Cool Couples-Mick and Bianca Jagger
April 18, 2015Continuing the story of cool fashionable couples we’re staying on with the swinging 60s and the glittery 70s with Mick and Bianca Jagger.
The seven-year marriage of the Rolling Stone legend Mick Jagger and the Nicaraguan-born model and socialite Bianca Jagger (formerly Bianca Pérez-Mora Macias) was a meeting of style, glamour and rock’n’roll that continues to inspire to this day.
Mick and Bianca Jagger – two strong individuals
Whereas Mick still tirelessly bops in his skinny jeans, Bianca has moved on to serve as a committed human rights advocate, goodwill ambassador and a member of several global charitable trusts, for which she has earned numerous humanitarian awards.
Mick and Bianca Jagger’s wedding
Yet back in the 1970 when they first met in Paris, Mick and Bianca Jagger were at the pinnacle of outrageous glamour. Their marriage at St Tropez in 1971 was who’s who in rock’n roll: Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney, Keith Moon and Eric Clapton were flow in by a private jet to attend the wedding of the decade. The couple wore elegant tailored white suits: Bianca’s suit by Ossie Clark hid the fact that she was four months pregnant.
The Ossie Clark outfits
Independently from each other, Mick and Bianca Jagger had a long-standing connection with Ossie Clark. After being introduced by Marianne Faithful in 1968 at Quorum (the boutique Ossie shared with his partner Celia Birtwell and Alice Pollock), Clark made some stage costumes for the Rolling Stones. For their 1972 Exile on Main Street tour he provided a number of slinky, leather and snakeskin lace-up onesies intended to unzip or unfurl onstage.
One suit, covered with hundreds of silver sequins that glittered on stage, was in fact made in series of five as they frequently fell apart on stage. The same suit went up for auction at Christie’s at the starting price of $12,744. According to the auction site’s description, the flamboyant lace-up sleeveless jumpsuit is made of pearl white velour, and is embellished all over with silver metal poppers backed by transparent sequins.
Woman of the year Hat Award
That same year, Bianca wore dresses by Zandra Rhodes, kaftans by the young Scottish designer Bill Gibb – fantastic creations influenced by Celtic designs and Eastern prints, immediately snapped up by the fashionable followers of the British Boutique Movement, such as Twiggy and young Elizabeth Taylor – and was crowned the winner of the Woman of the Year Hat Award.
Bill Gibb – a fabulous designer
Bill Gibb was considered the epitome of the emerging romantic eclecticism in British fashion, with many parallels to the young Alexander McQueen. He drew inspiration from nature, using fur, feathers, printed leather, and brightly printed flowing fabrics. His complex patterned knitwear and subsequent capsule wardrobes, as well as the 1985 comeback Bronze Age collection (in collaboration with his partner, painter and needlework artist Kaffe Fassett), further highlight the closeness of the artistic vision.
Gibb’s premature death in 1988 means that he is not as well remembered as his contemporaries. The Aberdeen Art Gallery and Museum currently holds the largest collection of his work.
Studio 54 – the place to be seen at
Following the Mick and Bianca Jagger’s move to New York, Bianca became one of the legends of Studio54 with a seemingly constant stream of bright, stylish outfits by YSL and Halston. Bianca not only wore their designs, but also partied and lived alongside them.
The image of Bianca Jagger riding into Studio 54 on a white horse for her 30th birthday is one of the most iconic images of the era, as is her portrait by Andy Warhol.
Bianca and Mick – the genderbenders
Both Mick and Bianca Jagger played against the gender stereotypes – her by wearing immaculate YSL Le Smoking, capes, walking sticks, bowler hats and gamine three-piece suits, him by softening the shapes and colours of his wardrobe, using a lot of scares, frills, glitter and make-up. This was a sign of their era, highly performative lifestyles and overall fashion movements, but it’s without doubt that they both introduced a specific way of wearing, swapping and living these garments.
Thanks greatly to Mick and Bianca Jagger, high fashion remains forever linked to the festival grunge, stylish tailoring with tacky kitsch, all the while remaining clear, wearable and desirable – in short, the epitome of sexy.
Mick and Bianca Jagger
Matching hats
Mick and Bianca in early 1970s
Wedding suits
Mick in Ossie suit
Mick in Ossie onesie
Ossie Clark designs for Jagger stage costume
Winner of the 1972 Woman of the Year Hat Award
Bianca Jagger wears feathers
Bianca in Zandra Rhodes
Bill Gibb designs
Bill Gibb
Bianca with Halston
Bianca Jagger in Halston dress
Bianca with YSL
Bianca on a horse entering Studio54 in 1977
Bianca by Andy Warhol
Gamine Bianca Jagger and Tatum O’Neil
Mick Jagger wearing Ossie Clark by Laurie Lewis, C-type colour print, 1973
Jagger with scarf
Mick Jagger in pale green suit
Mick and Bianca
Mick and Bianca Jagger
