Get your Goat to be cool and stylish
Last Friday, Jane Lewis, founder and designer of Goat, talked me through next autumn’s collection, unaware that by Tuesday her website would have crashed. And all because the new Duchess of Sussex wore a version of The Flavia dress Lewis had specially made for her to Prince Charles’s 70th garden party at Buckingham Palace. The website was only properly fixed last night .
If you’re rolling your eyes at this, I’m with you, especially after one upmarket fashion website recently told me that they were seeing “zero Meghan Markle effect”. In Goat’s instance it’s true. (The website had also had its stock of Goat stripped).
Lewis’s approach to her business is clear-sighted: she makes clothes that lawyers, galleristas, actresses and duchesses can wear, and she’s not precious about any of it – except getting the cut and fabric right. She doesn’t want to be part of a crew, or on a catwalk, although each season there are nods to trends that make sense to a Goat customer – flowers, a discreet frill and midi lengths.
“Why would you chose to be fashionable rather than stylish?” she asks. “It’s like being pretty rather than striking,” says Lewis. “I’d always choose the latter. Prettiness fades.”
A 43-year-old mother of three, Lewis is incontrovertibly stylish, with a predilection for Sixties Jackie O and Seventies Julie Christie shapes, which she generally wears in what she calls “off-colours” such as teal, burgundy and khaki. She keeps accessories to a minimum: Jackie O sunglasses, plain gold bangles or vintage resin cuffs – and, the day we met, a pair of lowheeled Jimmy Choo shin-length boots.
“They’re 15 years old,” she exclaims, “but the perfect length and shape.” This is someone who, despite having a huge number of clothes
(it’s her job after all) hates churn. Her wardrobe has to be versatile – so although she’s known for dresses, she gravitates towards jumpsuits and separates. For a wedding, she’d wear a maxi skirt or wide trousers with one of her bow or button-necked blouses. For big events, she likes pieces with embellishment. “That way, you don’t have to think about jewellery, which can wreck clean lines.” She prefers pockets to evening bags, wears heels “because I’m short and if you make sure your trousers cover most of the heel or platform it’s incredibly elongating”.
While the Duchess of Cambridge repeatedly finds pieces appropriate to her style, Lewis makes Goat look like modern Audrey Hepburn. It’s not a name the streetstyle set flock to but it is a label that can go every which way – and we could do with more.
“My mother and her friends buy huge amounts,” reports Lewis, whose greatest kick is going to weddings and seeing women in Goat, or having professional women repeatedly come back to the shop. Weirdly, this is not a sentiment shared by everyone in the business. I’m reminded of the designer who told one retailer they’d rather be cool than wearable. For Lewis, they are not mutually exclusive.