Meet The Woman Who Helped Us Fall In Love With Faux Fur

In the November issue of IMAGE Magazine, Marie Kelly meets Shrimps founder Hannah Weiland.

“In just four short years, the petite, softly spoken Londoner has created a globally successful luxury womenswear brand from – wait for it – faux fur, and built its profile almost entirely on social networking site Instagram. She manages a team of 12 (including two Irish women), and her label is worn by the likes of Alexa Chung and sold alongside luxury labels at prestigious retailers including matchesfashion.com and Havana boutique in Dublin. Add to this that she’s happily engaged to a member of the Guinness family, has a mews home in Notting Hill in West London and a miniature black and white poodle called Lionel (who she describes as looking like a pint of Guinness), and she seems to have ticked an awful lot of boxes on that “must do by mid-life” list women tend to obsess over.

Weiland’s story reads something like a modern-day fairytale. She hadn’t yet finished her degree at London College of Fashion when in 2013, former model and fashion heavyweight Laura Bailey spotted Weiland’s quirky faux fur coats on Instagram, put in an order and asked if she could wear one to London Fashion Week. Bailey was then spotted by Natalie Massenet (in fact, she was chased down the street by Massenet), and Shrimps was stocked on Net-a-Porter within six months, just in time for SS14.”

To read more about Hannah Weiland and the rise of the Shrimps label, pick up a copy of the November issue of IMAGE Magazine. On sale now.