One day, while shopping at London’s Harvey Nichols back in 1987, Princess Diana cast her eyes upon a sequined leopard-print Patrick Kelly ensemble. “It’s too tight, isn’t it?”People magazine reported the Princess asked her male bodyguard. He gave the nod. “I’ll take it,” Diana decided, forever the rebel.
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It was a testament to how far Kelly had traveled in his extraordinary life, charting a singular destiny that forever transformed high fashion, though he died before the world had the chance to receive the fullest expression of his gifts. But in the 35 years Kelly graced this earth, he created a life and legacy that resonates 30 years after his death.
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As the first American and first black person to become a member of the Chambre Syndicale du Prêt-à-Porter in 1988, which governs the French ready-to-wear industry, Kelly brought the pop exuberance of Elsa Schiaparelli back to the runways of Paris Fashion Week. But Kelly’s sensibilities were formed in more modest beginnings: Vicksburg, Mississippi during Jim Crow. Born in 1954, Kelly’s father died when he was 15. He and his two brothers were raised by his mother Letha, aunt Bernard, and grandmother Ethel Rainey—who Kelly told People was “the backbone of my tastes.” When he was six, she showed him a fashion magazine. He immediately noticed there were no Black women in it. “Nobody has time to design for them,” she said. Kelly knew then exactly what he was born to do.
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