Daphne Guinness (R) signs a bottle of perfume for a guest at the Barneys New York celebration of Fashion's Night Out at Barneys New York on September 10, 2010 in New York City.
Gallery of Daphne Guinness
Daphne Guinness attends a private preview of the exhibition BALENCIAGA Spanish Master at Queen Sofia Spanish Institute on November 17, 2010 in New York City.
Gallery of Daphne Guinness
Mourners arrive for a Memorial Service to honor the late British fashion designer, Alexander McQueen (March 17, 1969-February 10, 2010).
Gallery of Daphne Guinness
Daphne Guinness attends the 2012 New York City Ballet Fall Gala at the David H. Koch Theater, Lincoln Center on September 20, 2012 in New York City.
Gallery of Daphne Guinness
Daphne Guiness attends the Chanel show as part of Paris Fashion Week Haute Couture Fall-Winter 2015-2016 on July 7, 2015 in Paris, France.
Achievements
Sabine Getty and Daphne Guinness attend the Schiaparelli show as part of Paris Fashion Week Haute Couture Fall-Winter 2015-2016 on July 6, 2015 in Paris, France.
Sabine Getty and Daphne Guinness attend the Schiaparelli show as part of Paris Fashion Week Haute Couture Fall-Winter 2015-2016 on July 6, 2015 in Paris, France.
Daphne Guinness (R) signs a bottle of perfume for a guest at the Barneys New York celebration of Fashion's Night Out at Barneys New York on September 10, 2010 in New York City.
Daphne Guinness attends a private preview of the exhibition BALENCIAGA Spanish Master at Queen Sofia Spanish Institute on November 17, 2010 in New York City.
Daphne Guinness is a British and Irish heiress, socialite and fashion designer. Besides, she is known to be an art collector, model, musician, film producer and actress.
Background
Mrs. Guinness was born in Hampstead, London, United Kingdom, on November 9, 1967. She is an heir by direct descent of the 18th century Irish brewer Arthur Guinness. Her paternal grandmother was Diana Mitford, one of the legendary Mitford sisters. She is the daughter of brewery heir Jonathan Guinness and renowned French beauty Suzanne Lisney. As a child, she grew up in the country houses owned by her family in England and Ireland. She spent her holidays in an 18th-century former monastery in Cadaqués, Catalonia, where the neighbors included Salvador Dalí, Man Ray, Marcel Duchamp, Dieter Roth, and Richard Hamilton.
Career
Mrs. Guinness' first work in fashion was with Isabella Blow. At the request of Fashion Institute of Technology director Valerie Steele, she spent two years mounting an exhibition of a hundred displays of her clothing, which was staged within the context of her other projects, film and modelling. She has worked with Karl Lagerfeld, NARS, MAC, Akris, Gareth Pugh and Philip Treacy, working with them artistically or as a model or both.
Mrs. Guinness has walked in two of Naomi Campbell's Fashion for Relief shows to raise funds for disaster victims. In the same vein, in April 2008, she auctioned off part of her wardrobe, with the proceeds going to a struggling British charity called Womankind Worldwide, which deals with women's issues at home and abroad, such as domestic violence. In Spring 2009 Daphne Guinness was chosen as the face of an advertising campaign for Swiss clothing brand Akris. In 2009 she launched her eponymous fragrance in partnership with French fashion house Comme des Garcons. In June 2010, she purchased at auction the entire wardrobe of Isabella Blow, her friend who committed suicide in 2007. The lot was purchased prior to an auction which was arranged at Christie's.
She designs fashion, jewelry, and perfume. In May 2011 Daphne Guinness was asked to dress live in the window of department store Barney’s New York ahead of the Costume Institute’s MET Gala, to mark the opening of "Savage Beauty". The same year she created a make-up line for MAC cosmetics and starred in Joe Lally's film, "The Murder of Jean Seberg". In January 2011, she was asked by Tom Ford to close his comeback womenswear show. At the end of 2011, photographers Markus Klinko and Indrani, Daphne Guinness, and stylist GK Reid produced "The Legend of Lady White Snake", a film based on an ancient Chinese legend, where she played the central role of Lady White Snake. Daphne Guinness also held an auction in 2012 where she raised $744,285 for the Isabella Blow Foundation.
In 2012 Mrs. Guinness auctioned 100 items from her wardrobe to raise funds to start the Isabella Blow Foundation: a charity that provides donations for bursaries at Central Saint Martins School of Art and Design, and also supports mental health charities. The same year she starred in Shakki, a short sci-fi fiction directed by Julien Landais.
In 2013 she released a music video entitled Fatal Flaw which was directed by Nick Knight. In 2014 Daphne Guinness released a music video for the song "Evening In Space" the lead single of her debut album set to be released in September. The video was directed by David LaChapelle. In 2014 David Barron directed a documentary filmed in Mrs. Guinness' Irish home called Daphne Guinness, The Last Leveller that focuses on her musical work and personal musical tastes.
In 2016 Mrs. Guinness starred in Steven Klein’s advertising campaign for Macallan Whiskey and also released three music videos: one for the song The Long Now, directed by Luca Pizzaroni, for the song Magic Tea, directed by Christel Franken and for the song Old School, directed by Jamie Kendall. She appears extensively in David La Chapelle’s 2017 "Lost And Found" series. In 2017 Mrs. Guinness srarred in "The Aspen Papers", a film inspired by letters between romantic poet Jeffrey Aspern and Juliana Bordereau directed by Julien Landais. Two more her music videos were released this year: for the song Remember To Breath, directed by The Fashtons and for the song Electric Consciousness, directed by Joseph Lally and featured fashion designers The Blonds. She currently writes with friend and music collaborator Malcolm Doherty.
Quotations:
"I spend a lot of time upside down. It increases the blood flow to the brain, so it really helps your creativity."
"We need better things, not more. We should not pollute the world with meaningless, unused things when we can make and support things of rare and precious beauty."
"I really don't understand the idea of a celebrity stylist. Is it a real job? I know there's unemployment, but frankly the railways need to be fixed, too."
"I'm always reading many books at a time. It might be quite unorthodox, but what I do is, since I'm always surrounded with books, I'll read a page of physics, and then I'll read a chapter of a novel that I really love, and then I'll say, "Oh well, what does that mixture do in my head?" I adore reference books. I love encyclopedias. I also like just going back to original texts, because a lot of these self-help books today."
"As I got older I looked at the world and I realised, we need armour. So my jewellery and clothes became my armour."
"I treat clothing or a piece of jewelry like it was a piece of art."
"I dislike the idea of jewellery being like a price tag around someone's neck. It needs to be something else - and there is something extremely magical about armour."
"I think life is about having the mixture of the curiosity of an older person and the imagination of a child."
Personality
Daphne Guinness was a friend of the late fashion designer Alexander McQueen. Scheduled to model for charity on the runway the day his suicide was announced, Mrs. Guinness veiled herself in mourning.
Interests
reading books
Music & Bands
classical music
Connections
In 1987 Daphne Guinness married Spyros Niarchos, the second son of Stavros Niarchos, the shipping magnate. The couple had three children: Nicolas Stavros Niarchos (born 1989), Lex Spyros Niarchos (born 1991), and Ines Sophia Niarchos (born 1995). Her settlement, obtained at the time of her 1999 divorce, is for an undisclosed sum, which was added to her Guinness inheritance. She has been romantically involved with French TV philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy for a number of years.