Barbara Hulanicki
Doctor of Letters

As a fashion designer and retailer in the 60s and 70s Barbara was responsible for bringing affordable, unique and stylish fashion to the masses and she enthralled a generation of British women by gauging what the public wanted.

Polish born Barbara was raised in England. In 1964 she founded the boutique BIBA with her late husband Stephen Fitz-Simon. The BIBA store was a popular hangout for artists, film stars and rock musicians. BIBA expanded through the late 60s culminating in Big BIBA, Britain’s first superstore boutique. At one point there was a BIBA store in Queen’s Road Brighton, her only store to open outside London.

When BIBA closed in 1976 Barbara continued to work in fashion, designing for Fiorucci and Cacharel. In the 80s she opened a series of clothing boutiques and launched a makeup line, all under her own name. By 1987 Barbara had moved to Miami Beach where she became an interior and exterior designer. She has worked extensively for Island Records’ founder, Chris Blackwell, and has virtually single-handedly reconceived the art deco district in her home city. Last year she designed a range of wallpaper for Habitat and Graham Brown, as well as a fashion collection for Topshop and handbags for Coccinelle, Italy.

Barbara is an alumnus of the University of Brighton and last year she returned to the university to take part in a question and answer session following a screening of a documentary of her life and work, Beyond Biba.