“When I was young I was surrounded by people that made things,” says the British fashion designer Craig Green. “My godfather’s an upholsterer and I used to help him to earn money after school and on weekends.” The 34-year-old is famous for clothes that subvert and warp what we mean when we use the word functional, and his mind-bending catwalk presentations have been known to make audiences cry.

Craig is described by Vogue as “a down-to-earth guy with a brilliant mind.” In conversation he is warm, thoughtful and unassuming with no hint of the colossal ego he could so easily have acquired in what is hardly a low-ego industry. He was named Menswear Designer of the Year at the British Fashion Awards in 2016, 2017, and 2018. His clothes are often seen on celebrities: Rihanna, Robert Pattinson, Jay-Z have all been known to wear CRAIG GREEN. But his collections tend to be commercial hits as well, being wearable in more quotidien settings than arena stages and magazine covers.

As reflected in his accent, Craig grew up in London in a place called Colindale, a suburb at the northern end of the Northern Line. He still lives there, all the better to benefit from the grounding effect of family and old friends. His work reconciles the workmanlike appeal of utility and craft (his signature garment, and one his bestsellers, is the workwear jacket) with excess and spectacle. “My uncles are carpenters and bricklayers. My dad’s a plumber. My mum was a Brownies, Guides and Scouts leader so there was always arts and crafts in the house – as well as immersion boilers and plumbing materials.”

Craig’s inspirations have included camping equipment, food packaging, religious uniform, birds, weathervanes, the afterlife, and exercise machines. One realm of influence comes up over and over: contemporary art, particularly sculpture. His work is frequently described as a form of sculpture not only in the metaphorical “your jumper is so sculptural!” sense but also because there are often sculptures actually present at shows, in campaigns, in the world from which the collections seem to spectacularly emerge. CRAIG GREEN pieces have been displayed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Gaite Lyrique in Paris. There is even a “Craig Green” page on the architecture and design website Dezeen, and it doesn’t look out of place at all.

This all has a lot to do with (1) Craig’s time as a student at London art college Central Saint Martins and (2) the fact that when he arrived there he had virtually no preconceptions and so none of the disciplinary straitjacketing such preconceptions might bring.[…]