Swooping red straw accented with a mirror. Velvet and satin twisted to look like Tatlin’s tower. A topper made of chocolate. A stuffed gray canid. A bejeweled miter for Rihanna. For going on five decades, British milliner Stephen Jones has conceived some of fashion’s most notable headpieces, working with designers like Thierry Mugler, Claude Montana, and Rei Kawakubo — not to mention five Dior creative directors, from John Galliano to Jonathan Anderson — in addition to producing his own couture and ready-to-wear collections. He’s also been the subject of numerous exhibitions, including Hats: An Anthology by Stephen Jones, the 2009 V&A millinery extravaganza he co-curated with Oriole Cullen, and a career-spanning retrospective at Paris’s Palais Galliera, Stephen Jones, chapeaux d’artiste (2024–25). Born in 1957, he grew up on the Wirral Peninsula in northwest England, the son of a refrigeration engineer and a homemaker. While he credits the former with his understanding of physics and three-dimensional structure, he thanks the latter for his sense of color, line, and proportion. On leaving boarding school, he was all set to study architecture, before changing his mind at the last minute in favor of a foundation year in art. Afterwards, inspired by the 1975 V&A show Fashion from 1900 to 1939, he decided to study the subject at Saint Martin’s School of Art (now Central Saint Martins). Upon arrival, in 1976, he saw two paths: the tweedy traditions of British yesteryear, or punk. He went with the punks, even singing backup in a band called Pink Parts. While at Saint Martin’s, he tried his hand at dressmaking, but it was in millinery that he found his calling, when he interned with the legendary hatter Shirley Hex. In 1980 hewas invited by Steve Strange to set up shop in the basement of PX, the New Romantic boutique on Endell Street. For Jones, fashion ran in parallel with club culture — he was a regular at London’s legendary Blitz, and garnered attention from Jean-Paul Gaultier for a fez-wearing appearance in the video for Culture Club’s Do You Really Want to Hurt Me? (Gaultier wanted him to model; a motorcycle accident prevented this, but Jones went on to collaborate with him creatively). Today, Jones favors Comme des Garçons and well-worn Vivienne Westwood as his daily uniform, although he’ll still occasionally put his creations upon his head. A hat is “not the meaning of life,” he wryly says, but it’s nonetheless a “fabulous thing that can transform you.” PIN–UP sat down with the happy architecte manqué in his Covent Garden shop.

Rahim Attarzadeh: Tell us how your journey into the world of millinery began.

Stephen Jones: I actually fell into millinery by mistake, or by chance. I was at Saint Martin’s and couldn’t sew. My tailoring tutor took pity on me and sent me to get some work experience. I was the only person I knew at Saint Martin’s who was working in the industry at that time. I went to a couture house called Lachasse just off Berkeley Square and worked for a tailor. Next to the tailoring workroom was a millinery workroom, and I asked for a transfer. I absolutely loved it. It was a real eureka moment.

What kind of work were you doing before that?

We did tailoring, dressmaking, and everything really — women’s fashion. I never particularly wanted to change the world with a hat. At the time, I was just hoping to pay tomorrow’s rent, or yesterday’s rent, actually. When I left, I did clothes as well, but everyone particularly loved my hats. Then Steve Strange had moved PX from James Street in Covent Garden to Endell Street, and there was an empty basement. Things just started to gather steam.

When you started, did you know that millinery was going to be your career?

No, absolutely not. I really didn’t know what the hell I was doing. People always say you have to have an idea of what you want to become, but I really didn’t. I had this idea of perhaps having an afternoon fitting room with gray carpet, but that was about it.

What was the first hat you ever made?

When I told Shirley Hex, who ran Lachasse’s millinery workroom, that I wanted to work there, she asked, “Have you ever made a hat?” I said no. She said, “Well, how can I judge you if you’ve never made a hat?” So I went back to my parents’ house. I used a cereal box, a blouse of my sister’s, and some plastic flowers. That was my first hat. The second was made from an old towel and some net.

Do you remember what cereal was in the box?

