Hollie Bowden had an epiphany during an early moment in her would-be career as a stylist. She was on set, assisting Karen Clarkson, when she realized: “I don’t want to dress models. I just want to wear it all.” Years later, after establishing herself as a foremost interior designer and founding a studio and adjoining gallery in Shoreditch, she has curated the kind of wardrobe most people working in fashion would sell their souls for.
The talents that distinguish her as a self-described interiorist—mainly her drive to hunt rare, unique, and obscure pieces and her uncanny ability to pair them in the most unlikely combinations—make her an incredible fashion collector. As such, there is a cohesion between the spaces she decorates and the way she styles herself. “I like the scheme of what the project is and what I’m wearing to sync a little bit because it feels right,” she explains. “It feels like a kind of language.” Her taste is distinctive and yet difficult to define; the main throughline being an appreciation for vintage and a love of the unexpected. She’ll wear a lush green coat by ’60s and ’70s bohemia designer Bill Gibb with a painted halter top by the lavender-haired contemporary experimental artist Claire Barrow and pants from Found and Vision, her friend’s vintage shop. Similarly, she has styled her studio with a worn-down English table, a bright yellow felt Gaetano Pesce chair, and a religious sculpture. “That should not make sense, but it totally does,” she comments.
Bowden always had a strong sense of what she wanted to wear. Growing up as a competitive show jumper, she even found ways to personalize her riding attire, always opting for dark green and sewing her name into her high collar. She would use her show-jumping earnings to buy Diesel and Versace at Portobello Market, establishing relationships with vintage dealers she maintains to this day. Her signature Buffalo boots and silver Polo Sport jacket caught the eye of a young FKA Twigs when they were at school together. Today, Twigs and Bowden are friends—Bowden designed her East London home—and the jacket is worth thousands. (Sadly, Bowden doesn’t know where hers went.)
Over the span of our conversation, Bowden mentioned collecting over 25 brands and designers—from Issey Miyake (her first major luxury purchase) to the punky, cool kid jewelry maker Amy Rodriguez. Many, like Dilara Fındıkoğlu, are personal friends whose careers she has seen flourish over the years. She jokes that her wardrobe is the perfect stop on the way to a themed party. “If they want PVC, if they want seventies, if they want girly, if they want punk, anything, I’ve got it in abundance,” she laughs. She recently moved into a six-bedroom townhouse and for the first time in her life, has a dedicated dressing room for her expansive wardrobe. “After years and years, I now have a room with everything I’ve collected: a room for belts, a drawer for hair bands, all my hats, hundreds of them have a spot,” she explains. I can’t help but envy her four-year-old twin daughters who will one day have access to racks of Vivienne Westwood and Margiela.
Bowden enlisted her friend, the creative director Yaz XL, to help curate her outfits for this feature. She described the shoot, which took place in her studio’s gallery space, as a kind of reinvention for her; with the help of Yaz, she rediscovered pieces she hadn’t worn since her pregnancy with the twins. “When I had the girls, my friend said to me, ‘Just hide your wardrobe for at least four years.’ I went, ‘Don’t be ridiculous. Six months and I’ll be back wearing that little leather skirt,’” she recalls. “She was absolutely right. They’re just coming up to four, and this is the time that I’ve been able to be like, ‘Okay, Mum’s back.’
“I wore this dress to the Notting Hill Carnival, which was so stupid. It’s knitted, so it kept catching on people. By the end of the day, it was just shredded. That was the worst outfit you could wear to Notting Hill Carnival. But then actually, it’s quite nice, because it’s kind of deconstructed, and now I’ve tied it, played with it, and moved it about, and so it’s kind of become something different.”
“There’s a room next to our bedroom, it’s a particularly nice room, actually, and my boyfriend was like, ‘Well, the kids can go in there.’ I was like, ‘Are you kidding? That is my dressing room. They are upstairs.’ I’ve waited for this dressing room for years, and I’m having it.”
“Going into interior design, I felt like I could then afford to buy myself really beautiful clothes. [Fashion] is still part of my world; dressing up, doing interiors, it’s all quite fluid the way it works.”
“We were on set, and my friend Yaz told the hair stylist, ‘Actually, can you just let Hollie do her hair for a minute?’ She was like, ‘Do that thing when you just flick it up.’ I think sometimes, if I’m in an outfit that’s looking too prim, I’ll add a messy bun or something.”
“I think my mum and my gran really influenced my style from a really, really young age. I’m a collector. I’d probably say an obsessive kind of collector to the point that I’m probably a bit ill.”
“I’ve got different dealers that sell 1950s or ’30s [stuff], and a guy that just sells brilliant vintage T-shirts, somebody else that does knits. I’ve got this whole network of interesting people.”
“I got this necklace [pictured on the left] when I was with my ex-boyfriend probably like 20 years ago. We went shopping in Egypt at this market. This tiny shop had this necklace, and it was really expensive for what it was. I think it was like 500 quid, and we were like, ‘What? It’s just a bare rope with a glass.’ The shopkeeper was like, ‘No, it’s really important. It’s antique.’ We went to dinner after, and my ex was like, ‘If you down that pot of chili, I’ll buy you the necklace.’ I was like, ‘Absolutely,’ which sounds totally ridiculous. The waiter watched me do it, and he ran over and was like, ‘God, what are you doing? You’re mad, woman.’ Anyway, I got the necklace, and I’ve had it forever. I had to down a pot of chili for it. It was the hottest thing I’ve ever drank in my life.”
“I’m always searching for the obscure, the different. I do it with my children as well. Their wardrobe is insane. I’m getting their hats from Portugal, their coats made in Cornwall, their shoes in America. It is literally a full-time job, really, dressing them.”
“I’m not religious, but I’ve got so much religious stuff in my house. I quite like iconography, crosses, beads, and all that kind of stuff.”
“That’s the thing about vintage pieces, right? They have this way of being quite timeless.”
“The dress is this kind of metal crochet thirties dress, and it’s actually like metal. The amount of work that’s gone into it—it’s lovely, actually. Then I made the choker out of the same material. And the banana tree lamp is one of my favorite lamps.”
“For my 30th birthday party, the theme was a work of art. My friends just turned up in the most amazing outfits. I wore a canvas dress, and then everybody painted me. It was quite amazing, actually. I still have the outfit and I think I’ll probably frame it in a box frame one day.”
“This is my favorite top of all time. It’s a Claire Barrow top, and it’s painted with this kind of creepy little man, and squiggles, and God knows what. And then the Bill Gibb jack-coat, which is from Found and Vision, is one of the best things I’ve ever bought. I totally love it.”
“My style could go from super minimal and plain, to mixing leather, PVC, leopard print, bright red, whatever. Probably not bright red, actually. I definitely have a palette, but Poster Girl actually sent me a red all-in-one for my birthday, and I was like, ‘Oh, my God, maybe I could wear red.’ I’m having a rebirth where I feel like I could actually do things that I probably wouldn’t have before.”
“I’m always looking for that juxtaposition. Something might feel quite high-end, but then I’m keen to make it not high-end, and feel humorous, and fun, and a bit more relaxed.”
Art Director: Yasmin Exall and Smiley Stevens / Managing Editor: Hilary George-Parkin / Casting Director: Yasmin Coutinho / Executive Producer: Marc Duron
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