Ornate state

The intricate, embellished designs from Matty Bovan's SS19 collection

Bold and passionate, British designer Matty Bovan's wild imagination and punk ethos lead to a fashion dreamland. After graduating from Central Saint Martins in 2015, Bovan won the L'Oréal Professionnel Creative Award (alongside designer Beth Postle), just after he was awarded the LVMH Prize for graduates. Deeply influenced by his family, Bovan has had great enthusiasm for knitting from a young age.

On the first day of London Fashion Week, Bovan showed his spring/summer 2019 collection, with ornately layered crinolined ball gowns as well as headdresses made from all sorts of scavenged finds. Distended tweeds and cable-tied crochet flowers played an important role, while the eye-catching jewellery was handmade by the designer's mother.

For a long time, Bovan has made his pieces by hand in his parents' shed in Yorkshire. However, this time round, he used digital embroidery and turned his illustrations into machine-woven fabric – suggesting a potential scaling-up of his previously limited pieces. We can't wait to see what's next.