For Oran O’Reilly, the Irish designer behind Chappell Roan’s scene-stealing red dress at Kentucky Pride last month, waiting for pop music’s newest megastar to take to the stage in the custom gown inspired by drag legend Divine was an exercise in slow torture.
“I was up at 3am scrolling through Twitter being like, ‘she didn’t wear it, she didn’t wear it’, because I saw no photos of her in it. I was so stressed, so stressed. And then saw photos of her in it. But I think I was so sleep deprived, I was like, that’s not my dress. I was 100% convinced that it wasn’t my dress. And I was like, okay, you know what? This is it. It’s over. It’s over for me.”
“My mum was like, ‘no, Oran, that’s your dress’. And I was like, ‘no, no, no, it’s not. You don’t understand’. Like, my whole family were like, you’re actually crazy, gaslighting yourself.”
“And then the next day, I got a notification on my phone saying, ‘Chappell Roan tagged you in a post’, and I was completely on the floor.
Speaking to RTÉ Lifestyle over the phone, he laughs at the memory of this emotional rollercoaster: “It was crazy, but I wouldn’t have had any other way. It was the perfect level of, like, theatrics to go through.”
Theatrics is written into the DNA of O’Reilly’s designs, which have been hand-picked by everyone from CMAT to The Last Dinner Party. The Rathgar native had originally planned to be a playwright, intent on creating theatre and building worlds.
“And then I got denied from Trinity”, he deadpans, “which was one of those moments where I was like, you know what? That’s a sign from the universe.”
He pivoted to production design and enrolled at IADT, where he’ll soon be entering his final year with an impressive CV of commissions already under his belt. There, he discovered costume design, a new medium for the worlds he’d created in his head.
“With design, whether it’s art or whether it’s fashion or whether it’s costume or whatever, it’s all kind of the same. It’s just storytelling”, he says.
Despite being firmly committed to his neutrals, O’Reilly’s designs reference everything from historical fashion and famous figures, to medical imagery and classic films, a confluence of influences that have resulted in a bewitching and subversive portfolio.
Although barely into his 20s, O’Reilly has seen enough of the dark side of fashion to know how important it is to stay true to your own tastes.
“Fashion and costume and the culture around it is a bit bonkers in terms of how people talk about other people’s bodies or, like, the way women are treated”, he says, adding that no matter who he is designing for, “I want them to feel good”.
We need your consent to load this Instagram contentWe use Instagram to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
O’Reilly’s career so far is an example of online brand building done perfectly. Design by design has acted as a kind of digital breadcrumb trail, allowing similarly minded creatives to find and support him.
He started his career designing for drag stars he admired, chief among them Bailey J. Mills, an English performer who was among the creatives O’Reilly reached out to with a desire to work with them. “I made a look for her and then I think CMAT saw it. And then The Last Dinner Party saw stuff I did for CMAT”, he explains.
From there, Genesis Webb, Chappell Roan’s stylist, saw looks he created for The Last Dinner Party and they began swapping ideas over Instagram. “It’s like this domino effect of social media of like, somebody posts something, they go to see who made the outfit.
“She emailed me the deck. I chose the Divine look [from John Waters’ 1972 cult classic film Pink Flamingos]. She said, go ahead, make it. And then I I think I made it in a week, sent it over, and then a month later it was worn.”
Working with drag performers, he says, also cemented his appreciation of the campy look, and has drawn in more fans who understand the aesthetic.
We need your consent to load this Instagram contentWe use Instagram to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
“That really cemented my confidence within myself in terms of designing, because I didn’t know how to sew, so I was making it up as I went along.”
“It was very much a learning curve in terms of not everything needs to be made to the best quality, if that makes sense”, he continues. “It’s performance, it’s theatre. Those early jobs of, like, making fun, campy things or whatever is very much about artifice and the folly of whatever you’re trying to create. And it’s about making silhouettes bigger than they should be and whatever else.”
Once he hit IADT and they “pared [him] back”, he found he was able to combine the fun and artifice of drag with the precision and skill of fashion.
We need your consent to load this Instagram contentWe use Instagram to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
Speaking of fashion school, I couldn’t help but wonder what his classmates make of their ‘favorite artist’s favorite artist’ wearing O’Reilly’s designs?
“I think everyone is surprised as I am”, he laughs. “Every day I’m surprised that people care about the silly little dresses that I make. There’s no airs. I don’t think about what I do. I think everyone’s like, do you know what? Good for him, he’s trying his best.”
Rounding out our chat, he sums up his work so far in simple terms: “All I’m doing is sitting in my room sewing my dresses, and I’m hoping for the best, you know?”
That, and seeing Chappell Roan wearing your custom designs on the world stage, of course.