We interview Fashion Designer Nicole Murray

We photographed the whole collection whilst interviewing Nicole, prepare to fall in love.

On our recent trip to London, we were invited to the home of up-and-coming fashion designer, Nicole Murray, to view her collections and ask lots of questions!

Despite only having created two collections so far, Nicole is making her mark on the fashion scene with her work, creating garments ranging from floor-sweeping red carpet elegance to classic camel trousers and blazers. She was awarded a place on the Masters Degree course at London College of Fashion after Harold Tillman, Chairman of the British Fashion Council was particularly impressed by her degree show from Nottingham Trent University. Since then, she has gone on to show at London Fashion Week's On/Off show, stock her first luxurious collection in London's prestigious Harrods, and is set to sell her creations alongside Louise Goldin and Eley Kishimoto at the coming-soon online designer boutique 'Watch That Label'.

By seeing Nicole's collection first-hand, we had the chance to admire and find out more about the materials and finishes, which Nicole puts a lot of thought in to. She told us that the Masters course emphasised finishes of garments, which is why each dress has a built in corset, giving the perfect silhouette and eliminating any underwear problems! Nicole has a great aptitude with silks, and emphasised her passion for using those that are of the highest quality from France and Italy. In the SS11 collection we also saw wool being used in innovative ways.

We asked Nicole about her inspirations, and she told us that she loves taking a technique and making it more personal. This is evident through the smocking, hand fraying and lace in her garments. She really turns these traditional methods into something unexpected and beautifully unique, even though they are sometimes so intricate it becomes rather time consuming- the hand frayed trims (shown below) on one dress took two days to make! We saw that whilst the clothes were fuss-free, Nicole included personal quirks, explaining that she particularly likes to play with high necklines and low backs, which we thought was definitely a combination that sets the tone for the understated elegance that runs through each of her collections.

Like ourselves, Nicole particularly admires the designs at Chloe, Celine and Burberry, and told us that she would love to design for Lanvin. Whilst we were looking through the rail she pointed out that the dress below was almost worn by Dannii Minogue on a recent X-Factor live show, however it was a little too sheer for the gleam of the studio lights!

We loved spending the evening with Nicole and her equally as creative other half, musician Tom Wardle. Her designs were modern yet classic, and beautifully feminine.We're very excited to have been invited to the launch of the Collection of Curiosities pop-up shop situated in Holborn London next Thursday. Nicole will be selling her exquisite lambskin gloves and particular one-off pieces from her AW10 collection alongside other designers. It'll be a great chance to find out more and talk to other fans of her work!

Take a look at Nicole's website for the inspiring photo shoots and a video of her catwalk show.

'The Land Of Os'

Central Saint Martins graduate, Osman Yousefzada creates beautiful architectural designs which have caused much stir within the fashion world. The Afghan-British designer formed the collection for  Fashion In Motion live show which is inspired by the movement of the body.
Here we have an exclusive interview with no frills, as Osman gets straight to the point much like his gorgeous structural garments, about his experience as a designer and how he creates such innovative collections.

Sequins added to Osman's understated glamour

Have you always wanted to be a designer?

Yes, as I grew up my mother had a dress-making business, so I just took interest in fabrics from a young age, all the scraps. I've always liked fabrics.



Muted grey sci-fi ensemble



What was your favourite part of Central St. Martins?

Being basically surrounded by like-minded people, a lot of people with a lot of passion really.

 We loved the collection about the movement of the body...

The pieces fit together beautifully...

Yes, I mean, what I had to do was go through eleven collections because there was about fifty looks that were shown at the V&A, so I think it really helped me identify what I'm good at as a designer. 

The baby doll dress, paired with this Season's hottest shoe, the smoking slipper.

Who is the Woman that you design for?

She's intelligent, creative... I think with the kind of effortless style. She can just put something on, but creates a lot of drama when she walks in to a room basically.

As we'd never be able to choose, what from the collection would you put us in?

I don't know, I think I could picture one of you in the babydoll dress... and one of you in the little grey sci-fi suit.

We thought overall, the designs were minimal in shape but had real impact. Do you have a favourite piece from what you've chosen?

I don't know, there's a lot of favourite pieces. I move on really quickly, I think the babydoll dress. It's thirty metres of fabric, but due to the way it's cut, it's really reduced down.

There's always a little bit of a journey, these are pieces shown at the V&A earlier on, so they come from the last four and a half years. These are pieces that really stand out for me, they make a story really.

THE INTERVIEW: George Lamb

We're sure it's a fact that sometimes, you meet famous people and they don't live up to your expectations. However, George Lamb was definitely just as we'd hoped. He was happy to chat to us over his pizza Express Salad and Dough balls (we don't know how he resisted his bouncer's Sloppy Giuseppe pizza though), and we found that his gentlemanly ways have transferred in to fashion...

So from what you've seen today, do you think girls of Birmingham have much style? We're from Nottingham...

Nottingham girls are quite stylish then obviously! I think your generation are really lucky, my generation, girls it was alright for, there's not too much difference now between the high end fashion and the high street, they recreate and mimic. There used to be a real gap between the two. Topman today, you can find Topman ripping off Balenciaga as they all go to the shows. Whereas before, when I was growing up you'd never wear Topman, it just wasn't cool. Same with Topshop, it was doing it's own line of clothes, but it didn't bear much resemblance to what was going on in the high fashion world. But really now they're doing the same thing.You guys have got it lucky really, as before unless you saved up and bought designer gear it was impossible. I think generally, Britain's looking a lot more stylish than it did 10 years ago.



George on Osman Yousefzada: 'Osman is a real talent who shows true diversity, I was impressed, he's a talented guy for sure.'

Who are your favourite designers?

To be honest with you I've just started a menswear line with a friend of mine, it's called A.Sauvage. We showed a short film we made, 'The Art of DE' (dress easy) at fashion week.

It's a contemporary take on traditional men's elegant tailoring. The cut often is where  traditional men's tailoring will let you down. I've been wearing a lot double-breasted, normally if you ask a guy if they've any experience with double breasted is trying on their dads/grandads on whatever. It's back from when they were cut for really portly guys and so they're shlopping around all over the place. So guys are like "oh i don't like it, it's too baggy"

It's not the reality because you can get a better silhouette with a double breasted if you think about it. You get a really nice line. To be honest, I'm kind of top to bottom in our line everyday.

 You should check the blog out, it's a pictorial blog with various cats wearing our stuff. It's called thisisnotasuit.tumblr.com. I wear a bit of Acne, and there's a Japanese brand called Kolor that I quite like, B-store do great stuff.

It's harder for guys to dress isn't it? There's just more diversity for women.

Totally, we're essentially all selling the same thing, it's a focus on cut and quality.

Do you have a favourite piece from your collection?

There's one I was wearing yesterday, which when you go on the website you'll see.  It's a double breasted cream wool jacket, we call it the Dandy, and you wear it with burnt orange cords. It's quite colourful our stuff, but muted colours, as opposed to pop colours.

So how did you get into presenting?

I was managing bands and it was all going alright, then it was all not going alright. A might of mine just threw me a bone and said come and have a go at this.

What are you most proud of?

I've worked with a bunch of really interesting people, I've been all over the world, I've done some pretty cool jobs, I've got a nice lifestyle, I'm proud of what I've achieved in that perspective, so yeah, I'm quite happy with how it's all worked out.