April 3, 2023 |
Fashion has lost one it’s most witty, stylish and creative figures. The multi-talented Michael Roberts has died in his beloved Sicily, aged 75. Roberts, always immaculately dressed, was a writer, stylist, illustrator, art director, fashion director, film director and wit. “People say, ‘Oh, you jump from one thing to another.’ I don’t see it as jumping from one thing to another. I see them all as branches of the same thing. And when I’m tired of sitting on that branch, I can run to the other,” he said of his multi-disciplinary approach to creativity.
He counted Grace Coddington as a close collaborator and friend. The pair met in the early Seventies and were at the heart of an ultra-chic fast set, including Ossie Clarke, Manolo Blahnik, Bianca Jagger and Tina Chow, who all had huge influence on fashion. “It was that very exciting time in London when we were all poor but we were all super glamorous. We lived for glamour,” he said of those formative years.
Born in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, in 1947, Roberts father was from St Lucia and his mother was English. He studied graphic and fashion design at High Wycombe College of Art. In the early Seventies, he became the fashion editor at The Sunday Times before moving to Tatler where he famously transformed punk designer Vivienne Westwood into Margaret Thatcher for a cover shoot.
He was fashion director of The New Yorker, a role specially created for him, crafting many collaged fashion covers. More recently he was fashion & style director at Vanity Fair. In 2017, he wrote and directed Manolo: The Boy Who Made Shoes for Lizards, a documentary about his friend Manolo Blahnik. He published many books of his illustrations including a series of children’s books. He was awarded a CBE in 2022, for services to fashion. One of the few Black top-flight editors in the Seventies and Eighties, his prodigious talent broke down barriers. Paying tribute, Edward Enninful, British Vogue editor-in-chief described Roberts as a “Guiding light.” But when once asked if he believed in role models, Roberts replied in typically waspish fashion. “I believe in supermodels.”
Photograph courtesy of @edwardenninful on Instagram.
