Griff Made It Herself

Oh, no, you can definitely see. I try my best to get out and about, but you can feel the style differences for sure. New York is obviously maybe the most similar to London, but even still the style is different.

I feel like just the closer we got into middle America, the more, I guess, practical and utilitarian this style got. To put it diplomatically.

[Laughs] Yeah. And then I feel like when you get to the West Coast, I think people dress for the sun, and their lifestyles are around the sun. It's not a thing for me to own a fedora really because in the UK, the weather is just so bad. So, yeah, I guess it's just the weather difference mainly.

Yeah, exactly. I feel like sportswear is a bit more of a thing in America too because you guys have bars with huge cinema-style screens and a million different sports projected on one wall. I think that does manifest into both male and female style.

It honestly feels a bit fake and cheap when the UK tries to do the jersey style. Like, you know, our high streets will sell jerseys, but it's not really that good.

I can't remember where we were, it must have been in Dallas, and the venue or the security team actually got me this really incredible jersey on the Short and Sweet Tour. I'm trying to remember the team. But suddenly I was like, ‘Oh, this is what an actual real jersey is like.’ Like, I get it now.

I was the only girl growing up, so my earliest memory of loving style would be to entertain myself. I would get bed sheets and drape them on myself and try to make dresses from them. It's quite a sad way of entertaining yourself as a kid.

But I think I always loved the idea that I could create things. And at about like 15 or 16, I decided to take textiles in school. So that was when I started to learn how to sew.

I remember something switched where I really enjoyed watching the SHOWstudio panel discussions, and there's a few YouTube channels that would always livestream all the shows happening in Paris or London. It was probably like my late teens. I really just got infatuated with runway and creating things.

You know, this year has been so tour-based that I kind of dipped out a little bit. I'm trying my best way of keeping track of what's happening in the fashion world. Me and my stylist usually send each other bits and bobs and we’ll go like, ‘Oh, that was great.’ I feel like we always love a Simone Rocha show—that show is always really beautiful.

Actually, at the beginning of the year, I went to my first Chanel couture show, which was insane. I've never been to a couture show. There's a whole new level of decadence that you feel in the room and when you're like that close to all the garments. So that was a really cool, new experience to have.

It's ridiculous. It's insane. I just love how over the top it all is. The venue is so decadent. The music is so dramatic. The dresses are just—they probably weigh more than like the models themselves.

I feel like my taste is probably really influenced by what kind of movies and things I would have seen as a kid. I always remember The Sound of Music. There's a scene where she tears up all the curtains and makes dresses for the kids. I feel like in my early days that really informed my style.

But now, it's just scrolling on Instagram. A lot of people say when it comes to TikTok that they’ve built their for you page brick by brick, but I feel like that about my discover page on Instagram. There's no memes. It's all fashion. It's all design. So clothes-wise, I go to Instagram a lot because it's the best way to find young designers. And then I like to go to Pinterest for bigger visual ideas, like artworks or stage designs, stuff like that.

Oh, good question. The first one that comes to mind so cliche, like not arty or cool at all. But Devil Wears Prada just did do it. I mean, maybe that doesn't count as recent anymore, does it?

I've got a Laura Ashley dress that I love. Vintage Laura Ashley dresses generally. The fit of them is so nice—they have that V-shaped waistline. I just have a weird addiction to old vintage dresses. I have a rail of them in my wardrobe.

I really don't make wish lists at all. This is the first time, in my early adulthood, where I can now think about nice things. But it's hard to fantasize.

I feel like these days it's either beauty-orientated, or good hair products. I've recently been really in love with both. There's a woman in London, a hair stylist named Charlotte Mensah. She's got a really beautiful brand of hair products. Having afro-textured hair, it takes such a lifetime to try and test products that work.

Exactly, exactly. Like I would love the gift. I feel like at this moment on tour as well, our life is very much showering in a grotty, horrible venue shower. So currently I've been meaning to get some really high-end shampoo just to contrast the whole experience. Get me like a hundred pound body wash just for the sake of it, you know?

And maybe I've been like to the Ritz Carlton or something.

I mean, I can't say that Chris or Ed—as much as I love them—really inspired my style. If anything, if it did rub off on me, it probably wasn't a great thing. [Laughs]. Wearing T-shirts and trousers all the time.

I feel like Dua was really cool because it was the first time coming out of COVID that I was on tour properly. And she's just so on point all the time. She's never not on point. That was just really cool to witness for three months. Like every time you see her, her outfit is insane. I think I always felt like I should dress up for the moments that people are going to see me and then, you know, on the off days, it’s whatever. But I think I really appreciated that Dua was always pristine and looking amazing. I feel like she's the one that probably rubbed off the most style-wise.

And then I also opened for Florence, and I feel like she has such an effortless way of, I don’t know, just dressing in her own way. It’s so whimsical, but effortless, you know?

She is, she is. There's an aura about her. To be fair, she could probably be in an Adidas track suit and still seem like she's been plucked from a different pixie land, you know?

I have, yeah. It's really special. It’s cute because I never prescribe it too much. I've seen artists do it where there's like a whole mood board, but I'm kind of like, just come as you are. But people come and they do like the spiral on their hair that I do.

Last night, I was given this jumper that someone customized with a big spiral on it. There's always cute nail art going on, which I love. People find really beautiful ways of embroidering the spiral into loads of different things, which I love. I look at the crowd and I'm like, ‘Oh, everyone's really made an effort.’ And I think it just adds to a feeling of unity within the room.

I think sometime around last year, I went away with some friends and creative directors that I work with. And we took two, three days to listen to the music and try to flesh it out visually.
That was where I came up with the album title Vertigo, and the album name went hand in hand with the motif. We started with artworks and they were all intentionally flipped upside down or the orientation of things were kind of not the right way around. It was just trying to reinforce that feeling of dizziness and motion.

I do. I find it so satisfying that you can make something just like that. Right now there could be nothing, but if in two hours we sat down and got some fabric, or we sat down and got a guitar, there would be something at the end of that. It feels like a fun little superpower that we all have in a way.

It’s the fact that I am completely in control of what comes out at the other end. I think it’s probably a deeper psyche that I'm addicted to. And I think the process is fun because there's a lot of introspection and digging that you have to do to create something. You have to figure out what you like. You have to figure out your taste. You realise that like, ‘Oh, this chord makes me feel good.’ Or like, actually, I'm always drawn to using tools and calico because that combination makes me feel good. So you feel really in touch with yourself in both of those processes.

I'm really proud of the tour outfits we've created and designed. I really got into petticoats and cages. I wanted to reverse them because you're supposed to wear cages underneath dresses to build volume, but for the tour, we've put them on top and it kind of creates this deconstructed feel. So I really love all those shapes that we've made.

I really loved my Alexandra Palace performance look as well. I always really loved the dress I made for the Brits, which was a couple of years ago now. I still don't know how I feel about my Taylor Swift dress [for the performance at Wembley Stadium], but it happened, so it's fine.

That's also the risk of these things. It's like you put it out there, you say you've made it and then you have to live with it and you go, hmm, do I like that? Probably not. So, we'll put her in the questionable book. Though, It’s still nostalgic for me now and it's going to be a core memory. So I'll live with it. It's kind of like how you feel about your prom dress. You look back and go, I probably would have changed it, but it's cute that I did that.