Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (150th Anniversary Edition with Dame Vivienne Westwood)

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Alice has long been a touchstone for fashion, too. Vivienne Westwood, Zac Posen, Viktor & Rolf, and John Galliano have all sent looks down the runway inspired by Caroll's characters and Tenniel's drawings, while the transformative, otherworldly possibilities of Wonderland hold appeal for fashion shoots. Does he mind being in her shadow? "No, not at all. He's not in my shadow anyway. He's a very bossy person actually. He prefers to let me do the public things. He has an original point of view, he's extremely interesting. What is good about him is that he likes to go out. He goes to the pub across the road and he just loves to look at people. So when he goes down the club, or is watching TV, I can get on with my reading." On politics: "I'm [Brown's] worst enemy. I hate that man. I hate his cowardice, the fact that he just acquiesced in everything the horrible, disgusting Blair wanted to do. Cameron doesn't seem to have much to say, and the Liberal Democrats are following the government ideas. They are all old-fashioned thinkers." I recently interviewed her oldest son, Ben, who is a pornographer. He has recently been campaigning against the government's plan to criminalise the possession of extreme pornography. What does she make of his career choice? "It's such a cliche, that pin-up styling," she says. "I think it's boring because of that. Otherwise, I think it's fine. But I think he should make the women look more glamorous, more interesting. But then it probably wouldn't be porn if the women looked too strong." Scieszka’s retelling substantially alters and abridges the film and the original books. Both Carroll’s and Disney’s versions allude to Isaac Watts’ poem "Against Idleness and Mischief." In each version, however, the poem is changed from “how doth the little busy bee” to “how doth the little crocodile,” replacing the original text with incorrect verses. This allusion was removed from Scieszka’s version, a clear example of the changing times, since children no longer memorize Watts’ poems during their early education as they once did.

Maybe it offends her feminist principles, I suggest. "Oh no, I'm anti-feminist," she says. "They don't see the wood for the trees and everything has to be viewed from this feminist point of view. I know women have suffered and I think it's great that people stand up for women's rights but the problem with feminists is that they somehow consider women to be superior beings. And in the end, they just want to be men anyway. They want to do men's work." I try to ask her what she means by "men's work" but she steamrollers on. "[Feminists] certainly underestimate the power women [have had] in influencing their children, or men."V&A ‘Alice: Curiouser And Curiouser’ exhibition features Vivienne Westwood, Iris van Herpen and Viktor and Rolf

Westwood herself hosted an event during the installation, reading from the novel to more than twenty children from the charities The Kid’s Company and Rays of Sunshine. It was an appropriately heartfelt conclusion to an event that allowed one modern icon of British culture to pay tribute to another even more venerable one, and to give vibrant life to their shared lineage of playful, dangerous, intelligent anarchy. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland may technically be a children’s book, but Westwood fixes it with a universal theme. She drives us away from complacency: “The games [Carrol] plays with Alice empower her to think”. Even if the comparison between Wonderland and the establishment feels too radical, or too crass, for some, Westwood’s anarchy also “empowers” us to think. This marks the first V&A exhibition ever to offer a virtual reality experience and has been developed in partnership with HTC Vive Arts and produced by immersive games studio Preloaded. The visuals are based on new artworks created by Icelandic artist Kristjana S. Williams, commissioned for the V&A’s exhibition publication. I was hoping to see Westwood's third husband, Andreas Kronthaler, but he isn't in the studio. Westwood met him when she was teaching a class in Vienna and he was one of her students and they married in 1992. "It's amazing, it's incredible," she says of their relationship. "I feel so sure about it. He's so supportive and we're just so interested in each other. He's an amazing person." From the very beginning, then, the image of "Alice" has always been central. Tenniel certainly set an extremely high bar for illustrations – and he established many of the Wonderland tropes that endure across every medium, from her pinafore dress to the Hatter's top hat. Part of the reason Alice is so easily re-imagined is because she is so codified in the first place – something artists both use and subvert.

An illustration of Alice by John Tenniel

When Lewis Carroll dropped Alice into Wonderland,” she writes in her introduction, “she became his agent in a conspiracy to undermine adult notions of logic”. Unlike most of the children's books of the day, Alice and through the Looking Glass did not attempt to convey obvious moral lessons. Nor did they contain what critics have tried to insist are there—hidden meanings relating to religion or politics. They are delightful adventure stories in which a normal, healthy, clearheaded little girl reacts to the "reality" of the adult world. Their appeal to adults as well as to children lies in Alice's intelligent response to ridiculous language and action. Lewis Carroll was born Charles Lutwidge Dodgson on January 27, 1832, the eldest son and third of eleven children born to Frances Jane Lutwidge and the Reverend Charles Dodgson. Carroll had a happy childhood. His mother was patient and gentle, and his father, despite his religious duties, tutored all his children and raised them to be good people. Carroll frequently made up games and wrote stories and poems, some of which were similar to his later published works, for his seven sisters and three brothers. Westwood has a well-documented history in activism, notably her recent campaigning against climate change. Yet these documents feel strangely placed in the introduction to a book like Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. So what is Westwood’s thinking here? Punk is characterized by a consistent rejection of the mainstream. And while punk is often associated with a distinct musical style, fashion designers like Vivienne Westwood crossed mediums and helped shape a uniquely punk fashion movement by pushing against traditionally feminine aesthetics with dark colors and oversized pieces.