It was probably Cornflakes. It was my parents’ house, so it would have been something fairly universal.

How many hats do you think you’ve designed in your lifetime?

I actually calculated it. People sometimes ask me and I always say, “Thousands.” But I sat down at six o’clock one morning and went through my collections. I think I’ve designed around 12,000 hats.

How did it feel to calculate that number?

It felt like a lot more! But the funny thing is that, despite all those hats, it’s still a challenge. I’m working on next summer’s collection at the moment. It isn’t exactly like doing it for the first time every time, because you learn how to do things and you learn the tricks. But the challenge of making it good is always there.

Do you still get as excited about making hats as you did 40 years ago?

I get just as excited, and just as disappointed and frustrated.

Do the disappointment and frustration happen more or less than earlier in your career?

You have a longer vision of it. One of the things I learned from John Galliano is that there will be another collection. Don’t work something and work something and work something until you kill it. Take the learning process and use it next time. That was a really important design lesson for me. I was already 35.

You believe in constantly moving forward rather than looking back?

I’m always onto the next collection and the next project. After Paris Fashion Week, I have complete amnesia because I have to. I need to start again. But I don’t mind looking back at all. When you look back, you learn from your work. It allows you to push forward or to think, “That was okay,” or, “That wasn’t okay.” I also find the idea that fashion has a past, present, and future ridiculous. A hat from 50 years ago isn’t fundamentally different from a hat from ten years ago. It’s all part of a body of work. You add everything to this big pot.

Do you see your work as art?

I don’t particularly want to elevate what I do to the work of an artist. Would you say, “That’s Peter Doig’s work from last year — can we have something from him for next season, please?” It would be a ridiculous way of thinking. [Laughs.]

Do you think fashion is sometimes treated as something lighter than art?

Fashion is so many different things to so many people. It can be a sparkly top to go out on a Friday night. It can be a great artistic expression. It can be disruptive. Or it can simply be a nice suit to go to work in.

When you create a collection, are the hats intended primarily for museums or for people to wear?

When I create a collection, it’s always for a client’s head. When I work for a fashion designer, perhaps the end product is to be shown on the runway and create an image. But when I’m making a hat for my own collection, it’s very much for it to be worn. I have an idea who the person is and what they need a hat for.

About how others dressed?

Of course. I’d say, “I like your look this evening,” or, “I don’t like it this evening.” “I don’t like those shoes with that top.” It was seen as a creative pursuit.

You’ve described your millinery as “architecture in cloth.” What does that mean to you?

There’s always an element of architecture because you’re making a shape. I mean Zaha Hadid, she made a shape — not particularly functional, because often it was a box dressed in a fabulous shape. I worked in her incredible building in Seoul [the Dongdaemun Design Plaza], but inside it there’s a box. So, yes, there is an architectural element, but it’s a design element: shape, color, proportion, texture, and all those different things. It’s the same whether you’re building a building, designing a perfume bottle, making a hat, or probably making a cake. Of course, people live in buildings, but people live in clothes too. I’ve made hats that are inspired by the Liverpool cathedrals — there are two cathedrals, the Catholic one and the Anglican one.

And you merged them?

Somewhat. My great-great-grandfather had a haulage company and hauled the stone for one cathedral. But to me, the other looked like a spaceship. It was much more interesting. When I left school, I was going to study architecture. I had a place at what was then the Polytechnic of Central London, which had one of the best architecture courses in the country. Then, halfway through the summer, I decided to turn it down and do a foundation course instead.

Why did you change your mind?

It all looked a bit serious. I had been at boarding school and I wanted to have more fun. I don’t know if it was a giant mistake or not.

What do you think is special about hat making? What is it about putting on a hat that makes it so transformative?

It’s about taking all those things — shape, color, proportion, texture, experience — and putting them into one big design liquidizer. You create this visual, emotional, spiritual, fun cocktail that hangs together. And then you simply put it on your head. It’s so wonderful and transformative because you feel completely different — more than with any other article of clothing. Hat-making is so much about novelty. It’s about making something fun that is going to cheer people up. I once made Anna Piaggi a badge that said “Frivolity Monitor.” She wanted to make sure that everyone in the fashion business was enjoying themselves.

