John Galliano is a British fashion designer known for his work with two labels, Galliano and Dior. He produces a dozen collections (couture and ready to wear) each year, and is widely recognized as one of the most innovative and authoritative fashion designers of our time.

Inspiration comes in many different places for Galliano, such as on his morning run. Every day at 6am Galliano takes a six mile run along the Seine River and takes in the people and lighting of that hour. In 2000 he said that his boho meets hobo collection was inspired when he jogged past homeless people lined along the river.

Galliano's collections for his own label are often created as fanciful interpretations rooted in historical, regional, or pop culture themes. He's is known for his theatricality, and his unparalleled mastery in bias-cut dressmaking techniques.

Early Years

Juan Carlos Antonio Galliano Guillén was born in Gibraltar in 1960. His mother was of Spanish ancestry, and his father was a Brit who worked as a plumber. Galliano was enchanted in his youth by the vibrant world of Mediterranean colors and richly detailed textiles that surrounded him. He developed a passion for textiles at an early age, and the romance of what he saw and felt on trips to the marketplaces of Gibraltar with his mother would prove to be a source of inspiration for collections in the years to come.

At the age of six, Galliano moved with his parents and two sisters to London. It is here that he made his very first dress. In an interview with the New York Times, Galliano recalled the day his elder sister (age 17) needed something to wear for a beauty pageant, and he sat down at the sewing machine for his very first project. He described the design as something “cut close to the body,” and laughed when he added, "I like to think of it as champagne pink, but it really was apricot. A bit tart, a bit tart. But she looked happy with it, and that's what's important -- that she felt good."

Galliano was a mischievous youth, and did not excel in school during his years at Wilson’s Grammar School for Boys. He made his way onward to graduate from City and East London College, and then enrolled at London’s prestigious Central Saint Martins. It was at Saint Martins that he realized his talent and passion for the art of fashion design. He took an interest in studying historical costuming trends, and began developing the techniques of bias-cut dressmaking that have distinguished much of his later work. The designs he created for ‘Les Incroyables,’ his 1983 French Revolution-inspired graduation collection, gained him a taste of critical acclaim and ended up in the window of a popular London boutique. http://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/12/garden/he-likes-couture-when-it-sizzles.html?pagewanted=1 http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biographies/john-galliano.html

The Road to Success

Galliano debuted a collection entitled "The Ludic Game" on his own label in 1985. This collection saw his initial collaboration with an artist he frequently works with to this day, iconic hatmaker Stephen Jones (an artist Galliano met while out for one of his many evenings of partying in the London club scene). The new designs found widespread critical approval, and in 1988 he received the ‘British Designer of the Year’ award for his collection inspired by Blanche DuBois...but financial troubles struck when he lost backers, and was unable to show for several seasons. Disillusioned but determined to move forward, he moved to Paris in the early 1990’s.

Critical accolades continued as he established himself on the French fashion scene, but financial problems persisted and he was almost driven to declare bankruptcy. Luckily, the many friendships he had developed in the fashion community came to the rescue; industry professionals (including Anna Wintour, editor of American Vogue) promoted him for employment and runway show opportunities, and many top models (including Kate Moss) worked in his runway shows free of charge.

In 1995 , opportunity knocked and Galliano was put in charge of Givenchy by Bernard Arnault (LVMH). He was the first English man ever hired to head a French couture house, and many wondered if the brash young Brit with a flair for the theatrical would be fit for his new position. In a New York Times article from 1996, Mitchel Owens reported: “After he took over the reins at Givenchy last November, he startled staff members at the venerable Paris couture house by sending the sample dresses back to the seamstresses with a six-word directive: '’Tighter, smaller, tighter, smaller, tighter, smaller.’' The atelier workers were agog: refinement, not sizzle, had been the rule since the house was founded in 1952 by Hubert de Givenchy, an elegant, exquisitely tailored baron whose muse, Audrey Hepburn, was also blue-blooded. ‘'After about six months, they just gave in,’' said Mr. Galliano, whose multicultural fashion visions -- among them, a Hopi Indian maiden in Duchess of Windsor drag to symbolize, he said, the tribalization of society -- are hardly Hepburnesque. '’Now they understand. And we get along beautifully’ … His superficial eccentricities were not all that startled Givenchy's party-line loyalists (though Mr. Galliano, who is impishly handsome, has given up the matted dreadlocks that used to make him look like Salvador Dali gone Rasta). The couture salon, once a boiseried shrine to air-kissers and society doyennes, now flaunts an MTV edge. Rock music blares all day from his studio, runway models wear bird's nests in their hair (courtesy of Mr. Galliano's alter ego and official muse, Amanda Harlech, the bohemian stylist wife of an English baron) and Tina Turner has been spotted in the fitting rooms.” http://www.nytimes.com/1987/10/14/garden/center-stage-from-the-creative-fringe.html?pagewanted=2 http://chicstories.com/history/john-galliano-fashion-world-story-of-a-lucky-boy/ http://designmuseum.org/design/john-galliano http://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/12/garden/he-likes-couture-when-it-sizzles.html?pagewanted=1

In 1996, fortune smiled again and Arnault promoted Galliano to creative director for Dior . Though still a whimsical and often brash designer, Galliano proved himself to be the right man for the job at Dior and holds his position there to the present day. He resonates well with Dior’s grand tradition of excellence in haute couture, and also designs the house’s popular and critically acclaimed ready-to-wear lines for men and women.

In addition to his work for Dior, Galliano continues to release collections each year under his eponymous label. Each collection is titled and themed, and runway shows frequently feature offbeat staging techniques and special effects.

"For me, travel is the most powerful source of ideas. I'm like a pirate. I love to travel; it's what inspires me" http://www.harpersbazaar.com/fashion/fashion-articles/john-galliano-dior-0408-2

"Haute couture is relevant whatever the economy or mood of the moment. It's poetry from the heart and soul. I dare and I challenge people to dream. That's my job." http://www.harpersbazaar.com/fashion/fashion-articles/john-galliano-dior-0408-4

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