With handwritten lyrics, iconic looks and more, this retrospective pays loving homage to Amy Winehouse’s life and career

The legacy of Amy Winehouse feels like a combination of iconography and intimacy. Her diminutive, beehived silhouette is an instantly recognisable piece of pop culture, but her music was coloured by confession — and her darkest moments were strewn across newspapers.

This sensitively arranged retrospective at the Design Museum takes it all in, honouring her deeply stylistic approach to music and fashion, but also painting a warmly familiar picture of Winehouse as a young artist.

A collage of unguarded family photos, provided by Amy’s mother Janis, show her daughter as a teenager on family holidays, having her hair cut by her grandmother, and performing at a Finchley pub as a relative unknown in 2002. Directly opposite is an old street sign for Camden Square, covered in scribbled tributes from fans after Winehouse’s tragic passing, less than a decade later. It’s a heart-rending juxtaposition.

Those glimpses of pre-fame Amy are plenty, with a handwritten list outlining her ambitions for the future (among them, “to be photographed by David LaChappelle”, which she achieved years later), pages of sketched lyrics, most of which were never released as fully formed songs, and a video of Winehouse auditioning for Island Record execs, who applaud rapturously once she’s finished singing. They knew they were onto something.

 This is a warmingly familiar picture of Winehouse as a young artist
Valerie Philips

 

The musical influences that set her in stark contrast to the factory-farmed pop of the Noughties are clearly defined, whether it’s the old-school jazz of John Coltrane, the neo-soul of Lauryn Hill or the torch songs of Dinah Washington. It’s all beautifully realised in the form of a recreated recording studio, with layered projections showing how Winehouse’s artistry mingled with that of her heroes.

Her fashion inspirations are picked apart too, with lines drawn between the Sixties girl groups she listened to and her fondness for winged eyeliner (as well as that beehive hair-do), and explanations of her love of the clothes worn by American hip-hop artists in 90s led her to seek out similarly bold styles on the high streets of London.

All these tropes came together for something searingly individualistic, though, and the exhibition revels in that. The huge, tiered gallery of some of Winehouse’s finest looks is a glorious collage of colour (the yellow Preen dress and custom-made, heart-shaped Moschino bag, worn to the 2007 BRIT Awards, is an eye-popping standout). Winehouse’s former stylist, Naomi Parry, came onboard as an adviser to the museum’s curators; her contribution feels invaluable.

 A number of Winehouse’s iconic looks are on display
Ed Reeve

 

The more traumatic moments of Winehouse’s life aren’t over-magnified. A wall of newspaper cuttings remind us how often Winehouse’s demons were trivialised, and even romanticised, in the press, and there’s a thoughtful recognition of how her body image “changed radically” as a result of poor mental health, substance misuse and disordered eating.

But this is, above all, a celebration. An immersive installation closes the exhibition, and lovingly reimagines a 2007 live performance of Tears Dry On Their Own. It’s a heartfelt reminder of a generational talent, lost too soon