from telegraph.co.uk
Sienna Miller is well known for her love of clothes. Now, with the help of her designer sister, Savannah, she's creating them too. Hilary Alexander looks at their first collection
Sienna and Savannah modelling their first fashion collaboration 'An Anthology of Rebellion''My God! This is amazing. I've got to do a play here," says Sienna Miller.
"What a brilliant place for a party," says her big sister, Savannah.
The two siblings are absorbing the faded grandeur of Wilton's Music Hall in London's East End, first established in 1858. Their reactions mirror both the multiple personality of the building - it saw London's first cancan, served as a Methodist ministry and was an old clothes dump before getting back to its theatrical roots - and the fashions we are about to photograph.
The clothes go by the name of Twenty8Twelve - Sienna's birthday - and are the result of the first fashion collaboration between the star of Alfie and Factory Girl and her designer sister, a graduate of Central Saint Martin's in London.
The sisters are exceptionally close and share the type of relationship in which hugs are more frequent than ''hellos'' and ''how are yous'', and they constantly finish each other's sentences. But there the similarity ends.
Sienna is 25, a sexy singleton with a much-publicised on-off relationship with Jude Law behind her and a parallel life in the tabloids; Savannah is 28, married, and has a two-year-old son and a 12-year-old stepson.
Sienna divides her time between New York and London, where she's renovating a ''higgledy-piggledy'' house with a hammam in the basement. Meanwhile, Savannah, her eco-builder husband Nick and the two boys live the rustic life on a hill in Gloucestershire - thankfully unaffected by the recent floods - "like wild country folk".
Savannah is also at least an inch taller, a fact that is the source of endless teasing and calls for higher and still higher Christian Louboutin heels from Sienna. "Yes, but you've got better breasts," counters Savannah.
Put the two together in a studio and the result is instant fashion fusion.
"Sienna's edgy and out there; I'm soft and romantic," says Savannah. "I have an idea for a design and she adds the sex and flips it on its head. It's fun and it works."
"We've always had a shared aesthetic and we've always swapped clothes, so it seemed perfectly natural to go into this together," agrees Sienna.
The first collection for this autumn/winter, named ''An Anthology of Rebellion'', draws inspiration from 19th-century French peasants, Patti Smith, Jack Kerouac and the Beat Generation, 1970s rock and roll, and Dickensian London. It sounds an unlikely mix, but it is a softly sophisticated collection that bestrides vintage and contemporary influences.
Must-have pieces include tight-waisted, full-skirted frock-coats in cotton twill, wool tuxedo-jackets, silk smock-dresses in a Sleepy Hollow-style print, skinny, denim jeans zippered up the back of the legs from ankle to hip, funky cashmere knits and flounced ra-ra minis, all in a subdued palette of grey, cream, wine, navy and black.
The collection echoes Sienna's love of Boho and Savannah's slightly more pared-down, workaday-comfort approach. It is infused with delicate detail, such as rows and rows of needle-fine pintucks, waists defined by wide grosgrain ribbon and double-layer cuffs that can flounce out of cardigan sleeves.
There is a hidden element of artistic expression both in the little poems or notes that are concealed inside some of the pieces and in the evocative prints by David Cooper, who is also designing Twenty8Twelve's first store, opening in Westbourne Grove, west London, next month.
But, above all, each piece stands on its own, inviting the wearer to experiment and try it in different ways, layered under or over something else.
"Our brand is not about setting trends," says Sienna, famous for supposedly single-handedly launching ''the Boho look'' several seasons back.
"When everyone wore Boho it freaked me out," she says now. "I changed and cut my hair.
"I dress for myself and I don't care what people think. It's dangerous when you start dressing just for effect or for the photographers. Where's the fun in that?"
Savannah, too, feels that women should be encouraged to dress more individually.
After an endless procession of high-street ''fashion marriages'' and celebrity collections, you could be forgiven for thinking Savannah and Sienna were jumping on the well-connected style bandwagon. Far from it.
"We've been working on this for at least two-and-a-half years. But there was always Sienna's filming and then I got pregnant; that's why it's taken so long," Savannah says.
"It's not a one-hit wonder," adds Sienna. "Next spring/summer's collection is done and we're already working on a lingerie range. We don't mess around."
The autumn/winter collection is being delivered this week to all five Harvey Nichols stores in London, Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham and Dublin, to a clique of fashionable boutiques and, surprisingly, to www.asos.com, as well as the Twenty8Twelve shop next month.
