Everyone has heard of her father, after all, who doesn’t enjoy The Beatles? Her mother was also famous in her own right as a devout animal rights activist and foodie, musician and professional photographer, but Stella McCartney has also carved a road to fame all on her own.This article looks at Stella McCartney’s glistening career as a fashion designer and the achievements that have come with it.

Background

Born September 13th  1971, London, Stella McCartney comes from a very famous family. With Sir Paul McCartney as her father and Linda McCartney as her mother, fame and success was something that she grew up surrounded by. With drive and termination a key to the success of both her parents, it is no wonder Stella McCartney went on to achieve great things.

She attended normal public schools under her parents wish to live a normal a life as possible. During her childhood and teenage years, she became passionate about clothes and fashion which lead to her studying fashion at degree level and eventually graduated from Central Saint Martins in 1995. During her time here she made friends with the up and coming models Kate Moss and Naomi Cambell who even modelled Stella’s graduation runway exhibits.

Only two years after graduating, McCartney was appointed Creative Director of fashion house, “Chloe” in Paris, France. She came under a lot of pressure and scrutiny, particularly form her predecessor, Karl Langerfeld who did not think she was experienced enough to lead the company. He believed she was hired for her surname rather than her fashion ability but Stella McCartney proved a success both critically and commercially.

In 2001 she launched her own fashion label, named after herself, as a joint venture with Gucci Group, now known as the PPR Luxury Group. This range of clothing was show cased in Paris and were considered successful.

Stella McCartney now has 17 self named stores world wide including highly fashionable places such as London, Milan, Rome, Hollywood and Paris to name but a few.

In 2003, she released her own perfume range, again self titled “Stella”. I can personally vouch that this scent is gorgeous, it’s a firm favourite with my sister and I can strongly suggest giving it a try. I have been known to sneak into her room and use it!

With a high retail collection proving hugely successful, Stella McCartney decided to make her work more readily available to the masses at more reasonable every day prices. In 2005 she collaborates with high street retail giants H&M to come up with an affordable fashion line. This would prove to be astoundingly popular. In fact, it was so popular, some chains sold out of her collections on launch day itself.

In January 2007, she continued with her beauty line and launched a skin care range called CARE. This line of products is 100% completely green and organic, something that she is a firm believer in and strongly advocates.

Having already made her mark with clothes and beauty care, McCartney expands her collection further by releasing a lingerie selection in 2008. She then expands her range further by creating clothes for babies and children between the ages of newborn to 12 years.

In 2010, she is named as Team GB’s Creative Director for London 2012 by Adidas. McCartney and Adidas have had a long and successful history of collaborations, starting in 2004 when she designed a range of sports wear especially for women for the sporting giants brand. This long and successful partnership, along her with her own separate works and achievements, helped her secure this momentous and honourable appointment. This appointment is also historic as it is the first time a designer has been given the task of not only designing the Olympic uniforms, but also the Paralympic uniforms for the same year.

Notable Awards

VH1/Vogue Designer of the Year, 2000, New York.

Glamour Award for Best Designer, 2004, London.

Elle style award for Best Designer of the year, 2007, London

November 2011, she was presented with the Red Carpet Award by the British Fashion Council.

Personal Life and Trivia

Having grown up in a vegetarian household, both her parents being vocal about their decision to not eat meat, her mother even going on to found the Linda McCartney veggie food franchise, Stella McCartney is keen to uphold these ideals. She is a supporter of PETA and refuses to use leather or fur in her designs She does however, use wool and silk. She is vocal about animal rights and vegetarianism and even wrote the slogan, “Suitable for sporty vegetarians” on some of her Adias collections.

She is married to British publisher Alasdhair Willis, with whom she has 4 children.

McCartney is a favourite with the national treasure that is HRH Kate Middleton. Kate is often seen sporting Stella McCartney designs and this can only help boost her career further. The Kate effect, as it’s called here in Britain, is huge and will certainly help further her range of clothes.

Stella is close friends with pop royalty as well. She designed Madonna’s wedding dess to Guy Ritchie in 2000. She then designed Madonna’s costumes for her 2004 Re-Invention Tour.

She designed Gwyneth Paltrow’s and Jude Law’s costumes in the hit film Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow.

~ Image source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/adifans

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Nikki Peters

Nikki is a British based writer who spent over a year working at an up and coming social media dashboard company giving her plenty of hands on experience and insight into all things social media. Whether it's writing about all the latest news via Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn and networking in general, to how to use social media for your business or individual needs from customer relations, campaigning or marketing, she has many tricks and tips to share to help you stand out and get seen in the hustle and bustle of the World Wide Web - it doesn't just end with social media, technology and apps that help you engage and stand out, or simply just to allow you to have fun doing what you enjoy best, are also a keen interest. Feel free to follow her on Twitter!

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