Donovan, who died in 1996, was one of the significant image-makers who produced the famous London look of the 1960s. “It’s a very British thing: the Union Jack, Twiggy,” says Muir. But, as the new show demonstrates, there was more to Donovan than his renowned women’s-fashion shoots. 

“Al just struck up a rapport with people,” says Martin Barnes, senior curator at the V&A Museum, of the photographer Al Vandenberg, whose new book, On a Good Day, depicts London street life in the 1970s and 1980s.

On a Monday morning in Stoke Newington, London, the model Tessa Kuragi arrives for our brunch wearing a leather harness. In fact, it’s the “Tessa Harness” by Tamzin Lillywhite, named after her, and it snakes across her stomach, up her breastbone, and around her throat. She’s wearing it over a black turtleneck sweater; she has dozens of freckles, velvety red-wine lipstick, and an immaculate blunt bob. At first glance, I think of both Louise Brooks and Wednesday Addams. 

London’s new Audrey Hepburn exhibition has a satisfying symmetry. It opens with snapshots from her childhood in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands, when she gave ballet recitals to raise money for the Resistance — and it closes with a poignant image of her 50 years later, striking a dance pose in Steven Meisel’s studio, in what was to be the last major photo shoot of her life.

Back in the early 1990s, before there was a Savage Beauty show or friendship with Kate Moss, Alexander “Lee” McQueen was a young fashion graduate, living in a squat and producing fashion collections on a shoestring. Back in those early days, his world was full of friends and collaborators from Central Saint Martins — including Gary Wallis, who was just starting out as a photographer. 

In 2007, the photographer Nick Waplington was approached by Lee Alexander McQueen to collaborate on a photography book. McQueen’s idea was to document his working process, following one collection from its conception to the final show. He went to Waplington, he said, because he liked his “dirty, messy style.”

Look back at old photos from disposable cameras now, and you'll find they're endearingly unpolished. When someone took a group shot at a party, you didn’t know how you looked until the prints came back — and, more often than not, you'd be captured in the middle of an unflattering blink or sneeze.

This weekend, the V&A Museum launches its latest large-scale fashion exhibition — a retrospective of the work of the legendary Vogue photographer Horst P. Horst.

The acclaimed British photographer Ewen Spencer is perhaps best known for capturing the gritty nightlife of London — but that doesn’t mean he actually wants to live there. “London is quite unforgiving,” he says as we drive through the small seaside town of Brighton, where he’s been living for over a decade. “I’ve had a lot of attempted muggings.”

Martin Parr, the renowned British photographer and president of Magnum Photos, is wearing his only piece of designer clothing when we meet: a Paul Smith sweater. “It was in the sale. I would never pay full price!” he tells the Cut. “That jumper is the only thing I’ve ever bought consciously that I knew the label of — as opposed to walking into a shop because it’s next to the bank.”

It starts with claiming your spot on the riser. Then you need something to stand on to make sure you have a perfectly clear view; something for the photographer behind you to stand on, so that he can aim his camera above your head. Then you wait in position as the editors, buyers, and front-row stars come trickling in to their seats.