where he was working on a film being made about Kate Moss and the portrait artist Lucian Freud. “Lucian rarely painted anyone famous. His sittings are really long, so Kate had to go to his studio for months. They formed this kind of special friendship, so the film is about that relationship.”
Back in London, it was quickly apparent that a creative life was on the cards for him. At 16 he started ditching school to work in a hairdressing salon, and met Kate Moss through his sister. They became firm friends and he styled her hair from her early modelling career, and famously for her first Vogue cover. At 22 he became the youngest hair stylist to ever do a Vogue cover.
While his work tending to the locks of the rich and famous still sends him to exotic locales, Brown now spends most of the year in Galway. “I’m very lucky in that I’ve lived all over the world and had access to the most wonderful places and parties. But this here is the best place in the world. I identify as Irish. I mean, you can identify these days as a fridge if you want to, but I identify as Irish. My grandfather sold vegetables in the village here, so it’s home.
It’s Brown’s love of the local that has led him to his latest venture – a magazine about what he terms “Ireland’s Superpower – creativity”. The first issue of D’naleri was published earlier this year. “It all started when I saw this image on Instagram of a woman in yellow gloves – washing up gloves, and another image of the shadow of clothes hanging on a washing line. I never usually do this but I messaged the guy and asked him was he in London.
While the shots are striking, Brown is not interested in delivering a magazine that’s purely about the visual. “It’s not a fashion magazine,” he says. “No one is interested in, ‘Are polka dots the new stripes?’ The world’s a different place now. It’s not about politics either, it’s just a purely creative space. And it’s for different types of people, though it is Irish-led. So the magazine – D’naleri – is about trying to get them a foot on the ladder.