MARGARET HOWELL

Founded by designer Margaret Howell (b. 1946, Tadworth, Surrey), who trained as a fine artist at Goldsmiths' College of Art in the late 1960s. Her career began in 1970 making hand-made beads and accessories — picked up by Vogue and resulting in a commission of a beaded vest for Elizabeth Taylor. In 1972 she started designing, making and selling men's shirts from a flat in Blackheath, south-east London, with early orders from Joseph and US retailers. Margaret Howell Limited was incorporated in 1987. The first New York shop opened in 1982, the Tokyo flagship in Aoyama in 1983, and the London Wigmore Street flagship — designed with Will Russell of Pentagram — in 2002. The brand opened its own shirt factory in Edmonton, north London, in 1999/2000. Today the company employs around 500 people across more than 80 locations including London, Paris, Florence and Tokyo, designing menswear, womenswear and household goods built around a quietly English aesthetic of vernacular materials — Melton cloth, tweed, wool, linen and cotton. Howell was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) and a Royal Designer for Industry by the Royal Society of Arts.