"I quite like the idea of being at the till in my Louboutins," says Sienna.
At least that way she will be almost as tall as Savannah.
Sienna Miller is well known for her love of clothes. Now, with the help of her designer sister, Savannah, she's creating them too. Hilary Alexander looks at their first collection
"What a brilliant place for a party," says her big sister, Savannah.
The two siblings are absorbing the faded grandeur of Wilton's Music Hall in London's East End, first established in 1858. Their reactions mirror both the multiple personality of the building - it saw London's first cancan, served as a Methodist ministry and was an old clothes dump before getting back to its theatrical roots - and the fashions we are about to photograph.
The clothes go by the name of Twenty8Twelve - Sienna's birthday - and are the result of the first fashion collaboration between the star of Alfie and Factory Girl and her designer sister, a graduate of Central Saint Martin's in London.
The sisters are exceptionally close and share the type of relationship in which hugs are more frequent than ''hellos'' and ''how are yous'', and they constantly finish each other's sentences. But there the similarity ends.
Sienna is 25, a sexy singleton with a much-publicised on-off relationship with Jude Law behind her and a parallel life in the tabloids; Savannah is 28, married, and has a two-year-old son and a 12-year-old stepson.
Sienna divides her time between New York and London, where she's renovating a ''higgledy-piggledy'' house with a hammam in the basement. Meanwhile, Savannah, her eco-builder husband Nick and the two boys live the rustic life on a hill in Gloucestershire - thankfully unaffected by the recent floods - "like wild country folk".
Savannah is also at least an inch taller, a fact that is the source of endless teasing and calls for higher and still higher Christian Louboutin heels from Sienna. "Yes, but you've got better breasts," counters Savannah.
Put the two together in a studio and the result is instant fashion fusion.
"Sienna's edgy and out there; I'm soft and romantic," says Savannah. "I have an idea for a design and she adds the sex and flips it on its head. It's fun and it works."
"We've always had a shared aesthetic and we've always swapped clothes, so it seemed perfectly natural to go into this together," agrees Sienna.
The first collection for this autumn/winter, named ''An Anthology of Rebellion'', draws inspiration from 19th-century French peasants, Patti Smith, Jack Kerouac and the Beat Generation, 1970s rock and roll, and Dickensian London. It sounds an unlikely mix, but it is a softly sophisticated collection that bestrides vintage and contemporary influences.
Must-have pieces include tight-waisted, full-skirted frock-coats in cotton twill, wool tuxedo-jackets, silk smock-dresses in a Sleepy Hollow-style print, skinny, denim jeans zippered up the back of the legs from ankle to hip, funky cashmere knits and flounced ra-ra minis, all in a subdued palette of grey, cream, wine, navy and black.
The collection echoes Sienna's love of Boho and Savannah's slightly more pared-down, workaday-comfort approach. It is infused with delicate detail, such as rows and rows of needle-fine pintucks, waists defined by wide grosgrain ribbon and double-layer cuffs that can flounce out of cardigan sleeves.
There is a hidden element of artistic expression both in the little poems or notes that are concealed inside some of the pieces and in the evocative prints by David Cooper, who is also designing Twenty8Twelve's first store, opening in Westbourne Grove, west London, next month.
But, above all, each piece stands on its own, inviting the wearer to experiment and try it in different ways, layered under or over something else.
"Our brand is not about setting trends," says Sienna, famous for supposedly single-handedly launching ''the Boho look'' several seasons back.
"When everyone wore Boho it freaked me out," she says now. "I changed and cut my hair.
"I dress for myself and I don't care what people think. It's dangerous when you start dressing just for effect or for the photographers. Where's the fun in that?"
Savannah, too, feels that women should be encouraged to dress more individually.
After an endless procession of high-street ''fashion marriages'' and celebrity collections, you could be forgiven for thinking Savannah and Sienna were jumping on the well-connected style bandwagon. Far from it.
"We've been working on this for at least two-and-a-half years. But there was always Sienna's filming and then I got pregnant; that's why it's taken so long," Savannah says.
"It's not a one-hit wonder," adds Sienna. "Next spring/summer's collection is done and we're already working on a lingerie range. We don't mess around."
The autumn/winter collection is being delivered this week to all five Harvey Nichols stores in London, Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham and Dublin, to a clique of fashionable boutiques and, surprisingly, to www.asos.com, as well as the Twenty8Twelve shop next month.
"I quite like the idea of being at the till in my Louboutins," says Sienna.
At least that way she will be almost as tall as Savannah.
