You need to be inspired by something in order to look good

"I think thinking is stylish. Looking is stylish. Culture is stylish. I think you need to be inspired by something in order to look good. A poem, a picture of Wallis Simpson, tailoring… I have an obsession with Wallis Simpson. When people talk about ‘style’ & ‘stylish’, they’re talking about trends. I think style is about a person recognising what their best features are and if your best feature is a waist, wear a fucking waist. If you’ve got a good bust, go empire. I think it’s about finding a mood that you keep to. Then everyone can identify with that style. I think that unstylish is, as celebrities do nowadays, to borrow things from the PRs. They borrow, and it’s so clear that the dress has just been sent. You can feel the bike delivery."
Isabella Blow

On this day in 1958, that fashion maven and instantly recognisable photo-journalist's dream Isabella Blow was born. Her style, her championing of hats by Philip Treacey and Stephen Jones and her eye for "the next big thing" in fashion were legendary.

I still have an enduring image of Isabella at Paddington station, surrounded by trunks, hat boxes and flustered porters, on her way to her train. She looked every inch the glamorous star - a little more steam and whistles and you would have sworn it was Marlene Dietrich in "Shanghai Express"...



The world is a little less stylish, just a little less fun without her.

Read the tribute to Izzy published in Vogue , the magazine for which she worked for so long.