You spin me - Fashion designer Tim Ryan
Pictures: Independent Woman
• amfAR cinema against AIDS
• Celebration of the Arts Gala
• What to expect premiere London
• Billboard Music Awards Red Carpet
• Men In Black 3 London Premiere
Monday Aug 31 2009
I don’t remember my first meeting with Tipperary native Tim Ryan, as it was so long ago, but I do remember him pulling randomly knitted squares of wool pieces that looked like doilies out of a big bag, which he then assembled into divine skirts and dresses.
Back then, cash-strapped Tim used any scraps of wool he had to make a garment. When I asked where he had learnt to knit, he simply said that his mother had a knitting machine. No romantic story about collecting wool from the sheep on the family farm, and then being mentored by a genius art teacher, leading to the birth of a great talent. No. Tim Ryan’s story was much more mundane than that. He was all about what was in his bag, and whether I was going to use it or not in a shoot.
A year later, Tim made a huge leap forward in his work, creating divine, John Galliano-like, bias-cut knit dresses in fine, viscose yarns. He was then approached by Marc O’Neill to work on some knitwear for his collections, and he caught the attention of powerful women such as TV personality and stylist Sonya Lennon — who is his main muse — making a move to Dublin inevitable.
A shift to London and exhibiting at London Fashion Week have been the making of Tim. Publications such as Vogue are now devotees of Tim’s work, and his collection is selling fabulously in Browns Focus, on London’s South Molton Street. On our pages today is Tim’s current collection. It’s a sophisticated offering, confidently applying a tight colour palette of indigo, purple, pewter and black — with dashes of lurex and mohair ‘fur’ — to a diverse spectrum of shapes.
Tim grew up devouring issues of Seventies’ Vogue, and his design aesthetic reflects a bold, sexually powerful, liberated womanhood. Shapes are all about the body, and emphasise sexuality even when layering and covering up: polo necks, batwing sleeves, deep frills, cape-like dresses and panelled, dance-inspired skirts. It is a sexy collection in a different way to the earthy sensuality Lainey Keogh has educated us into, and it would seem that it is the next step.
“Whether it’s Ireland, London or New York, every country has an attitude to fashion. What is in in one place is out in another,” Tim says. “So, it is about a character that loves her clothes, whether they are in or out of fashion. And it is relevant now because the notion of acquiring new is no longer right. It is about what is beautiful, flattering and feminine. There is a joyousness about it.”
Next stop for Tim is Paris. Quietly excited about the prospect, Tim Ryan is a happy man.
