Chloe Hamblen

How would you describe what you do?

I am the founder and creative director of luxury lingerie label, Lascivious. Day to day, I oversee every aspect of the business, from design to sales strategy, creative projects and branding. As the company is still relatively small, I have a very hands-on role, and am involved with every area of the business.

What is your background?

Before launching the label, I studied contour fashion at De Montfort University - at the time it was the only place in the country you could undertake such a course. I punctuated my studies with loads of work experience as well, securing placements with Alexander McQueen and Agent Provocateur. I also worked for brands such as Myla, La Perla and Ann Summers, all with a view to learning as much as I possibly could about the industry. Following my graduation, I worked for 7 months at Marlies Dekkers in Rotterdam before returning to the UK to start my own brand. It's been a steep learning curve, but that's the nature of running your own business.

Who inspired you at the outset?

I have been inspired by so many people in different ways. Sometimes from a comment from someone I respect believing in me, or from seeing the success achieved from previous students from my course, such as Janet Reger for example. The designers that I admired the most were Alexander McQueen, Marlies Dekkers and Chantal Thomass. I was also inspired by my time at Agent Provocateur, which at that time was a small team just opening their second store.

Who, or what, inspires you now? 

I'm still inspired by all the above, but adore strong women like Mary Portas and Alex Polizzi and I am continually inspired by other creatives and those I collaborate with.

What was the last useful thing you learnt?

I learnt recently that if you put comma marks around search terms online it will only bring up results for that specific thing and not general results that happen to contain the individual words, quite helpful.

What are you working on right now?

We exhibited our AW12 collection in London mid-January, and one of the ranges was immediately snapped up as a UK exclusive for Harrods, who have stocked the brand since last year. As we want our other stockists to still have a full collection to make their orders from, I am designing another collection to integrate with AW12 which will need to be completed in the next week in order that we have it sampled in time for out debut showing in New York mid-February. It is, as always, an incredibly busy time for us!