From Rolls-Royce to Royals: Bradley Theodore talks fashion icons, David Bowie and the “nepo babies” that have taken over New York
Famed for painting everything from Rolls-Royce cars to vibrant street murals—and even a submarine—Bradley Theodore now turns his artistic lens toward Marie Antoinette and the pioneers of fashion.
A true creative force, Theodore’s work lives at the intersection of art, fashion, and technology. With his signature style—bold, bright, and unmistakably his—he has left his mark across the globe. In New York, his murals energise entire neighbourhoods. But his reach goes far beyond the street: he’s customised cars for Rolls-Royce, hand-painted trousers for fashion icon Iris Apfel, designed album covers, collaborated with Def Jam and Sony, created decorative plate collections, and even transformed an ex-Soviet submarine in Montenegro into a canvas.
Fashion remains at the heart of his vision—not just as inspiration, but as a way to bring art closer to everyday life.
His new exhibition, Reign of Fashion, coincides with a renewed cultural fascination with Marie Antoinette, spurred by a major Victoria & Albert Museum show. But Theodore insists it’s pure coincidence. “I lived across from the Louvre in my 20s,” he recalls. “I’ve been fascinated by Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI ever since.”
Those years in Paris left a lasting mark. He immersed himself in French history and design, frequently visiting museums and the Palace of Versailles to study the opulence of the monarchy. “I’ve always been obsessed with fashion history,” he says. “The Louis XVI era was revolutionary—he reappropriated the world.”
Now, in Fashion Mavericks, a striking portrait series, Theodore pays tribute to the founders of the world’s most iconic fashion houses—Guccio Gucci, Coco Chanel, Karl Lagerfeld, Edoardo Fendi, and Thierry Hermès.
“I wanted to paint them as the royalty of their era,” he explains. “Most of them came from humble beginnings.” The thread tying these fashion pioneers to Marie Antoinette? Cultural immortality. “She wasn’t the first fashion icon,” he says. “Catherine the Great was. She used fashion as a tool of power—those regal gowns and robes were her armour.”
Theodore is known for reimagining cultural icons in fresh, unexpected ways. For the opening night of his Clarendon Fine Art show, he’ll debut a live performance: painting a Birkin bag—something he’s declined “a thousand times,” despite countless high offers. “But now felt like the right time,” he says. The Birkin, after all, is a modern symbol of extravagance—just like Marie Antoinette. (One famously sold at Sotheby’s for £7 million.)
Theodore’s journey started in the Turks and Caicos but took a sharp turn when his family moved to Miami. Raised in what he describes as “a very psychotic neighbourhood,” and battling a severe speech impediment, he found solace in drawing. Art became his voice.
Everything changed when he moved to New York at 17. Surrounded by the city’s raw creative energy, he mingled with the likes of the Wu-Tang Clan, Björk, Tricky, and David Bowie. “New York had no borders then. Anything felt possible,” he remembers. “We’d work all day and party all night in SoHo—gallery openings, new bars, everyone mixed together. Not like today’s ‘nepo baby’ scene of today. Now it’s changed. If I go to event now, I’ll see people posing. They don’t really buy into the creative scene in the same way. I’d rather hang out with people who have good vibes and no money than the other way around. Back in the 90s and noughts, there was a creative vibe.”
Though he was building confidence through art and nightlife, Theodore’s transformation was just as intellectual. “I started reading everything—history, communication theory. It helped me heal.” Reading became a tool for self-expression and mental clarity.
Through the New York creative circuit, Theodore met fashion legend Donna Karan —“we used to club together,” he says—and soon became connected to style heavyweights like André Leon Talley. He recalls a quintessential New York moment: “I was at lunch with Will.i.am and Whoopi Goldberg, and Donatella Versace walks in—flanked by the best-looking bodyguards I’ve ever seen.”
Later, he became friends—and neighbours—with David Bowie and Iman. “Bowie had this quiet grace. No one ever bothered him. He just moved through the world with ease.” Reflecting on Bowie’s passing, Theodore echoes actor Gary Oldman’s sentiment: “The world’s gone to shit since Bowie died.” And what would Bowie say about the present? Theodore doesn’t miss a beat: “He saw it coming. He wrote I’m Afraid of Americans in 1997.”
By 2012, disillusioned with the commercial turn of the club scene and street art, Theodore retreated to a Brooklyn studio, where he spent a year in near-total isolation. The result was a new visual language—vivid, skull-laced, tattoo-inspired work deeply rooted in cultural symbolism. While not all pieces feature literal skeletons, his art consistently explores the tension between life and death, beauty and decay.
“I believe fashion allows people to become art,” he says. That belief inspired his now-iconic portraits of fashion figures. In 2013, he painted Karl Lagerfeld and Anna Wintour on the shutters of a Bowery pizzeria, cleverly hiding his contact info in Lagerfeld’s ponytail. Within 48 hours, the mural had over 200,000 Instagram likes—and Theodore was catapulted into the spotlight.
His first painting was bought by Alyssa Milano, the second by Whoopi Goldberg. Since then, his work has been collected by major names including Adele, Adrien Brody, Bryan Cranston, Kate Moss, Iris Apfel, and Salma Hayek—who reportedly purchased a portrait of Prince.
Ever in tune with the pulse of culture, fashion, and art, Bradley Theodore continues to dissect modern fame through bold colour, layered storytelling, and razor-sharp cultural commentary. A street artist with the insight of a philosopher, he paints not just what’s visible—but what it means. As for the kind of creativity that he found in cities all over the world, he ends on an optimistic note and says, “Maybe it’ll go back that way.”
Bradley Theodore
On view at Clarendon Fine Art
46 Dover St, London W1S 4FF
19–29 September
clarendonfineart.com
Editor in Chief of Ikon London Magazine, journalist, film producer and founder of The DAFTA Film Awards (The DAFTAs).
