Agyness Deyn’s ineffable presence, characterised by her androgynous features, tomboyish charm and lopsided peroxide chop, made her a runway favourite during the Noughties. When she wasn’t frequenting raves and nightclubs with her rock star pals, the Oldham model was muse to fashion houses like Dior, Chanel and Jean Paul Gaultier. Backstage at shows, she was often photographed wearing her beloved Dr Martens (she eventually collaborated with the brand in 2010). In a nutshell: she was the poster girl for indie sleaze before anyone was calling it that. Now, a decade on, Agyness made a triumphant return to the runway in Sacai’s spring/summer 2024 show at Paris Fashion Week.
“We moved back to New York for my daughter’s school, and then the next thing I knew I had a call from my agent asking if I wanted to walk a show in Paris,” Agyness tells Vogue over the phone ahead of the show. “Then, I met with [Sacai designer] Chitose Abe and I was starstruck. I’m such a fan of the brand, so it felt exciting, as well as organic, to be doing the show with her.” On the Sacai runway, she made a striking entrance in a sleeveless white top that’s tucked into black voluminous, sheer-panelled trousers. Even after her absence from the circuit, Deyn can still command the runway at 40.
After taking an unofficial hiatus in 2012 to focus on acting and start a family with her husband (she’s now a mother of three), Agyness feels blessed when she looks back on her career in fashion now, from being scouted in London at 18 to walking the runway for practically every major brand. Reflecting on her modelling journey, she shares: “I have such a deep love for it all – the adrenaline of racing between shows on bikes, and experiences like having honey applied to my hair after having it stripped of something else from another show. It was so exhilarating – worlds apart from my upbringing in the north. Living that extraordinary life felt like a dream, and I had to constantly pinch myself to believe it was real.”
Agyness also fondly recalls the close friendships she formed with fellow models during that time, including Behati Prinsloo, Coco Rocha, Lily Donaldson and Jessica Stam. The young women were a crucial support network for one another in the whirlwind of the fashion industry. “We were a tight-knit group, like a family, so I always had a good time and felt a sense of security,” she says now. “We would drink espressos and go out to parties, then get woken up in the middle of the night to go to a fitting in our pyjamas… Oh, and [we were] smoking cigarettes constantly, but I don’t do that anymore.”
As for the resurgence of indie sleaze, a trend the model had a hand in shaping the first time around, Agyness confesses that she only learned of the catch-all phrase to describe band tees, spray-on denim and skinny scarves very recently. “We didn’t really think about it at the time – it was a lot of industries colliding, ranging from fashion personalities to artists and bands,” she recollects. “As for the look, it’s that feeling of grabbing the first thing you see in the morning to wear – a sort of balls-to-the-wall kind of vibe.” Will today’s interpretation of the trend endure? “It’ll probably be a bit more buttoned-up now,” Deyn says. “I don’t think you can ever fully replicate something as it was, though.”
Before ending the call, we had to ask Agyness if she still wears her Dr Martens. “I still prefer to wear menswear, although with feminine pieces like gold ballet slippers and a Jil Sander bag,” she says. “But, yes, I’ll always go back to my Docs… It’s ingrained in me to do so, and I can wear the same pairs I did when I was a teenager: one in black, the other in cherry.”