One of the messages of her last collection was "don't buy clothes" and she rails against consumerism, strange for a fashion designer who produces several collections a year, for an industry that is nothing if not about consumers. "You might think that's really disingenuous of me, but I'm serious," she says. "I'm not here to defend [being a fashion designer], it's something I do. It seems fitting, then, that Westwood’s view of Wonderland’s “adult logic” is that it is entirely illogical. Is it important for her to be in love? "No, it wasn't. One of the greatest periods of my life was when I was without a man, sexually or any real way, for about 10 years. Except that wasn't really true because I was very close to my friend Gary Ness, who is dead. He was a homosexual but I was very attracted to him. I was not looking for a man at all, and if you want to find a man, maybe don't look for one and you might get one."Wonderland is always a powerful metaphor or idea to work with," says Bailey. And that's what the V&A show is interested in: how one man's nonsensical story, made up to entertain a little girl, has allowed so many generations of readers and so many restlessly reinventing artists to go down the rabbit hole of their own imagination. Other characters from Wonderland are just as famous as Alice. The Mad Hatter, the Queen of Hearts, and the Cheshire Cat appear through modern lenses. For example, in true 1960s aesthetic, a psychedelic poster designed by Joseph McHugh portrays a red-eyed Cheshire Cat. The exhibit will also include images from modern dramatic renditions of the tale. The costume designs of the 2010 Tim Burton film and Christopher Wheeldon's ballet (performed in 2011 by London's Royal Ballet) demonstrate the enduring relevance of Carroll's characters. Original Walt Disney concept art created for the animated 1951 film will also be on view. In the book, the King of Hearts tells us: “Begin at the beginning . . . and go on till you come to the end, then stop.” The choice of language is evocative. “Agent” and “conspiracy” seem incongruous words to use in the context of Alice in Wonderland. What they do, however, is link Alice to Westwood’s broader, typically anarchic, interpretation of the book. Wonderland as symbolic of our present day society, and Alice becomes a rebel who sees through this madness.

Born in Tintwistle, Derbyshire on 8 April, 1941, the doyenne of British fashion, Dame Vivienne Westwood (Vivienne Isabel Swire) forayed into the world of design in the early 1970s, after working as a primary school teacher and making her own jewellery that she would sell at local stalls. A voracious reader and an enthusiastic creator, she stitched together her bridal dress for her first marriage to Derek Westwood, before meeting Malcolm McLaren (musician, impresario, and singer-songwriter who also promoted and managed the band, ‘Sex Pistols’ and ‘New York Dolls’). I'm not interested in talking about little anecdotes about things that have happened to me," she says, not unkindly. I suppose her past has been gone over so much that it is threadbare. Westwood grew up in the Pennine village of Tintwistle, where her father worked in the Wall's sausage factory and her mother was an assistant at the local greengrocers. After art college, Vivienne Swire married Derek Westwood, a factory apprentice, and their son Ben was born. The marriage didn't last, and when Westwood met Malcolm McLaren, she fell pregnant with her second son, Joe, almost immediately.During the digital press preview, Kate Bailey, senior curator of theatre and performance at the V&A, said: “This is the first exhibition to look at the impact and influence of Alice across disciplines, and we will provide visitors with a dynamic theatrical experience, transporting them through space, time and scale into a series of different encounters and dimensions, inspired by the books through Alice’s adventurous journey. The exhibition aims to immerse visitors into the world of Alice around every turn, including a “mind-bending” game of croquet in virtual reality. Visitors emerge into the Queen of Hearts’ croquet ground to pit their wits in ‘A Curious Game of Croquet’. Kronthaler is 25 years her junior and she has often spoken of how he goes off on holiday without her ("I hate to travel"). It is perhaps mean to even suggest it, but does she ever worry he will leave her? "No, I don't. But it's difficult to say that and one doesn't want to sound complacent. I know he's committed to me. We support each other, intellectually and in all kinds of ways." Over time Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland has taken on a number of different interpretations. Author of Alice’s Adventures: Lewis Carroll in Popular Culture, Professor Will Brooker, describes how “In the 1930s it was psychoanalysis, in the 1960s it was psychedelia, and in the 1990s paedophilia”.