Andreas Kronthaler

Andreas Kronthaler is an Austrian fashion designer and the Creative Director of Vivienne Westwood. Born in 1966, he met Vivienne Westwood in Vienna in 1988 during her teaching period at the Academy of Applied Arts. He moved to London in 1989 and entered the house’s design practice. By Autumn/Winter 1992–93 he was co-designing Always on Camera with Westwood, and by 1998 he was publicly described as her co-designer. He and Westwood married in 1993.

Kronthaler’s authority expanded across the mature house. By 2009 Westwood and Kronthaler were working together on Gold Label and he was directly involved in menswear with Francis Lowe. Westwood publicly called him her co-creator in 2011. His contribution encompassed garment design, fittings, styling and the development of Gold Label and Vivienne Westwood Man, making the later 2016 change of name a public acknowledgement of an established creative role.

For Autumn/Winter 2016–17 Gold Label became Andreas Kronthaler for Vivienne Westwood. The renamed Paris line retained its place inside the Vivienne Westwood house and gave Kronthaler explicit authorship of its principal experimental runway collection. The same year Red Label and Vivienne Westwood Man were consolidated into the global Vivienne Westwood mainline. Westwood remained active in design after these changes, and the two continued to work together through her final years.

Following Westwood’s death in December 2022, Kronthaler continued the Creative Director mandate he already held. He leads Andreas Kronthaler for Vivienne Westwood and contributes to the wider creative direction of the house, alongside the London design team responsible for the mainline and specialist divisions. He also sits within the wider Westwood legacy through The Vivienne Foundation. His current role combines direct collection authorship, stewardship of the house archive and the continuation of a creative partnership that began decades before his name entered the line title.

Kronthaler’s work is grounded in garment construction, bodily proportion and the transformation of historical dress. His collections draw on corsetry, tailoring, drape, folk costume, ecclesiastical clothing, uniforms and domestic or found garments. These references can appear through enlarged volume, exposed construction, improvised layering and deliberate shifts in gendered convention. The result retains the physicality of Westwood’s house codes and gives them a highly personal scale and rhythm.

Material and styling decisions are central to his authorship. Fabrics can be wrapped, knotted, suspended or built into sculptural forms, and familiar garments are frequently displaced from their expected use. Menswear has been an important part of his practice for decades, including substantial work on Vivienne Westwood Man and the return of a dedicated Westwood menswear presentation in Milan in 2025. Casting and styling extend the garment language through age, body type and gender expression.

The archive operates as an active design resource. Kronthaler has repeatedly revisited Westwood silhouettes, historical garments and personal wardrobe material, then altered proportion, fabrication and context for new collections. After 2022 this archival work acquired an additional memorial dimension, especially in collections that engaged directly with Westwood’s clothing and shared history. His authority remains strongest on the named AKVW line, with mainline authorship still distributed through the London studio.

Political and environmental concerns remain visible through the house’s public activity, though Kronthaler’s collections often communicate through garment construction, character and theatrical image before explicit slogan. His practice joins technical fluency with improvisation and humour and preserves the house’s appetite for historical dress and bodily exaggeration through a distinct authorial voice.