Vivienne Westwood
British fashion designer (1941–2022)
Dame Vivienne Isabel Westwood (née Swire; 8 April 1941 – 29 December 2022) was an English fashion designer and businesswoman, largely responsible for bringing modern punk and new wave fashions into the mainstream. In 2022, Sky Arts ranked her the 4th most influential artist in Britain of the past 50 years.
Westwood came to public notice when she made clothes for the boutique that she and Malcolm McLaren ran on King's Road, which became known as Sex. Their ability to synchronise clothing and music shaped the 1970s UK punk scene, which included McLaren's band, the Sex Pistols. She viewed punk as a way of "seeing if one could put a spoke in the system".
Westwood opened four shops in London and eventually expanded throughout Britain and the world, selling a varied range of merchandise, some of which promoted her political causes such as the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, climate change and civil rights groups.
Life and career
Early years
Westwood was born in Hollingworth, Cheshire, on 8 April 1941. She grew up in nearby Tintwistle, and was the daughter of Gordon Swire and Dora Swire (née Ball), who had married two years previously, two weeks after the outbreak of the Second World War. At the time of Vivienne's birth, her father was employed as a storekeeper in an aircraft factory; he had previously worked as a greengrocer.
In 1958, her family moved to Harrow, Greater London.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Vivienne Westwood” as british fashion designer (1941–2022). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as british fashion designer (1941–2022). Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 2, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q158067. VIAF identifies the subject as 85586601. The Library of Congress control number is no96002170. 3 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 2 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1941, 2022 and 1958.
A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.
- Establishing names and roles
- Building a first chronology
- Locating cited institutions
Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Vivienne Westwood”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Vivienne Westwood primary sources, Vivienne Westwood archive and Vivienne research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “Vivienne Westwood” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.