating bustles and corsets for red carpets and celebrities, later leveraging her status to promote various causes.
Her clothes sometimes featured activist slogans, and despite participating with the fashion week calendar, she often urged her customers to buy less, not more. In a 2017 collection she showed a unisex line of trousers, hats and capes in the hope that men and women would share the same clothes.
The memorial took place at the start of London fashion week, which was dedicated to the late designer and her legacy. “Her work not only changed the fashion industry, giving birth to and defining punk, but it also drove positive change globally,” said Davina Wedderburn of the British Fashion Council. “It’s only right that we celebrate her.”
A small funeral took place on 9 January in Tintwistle. According to the Herald, the family decorated the church with Harris tweed cushions.
“She started a punk and ended a dame, without compromising an inch,” said Bonham Carter. “She was a true feminist.”
