John d Green photographed Mary Quant OBE for Birds of Britain at his Kensington studio on 12 October 1966. At the time she was 32.
The daughter of Welsh school teachers living in London, Mary Quant became an instrumental figure in the 1960s fashion movement in London, taking credit for the miniskirt and hot pants and for encouraging young people to dress to please themselves.
In 1955 Quant and her husband opened their first boutique, Bazaar, on London’s Kings Road. In 1957 they opened their second branch, designed by Terence Conran, and by 1966 Quant was working with eighteen manufacturers concurrently to create her own designs.
Quant said: “It was the girls on the King’s Road who invented the mini… I wore them very short and the customers would say, ‘Shorter, shorter’.“
