Talking about my generation - MARY QUANT'S FASHION REVOLUTION

The British designer raised hemlines and eyebrows as she liberated stifled women worldwide

With her skinny-ribbed sweaters, key-hole dresses, go-go boots and geometric hairstyles, designer Mary Quant sure made an impact on the world in the 1960s.

At a time when women weren’t even allowed to have their own bank accounts in her native Britain, the young art school graduate burst onto the fashion scene like a supernova, changing the world’s sartorial landscape forever.

Out went the waist clinching corsets, scratchy suspender belts and toe squeezing stilettos of the staid post-war era – and in came tights, round-toed shoes with clumpy heels, and hemlines raised to audacious heights.

The Beatles might have provided the rebellious soundtrack for the “youthquake” that reverberated around the world in the 1960s, but it was Mary Quant who supplied the look.

Now, a documentary simply called Quant is set to give the world a new appreciation of the ground-breaking designer.

Directed by actress Sadie Frost, the feature-length movie – yet to be scheduled for New Zealand release – promises not just to lift the lid on how one woman’s sense of liberation and innovation created a global sensation, but also some surprising details of her life.

Born in the 1930s to parents who were both teachers, Mary Quant started showing a flair for fashion from the age of seven, when she cut up a bedspread because she thought it would make a nice dress.

Her parents expected her to follow in their own footsteps and become a grammar school teacher, but Mary had different ideas, studying art at a university in London.