Debbi Marco
IT’S hard not to like TV stylist Joey Bevan.
Talking at a million miles per hour, the star of new BBC1 makeover show You Are What You Wear can’t wait to tell me what he’s been wearing in lockdown – even though he’s been shielding because of his asthma.
He admits during the first two weeks of being confined to his flat in Essex, with only his sausage dog Buddy for company, he alternated between Star Wars and Harry Potter-themed pyjamas.
But he added: “Then I thought, I’ve got to get out of this. I need to remember I am a stylist. So I’ve been making more of an effort and doing fun campy videos online.”
Joey, 32, started out working as a designer on The X Factor and Britain’s Next Top Model Live, before moving into styling by accident.
A stylist who was using his clothes for a magazine shoot fell ill and at the last minute Joey was asked to fill in.
He said: “I then got other styling jobs and I fell in love with it. Why would I just want to work with my own collections when I can work with everyone’s beautiful clothes?”
Joey’s love of fashion started at a young age. One of his earliest memories is making paper dolls with his sister Jacqlyn, then re-styling them.
After dropping out of university, he worked part time in a charity shop and would buy the clothes and transform them to sell.
He said: “I’d take a vintage skirt and shirt and make them into a dress to sell on my stall.
“I got spotted and was asked to take part in a London fashion show.”
Joey feels we need to re-examine our relationship with clothes.
He said: “We’re a very lazy generation.
“We were brought up with nans and grandads who had sewing kits and tins full of buttons. But we don’t do that – it’s our throwaway culture.
“I say, if it’s got a hole in it, then sew it up or change it. Buy a patch and put it on.
“You have to have a relationship with clothes.
“I don’t follow fashion. I’ve been wearing Hawaiian and printed silk shirts for 20 years, and now all of a sudden everyone’s wearing them.
“At last, I’m in fashion.” ●You Are What You Wear starts on BBC1 at 8pm tonight.
We’re a lazy generation. If it’s got a hole in it, then sew it up