You’ve worked closely with Rei Kawakubo for many years. Have you learned anything from her approach to geometry and sculptural form?

If I made a hat for Rei that I thought she would like, she would automatically hate it. She wants a space in her collection that doesn’t fit. She wants something that highlights the contrast.

How important is that kind of creative tension?

Very. Lesley, my assistant for 25 years, was someone Rei really loved. She was tall, quite big, and from Glasgow, and she would say to Rei, “I don’t like the way you’ve put that together.” Rei would laugh and change it. None of her Japanese staff would ever say something like that. Lesley could say, “I don’t like those shoes with it. It ruins the line,” and Rei would appreciate it.

How do you approach designing for an exhibition or museum?

I always want to be completely respectful to the place. When I did the big exhibition at the V&A, I knew the space as this incredible neo-Romanesque room with triple-height arches, galleries around it, a painted ceiling, and gold mosaic. I imagined it as an Italian garden, with purple and turquoise light, little gazebos, felt, straw, Victoriana, and Modernism. But when I arrived, it was a plain white box because the space had been converted into a modern gallery. So [set designer] Michael Howells created a fantasy. He painted it all black, but we still had the gazebos. We used lighting so that there were leaves and things moving across the walls to make it magical.

Do you try to reinvent the architecture when you design an exhibition?

Sometimes. But I always want to respect the place. For the show at Palais Galliera, I said we should keep the color of the walls and the floor as it was. We matched the color of the floor and put it inside the cabinets. The architecture, the infrastructure, and everything down to the label on the hat don’t have to match exactly, but they have to be in synthesis. When a visitor walks in, you want to create one experience. You want them to feel it, not just observe it.

Does the fast pace of fashion make it difficult to work in a fantasy-driven way?

Absolutely not. For a collection, I can have books and books full of research notes for every hat and every color. But I know that the little bow I’m going to tie on somebody’s head — the thing that wasn’t in all those books — might be the best thing I’ve done. Unless you have all that experience and knowledge, you can’t do that. You have to have all the information, and then you have to let it go. You use your subconscious.

Was there another designer who worked similarly to you or maybe with whom you had a subconscious connection?

The only time I had that was with John Galliano. We weren’t making a hat — we were putting Kate Moss into an obi sash. We were both kneeling down, with her standing there, and I was smoothing the fabric on one side while he was smoothing the other. I was putting safety pins in it. Our hands were moving as one. It was incredibly intimate. We looked at each other afterwards and smiled. I think we knew we had experienced something quite special. It was actually very simple: human contact and human pleasure.

Was that during Galliano’s tenure at Dior?

It was many years before that. It was the second show I worked on with him, in 1994.

Would you say your time at Dior with Galliano was your most productive period?

No. But the extraordinary thing is that when we were doing things then, it was right for the fashion world at that time. It wouldn’t necessarily be right for the fashion world now. But when people look back, they see it as an extraordinary period. I’ve had extraordinary personal moments with Raf [Simons] as well, and certainly with Maria Grazia [Chiuri]. I’ve created things with all of them.

You’ve said that you don’t have much ambition. Do you still believe that?

I always thought I had no ambition. However, my friend Fiona Dealey reminded me of something I said when we shared a flat. We had a payphone downstairs, and I apparently told her that when she answered it, she had to say, “Stephen Jones, milliner.” So, there was clearly some ego there! I did have an ambition in the sense that I thought my fate would be within the fashion business. But what that would be, I didn’t really know. And I always thought, “It’s just a hat. It’s not the meaning of life.” It’s this fabulous thing that can transform you, keep you warm and dry, whatever. It’s the cherry on the cake of design. In architectural terms, making a hat is like making the most delicious lobby of a hotel, or the finial on top of a building. It’s a very simple act — putting something on your head — but it can completely transform how you look and feel.