Lily Allen: The Designer Remix

By Jenny Dickinson

When planning our October ‘London’ issue, the choice of who should grace the cover was an obvious one: Loudmouth lyricist Lily Allen, voice of a generation and fashion wild card. Hell, she even wrote a song about London, nevermind her cab-driver like knowledge of the capital’s best clubs, bars and restaurants.

Seven of London’s hottest designers, including Richard Nicoll, Luella Bartley and Giles Deacon, created looks exclusively for Lily’s ELLE shoot, and the resulting photographs, taken by Rankin, are strong, stylish and original, just like the woman herself.

Here’s a taster of the portfolio and interview by The Spectator’s Matthew d’Ancona. For the full story, pick up a copy of October ELLE, on sale 2nd September.

Click here to see the behind the scenes shoot on ELLE TV

Click here to see Lily Allen's style file...

'I suppose the ones I am really trying to capture the attention of are the people my own age, which is odd because I don’t hang out with people my own age.’

There is a recurring theme in our conversation: self-doubt, coupled with a deep sense of responsibility to, and connection with, her generation; the twenty something cohort who fell in love with the London ska and mockney street talk of the first album, who have stayed loyal and whom she hopes will continue to stand by her. ‘I am very aware that there are kids and much older people who get enjoyment out of my music. But I suppose the ones I am really trying to capture the attention of are the people my own age, which is odd because I don’t hang out with people my own age.’

Indeed: Lily is close to her godmother, the television producer Henrietta Conrad; she speaks to Damien Hirst ‘on a daily basis and he kind of looks after me’; and she made headlines earlier this year when she had a relationship with art dealer Jay Jopling, more than two decades her senior.

‘I definitely have more adult contact and I don’t see that changing,’ she says. ‘I find it more challenging perhaps, and maybe I feel people my own age are a bit… not in awe, but impressed.’