Mary Quant passes

Mary Quant passes

For those who remember her as a fashion icon and pioneer of everything that was stylish and outrageous, the passing of Mary Quant may be some significant chapter of our lives but barely registered in others. While some of us were trying to understand the rudiments of grammar, language, verbs, tenses and words, the presence of a radical fashion designer at the very cutting edge of the 1960s zeitgeist seems almost reassuring. This was a Britain and London at its most creative, thinking ahead, revolutionary, innovative, using the richest fabrics and materials at its disposal and just looking good.

In the heart of New Bond Street, Bond Street and Oxford Street, those huge shopping emporiums were opening up some of the classiest stores with everything a young girl or woman could hope to find. The 1960s was the decade when London switched on a whole kaleidoscope of colours and enjoyed the best of all times, making fun its only objective and just showing off in vivid, vibrant patterns, fashions that broke all boundaries and didn't care for a minute what the rest of the world thought of it. There was almost a heady, dizzy, giddy acceptance of the unconventional and how London loved to be the centre of attention.

Mary Quant of course was deeply and emotionally involved in all of those bewildering evolutions, the weird and the unusual, the bizarre yet funky, the ludicrous and inexplicable. Quant was the leading force, the driving force, the one whose dresses, skirts, trousers, mini skirts, hot pants, silky scarves, pashminas, the perfectly symmetrical looks and then the androgynous seemed to work perfectly. It was bold and beautiful, measured to perfection. The arrival of Mary Quant had taken the world of fashion into an entirely new dimension.

Suddenly the heart of the West End of London had been transformed by one woman whose scissors, tape measures and staple guns would provide all of those wonderfully smooth  and flowing frills to some of the most feminine of  clothes. Quant was unashamedly original, always striving to be one step ahead of her contemporaries, never afraid to indulge in the cool, original and ostentatious. Her name always dominated the pages of Cosmopolitan, Tatler's and Vanity Fair. Quant dared to be different, challenged the Establishment and at times derived enormous pleasure from the criticism, snide comments and the negative and derogatory barbs. It was just Mary Quant being Mary Quant, controversial and provocative.

There was a point during recent decades when her rivalries with the likes of Vivien Westwood and Zandra Rhodes provided an entertaining diversion from the more serious news agenda of the day. While the rest of the world was struggling to understand the explosive terrorist outrages of the IRA, Quant was far more concerned with glittering fashion catwalks followed by champagne and canapes. Quant was celebrating that year's mail order catalogue, smiling for the cameras, always designing, never slowing down and permanently looking for the outfit that would stop us all in our tracks.

At all of the West End's most celebrated fashion venues such as Carnaby Street and the Kings Road, a light will go out in homage to this most avant- garde  fashionista. You found yourself wondering what exactly will be going through the minds of Naomi Campbell, Kate Moss and Jemma Kidd. The models  of the 1960s, 70s, 80s, 90s and now the 21st century will wipe a reflective tear for the woman who made it all possible. The world of fashion will gather in a collective state of mourning. Mary Quant always did have class.