HOGG, Pam

British fashion designer

Born: Paisley, Scotland; grew up in Glasgow. Education: Studied Fine Art at Glasgow School of Art; switched to printed textiles course, winning two medals and two scholarships; MA in Textiles at Royal College of Art, London. Career: Lectured in Derby, England, and Glasgow while selling paper designs to New York and Paris; first collection Psychedelic Jungle, 1981; singer in rock band, from 1987; current band Doll, from 1993. Exhibitions: Art Gallery Museum, Glasgow, June-August 1991.

Publications

On HOGG:

Articles

Franklin, Caryn, "Hogg in the Limelight," in Clothes Show (London), April 1989.

Godfrey, John, "Warrior Queen," in i-D (London), August 1989.

Niland, Seta, "Hogging the Spotlight," in Fashion Weekly (London), 22 March 1990.

Rodgers, Toni, "Double Vision," in Elle (London), March 1991.

Godfrey, John, "Pam Hogg," in Elle, June 1994.

McRobbie, Angela, "Falling Off the Catwalk," in the New Statesman & Society, 7 June 1996.

Drawing on influences as diverse as sportswear, S&M rubberwear and 15th-century armor, Pam Hogg produced distinctive clubwear with a punk feel. Exploring similar routes to those charted by Vivienne Westwood, she developed her own niche in the London fashion scene, while vehemently retaining elements of her native Scotland in her designs.

Riding the wave of British talent which swept to the forefront in the mid-1980s, Hogg, in common with John Richmond, represented the coming together of popular culture and fashion. She used rock music as a constant source of visual ideas, to create strong images for womenswear in PVC and studded leather. In a sense her clothes reflected her own lifestyle, her aspirations to pop stardom, which sometimes took precedence over her designing, and her enthusiastic involvement in London clubland. This close contact with street life enabled her work to remain in tune with shifts in focus among the generation of clubbers and popstars she dressed.

Hogg's work was infused with the desire to create fashion as a series of costumes, first for the early 1980s New Romantic nightlife, with heady silver-printed velvets which drew upon her training in textiles, and later, as she began to establish a more coherent and distinctive look, in sporty stretch jersey with leather. Her clothes promoted strong, often provocative images for women that dabbled in the confrontational sexual and tribal motifs of punk, and responded to her own uncompromising personality.

In 1990 this interest in raw sexual statements was crystallized in a collection that included shiny black rubber front-laced catsuits and thigh-high spike-heeled platform boots, which toyed with fetishism. The stark, anarchic personae created by such clothes was tempered by a sense of humor and frequent references to another strong look from the 1970s—glam rock. Hogg often used sparkling gold lurex for leggings or bell bottoms flouting convention, fake cowhide chaps, and red tartan panels and fringing.

Her silver leather minikilts and studded biker jackets equally exemplified her mixing of imagery. In characteristic style, in the autumn-winter of 1989-90, she combined references to Joan of Arc with Hell's Angels and go-go dancers, dubbed the "Warrior Queen" collection. It was typical of her work; shiny corsets were worn with jersey separates with puffed shoulder and elbow sections that referred to slashed 15th-century styles and seemingly castellated cutout hems, and leather crowns-cum-helmets providing a nocturnal urban armor. Her work ran parallel with Westwood's, yet Hogg was more concerned with exploring subcultures and historical inspirations for strong imagery than for overriding philosophies.

The ability to combine shock tactics with wearable clothes continued in Hogg's menswear, which derived its distinctive style from similar sources, with punkish overtones and an overblown humor, combining macho leather with lace, gold trimmings, and the obligatory tartan. It challenged notions of what is acceptable as menswear and set Hogg within the movement from the late 1980s to broaden the horizons of this area of design. Her own line was developed in response to the success of unisex garments within her women's range, with male customers keen to adopt Hogg's upbeat style and sport her flaming heart logo.

Despite having shifted her interest from clothing to music in 1992, her last collection continued to sell well, having become as close to a classic style as clubwear could. Her encapsulation of the traits of British city street life—music, sex, rebellion, and a perverse sense of its own heritage—ensured its continued popularity. Hogg's success in Britain was complemented by the appeal of such witty, indigenous imagery to foreign buyers, who quickly recognized her cult status.

—Rebecca Arnold