Few designers have signatures as recognisable as Simone Rocha.
Since launching her label in 2010, the 38-year-old has built a design language around femininity that is as distinct as any logoed merchandise. She is known for swathing women in layers of tulle, satin, and organza, dappled with pearls and crystal beads, and armouring them in thick Aran knits and grungy leather. At once otherworldly, there is something down-to-earth in her approach.
On October 15, Rizzoli will publish a comprehensive review of Rocha’s seminal oeuvre. Edited by Isabella Burley, a friend and collaborator of Rocha’s, the self-titled book is a sumptuously elegant compendium of the designer’s career, inspirations, and fascinations. The hardback coffee table tome, cloth-bound in Pepto Bismol pink, has been in the works for two years.
Separated into five chapters, the book studies her influences from artist Louise Bourgeois and designer Rei Kawakubo to her Irish identity and Chinese heritage. It delves into her feminine world that explores themes such as motherhood and female sexuality, and how she interrogates and subverts them. The pages are beautifully laid out with photographs from glossy magazines, catwalk imagery, and snapshots from backstage at her biannual fashion shows at London Fashion Week, by photographers Andrew Nuding, Jacob Lillis, and Colin Dodgson.
Along with imagery, there are essays, stories, and interviews with Rocha and loyal friends and collaborators such as actor Chloë Sevigny and artist Cindy Sherman. Every aspect of her career thus far is covered.
“Having passed my first decade in fashion, designing haute couture for Jean Paul Gaultier in January, and thinking about my next chapter in fashion, it felt like an appropriate time to show what I’ve done and lift the lid on my influences and share the narrative behind it,” says Rocha, over the phone days before she presents her spring/summer 2025 collection at London Fashion Week. Although she feels under the weather, the designer is chirpy after a long day in the studio.
One of the book’s highlights is an interview with former President of Ireland Mary Robinson, who Rocha, along with many Irish women, cites as an inspiration for her efforts towards making Ireland a fairer country for women and marginalised communities.
When Rocha was younger, she witnessed Robinson advocate and campaign for the legalisation of contraception and divorce, the right of women to sit on juries, the decriminalisation of homosexuality, and other policies, in addition to her peacemaking efforts. Moreover, Robinson’s command of fashion as a tool of self-expression in a position of power continues to influence Rocha.
Speaking to Lou Stoppard, Robinson discusses her time as president and the “moral authority” she associated with her time in Áras an Uachtaráin, the politics of fashion, the role of women in Irish society, symbolism in Irish culture, and arts and culture in Ireland. In the book, Rocha recalls flying back to London after a trip to Ireland and sitting behind the former president. She remarked how Robinson was wearing a string of pearls under a black roll-neck sweater.
“[With the contributors] I wanted to acknowledge the people I’ve worked with for a long time like [stylist] Robbie Spencer and [photographer] Jacob Lillis, but I also wanted to share the people whose work and worlds that I admire like [visual artists] Roni Horn and Cindy Sherman. Some people are better known and some are more unknown. I enjoyed that balance,” says Rocha. “What I found most humbling was hearing what people from the industry like Anna Wintour, [writers] Cathy Horyn and Tim Blanks had to say. It contrasted with the friends I collaborated with. I wanted the book to have a rounded view that felt quite democratic. It was very stimulating for me.”
A panoply of contrasts
Rocha’s designs are a panoply of contrasts.
The duality of darkness and light is in full view. Her penchant for ornamental beauty and sensuality collide with splashes of perverse kinkiness, yet they all synchronise organically. Even before she added a menswear line, the interplay of masculinity and femininity was visible in almost every look. For every delicate touch, there is a toughness lurking.
“I like to root things. Even if something is ornate, fantastical, or experimental, I like to ground it in reality,” says Rocha.
With references, 19th-century painters such as John Constable are as relevant to Rocha as modern photographers such as Paul Kooiker or Perry Ogden. Victorian garments take pride of place alongside the art of Shibari, or Japanese rope-tying.
Her mixed heritage forms the basis for another contrast. Rocha routinely plumbs her Irish identity and Chinese heritage with references to christenings, communions, weddings, wakes, and funerals, Irish stories, myths and legends, and her father’s family photos in Hong Kong and traditional customs.
Nigerian-American artist and poet Precious Okoyomon highlights this contrast in an interview in the book. They say that “wearing Simone Rocha gives me an amour, I have all of these soft, poofy layers, but there’s an element of darkness in there, too — I feel like a militant angel of joy.”
Background
Rocha was born in Dublin in 1989 to John and Odette Rocha. Her fashion designer father rose to prominence in Ireland in the 1980s, before working on licensing deals with Debenhams and Waterford Crystal. He shuttered his business in 2014. Her mother Odette is John’s manager. Rocha credits her mother with fostering interest and love in the arts from a young age while her father taught her an appreciation for tactility. Her parents, who each have an essay in the book, have helped her build her business from the ground up. Odette helps with operations while John assists with store design.
