‘I love gowns, volume and a lot of drama': Meet the young Irish designer creating outfits for CMAT and Chappell Roan
CMAT
, actor and TV presenter
Siobhán McSweeney
, US pop superstar
Chappell Roan
and drag performer Bailey J Mills all have in common?
Well, they are fans of the young Irish
designer
Oran O'Reilly, otherwise known as Oran Aurelio, a recent graduate of the
Institute of Art, Design and Technology's
(IADT) four-year course on production design for
film
, the only course of its kind in Ireland.
Aurelio's striking silhouettes, colours and constructions, with some items made from old curtains and deadstock, display a lively and informed imagination at work. He says he was always interested in old movies and Hollywood, and the famous costume designer Edith Head.
He originally had ambitions to be a playwright. He speaks highly of designer Peter O'Brien, his tutor at IADT. 'I learned so much from him – the way he thinks, the way he talks about design, his cultural references are so specific to what I love about fashion.'
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He fell in love with costume design on the course, where 'I finally discovered what I was looking for – storytelling but it is fashion and glamour'.
Dressed in a stylish white shirt with mosaic cufflinks when we meet in Dublin, his appearance with goatee and moustache has a certain Florentine flourish, no doubt attributed to his half-Italian ancestry.
The youngest of five from Rathfarnham, in Dublin, his mother Orla, formerly a make-up artist in Brown Thomas, encouraged his love of glamour and 'dressing for the occasion'. His grandparents on his mother's side were from Reggio Calabria in southern Italy, and owned a shop on the quays selling religious goods – hence the mosaic cufflinks.
Ask him how he defines glamour and he cites Maria Callas singing Bellini's Casta Diva 'in a gorgeous gown – that is glamour, it is putting an effort into how you look'. He also references Babe Paley and the Swans, Truman Capote's New York socialites in the mid-20th century, and their famous hangout at La Cote Basque in the 1960s, as other examples of glamour.
'I love the idea of keeping glamour alive,' Oran O'Reilly says
The Duchess of Malfi cape from Oran's debut collection
Earnest, well read, and impeccably polite, his thirst for knowledge and experience is immediately obvious. His reputation and popularity has been growing rapidly in the drag community and with global pop stars too, after he started posting his work on Instagram.
'Social media has been such a catalogue for what I do. There is instant feedback, every voice is equal – it is quite terrifying in a way,' he says. A mention in British Vogue in 2023 as an up-and-coming talent remains a source of pride – 'it made me look legit'.
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Dublin photographer Sarah Doyle: 'I am more interested in style than fashion'
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Since then, his pieces have included a corset bodysuit with fringing inspired by 18th century dress for CMAT. He has designed a few pieces for Florence and the Machine, including one made from curtains found in a charity shop for Glastonbury in 2023.
There was a shirred taffeta gown for Irish singer Nell Mescal, costumes for British indie rock band The Last Dinner Party , a handknit dress with train for American actor Ally Ioannides and a red dress in neoprene for Chappell Roan inspired by the movie Pink Flamingos. 'I had to make 10 neoprene dresses after that for [Dublin boutique] Om Diva last June,' he sighs – with a smile.
We discuss how festivalgoers wear elements of the gear their stars sport, such as the sparkly cowboy hats and boots that could be seen everywhere at the recent Tate McRae concert at Dublin's 3Arena.
'It's almost such as a studio system (controlling every aspect of the business). Their persona is referenced in their clothes and that is how they sell themselves to the audience who tend to dress such as them,' he says. 'It's a uniform.'
His debut collection, The Tragedy of the Duchess of Malfi, was photographed at Loreto Abbey in Rathfarnham
His debut collection is called The Tragedy of the Duchess of Malfi (a Jacobean revenge tragedy), photographed in Loreto Abbey Rathfarnham, where he went to school. It will be presented on the steps of the National Concert Hall on September 2nd for his formal outing as a fashion designer, and will express his combination of theatricality, camp and glamour.
'I love gowns, opera coats, a lot of volume and a lot of drama. And point d'esprit (finely woven net lace).'
He hopes the collection will establish him as 'the kind of designer I would like to be and how I like to be perceived. I want to be able to craft gorgeous gown for people, and would be open to working with anyone (in that way).
'I love the idea of keeping glamour alive.'
Oran Aurelio's Instagram can be found here,
@oranaurelio
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