Rocha has lived in London since she completed the MA in Fashion at Central Saint Martins in the late aughts. She lives in De Beauvoir Town with her husband, photographer Eoin McLoughlin, and their two children, Valentine and Noah Roses. When her schedule relents, she enjoys spending it with her family or swimming. While she loves London, the optimal use of her free time is best enjoyed at the seaside.
Of course, the demands of running a successful fashion business have produced fruitful moments.
Over the years, her designs have been worn by some of the world’s foremost celebrities such as Rihanna, Billie Eilish, and Greta Gerwig. In May, she dressed Eve Hewson for the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art and Vogue’s annual Met Gala.
In an interview in the book, actor Chloë Sevigny, who has been buying Simone Rocha for over 10 years, says “there’s like this tenderness and playfulness [to Rocha’s designs], but it’s also modern and new. I hate to say they’re magical, but they are.”
Successful collaborations have included those with J Brand jeans to Moncler. In 2021, she announced a collaboration with H&M, which sold out almost immediately.
Earlier this year, Jean Paul Gaultier invited her to be a guest designer at his haute couture show in Paris — an opportunity that brings her great pride.
Almost 15 years since starting her label, Rocha has four stores across the globe: one in London, one in New York, and two in Taipei. According to a recent article in the Financial Times, turnover for her label is over $20m (€18.6m)with profits over £1m, with accessories accounting for 36% of overall sales.
Despite the fashion industry’s default to constantly look forward, Rocha is proud of what she has created.
Every season since I’ve started, I’ve been able to put on a show and make a collection that resonates deeply with me and my team has been able to achieve something that I am incredibly proud of.
In the book, the stylist behind her shows, Robbie Spencer, says “one of the things that has always stayed with me is that Simone often says she can only do what she does; she can only make the clothes she makes. She can’t be anything else. I think the uncompromising vision she has is what draws people and makes everything she does so special.”
From strength to strength
The week before our call, Rocha was in Venice, Italy, where she had designed the costumes for theatremaker Sophie Hunter’s new performance installation which debuted during the Venice International Film Festival. The installation was an urgent environmental call to arms to protect the world’s salt marshes.
Rocha is no stranger to extracurricular activities.
In 2022, she curated ‘girls, girls, girls’ at Lismore Castle Arts, an exhibition spotlighting various women artists such as Roni Horn, Harley Weir, and Jackie Nickerson (all of whom feature in the monograph). In 2023, she was the partial subject of ECHO. ‘Wrapped in Memory’ at the Fashion Museum Antwerp, an exhibition that examined the connection between her work and artist Louise Bourgeois and choreographer Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker.
When she returned to London, she returned to the studio to finish the spring/summer 2025 collection, which she described to the Financial Times as having a spirit of escapism.
It is clear that, as fashion editor Lynette Nylander puts in the book, “with each collection, the tropes of womanhood — namely what and how womanhood should look like — are examined and disrupted as Rocha crafts her own vision of femininity.”
Next week, Rocha will travel to Paris with the collection, where it will be displayed in an airy gallery space in the Marais. Her sales agents will be overbooked with appointments as hordes of international retailers clamour to stock her designs in their stores and secure exclusive product placements. With each season, she accrues popularity like no other.
Earlier this year, Clodagh Cronin, owner and director of the independent luxury boutique Samui on Cork’s Drawbridge Street, added Rocha’s clothing, accessories, and footwear. It sits alongside Rick Owens, Sacai, and Dries van Noten, other independent brands with uncompromising visions.
“Certainly, Simone is one of Ireland’s most important designers working today. Her work takes on the rarified qualities of haute couture yet she manages to ground them in reality. Our clients find ways to incorporate these special pieces into their everyday wardrobes,” says Cronin. The response to the brand’s arrival at Samui was uproarious.
For the current autumn/winter 2024 season, she highlights a black beaded knit cardigan, an oversized alpaca wool-blend turtleneck with a pleated neckline, and a long tutu skirt as key pieces of the season. When the first drop of the new season launched in August, it was feverishly snapped up by clients.
“Everyone wants a piece of Simone,” says Cronin.
Rocha is incredibly flattered when she sees people wearing her clothing.
“I love walking down the street and seeing someone with a pearly clip in their hair. It feels powerful to me,” she says.
“Clothing is such a sensitive thing. It’s a choice about what you put on your body to make you feel protected or feel provocative, feel flirtatious or secure — it’s such a personal thing but it’s a practical thing, whether it’s emotional or physical. That somebody can find that in something I have created is incredible.”
When Rocha attempts to characterise her progression from her London Fashion Week debut in September 2010 to last Sunday’s show, she laughs, “it goes from teenager to mother.”
“It’s a massive self-portrait. In some seasons I can be honest with myself and, other times, I can be in denial. It’s a progression, it’s like a lifeline. I still feel lucky and excited by it all.”
Simone Rocha by Simone Rocha, published by Rizzoli, is available on October 15.
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