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Grunge glamour is making a comeback because people are looking for comfort and are nostalgic for an era that seemed to be so much more comforting than the times we live in today.

You only have to switch on the news to see how exhausting life has become, all over the world, yet people watch this stuff 24 hours a day. It’s driving us all insane. Especially Trump. Compared with this, the Clinton years were financially comfortable for many more people, while fashion-wise it was a really interesting, brave time, with designers breaking boundaries.

On the recent runways I was stoked to see the slip dress making a serious comeback at Christopher Kane and Coach — it was like a flashback! The Nineties look, especially bias cut, feminine figure-skimming dresses, became my signature look — I guess partly because I was brought up in a gender-neutral household.

Growing up, first in San Francisco, later in Oregon, my mom, who was a psychologist, insisted on having no dresses or patent leather shoes at home. I was only allowed to wear dresses on special occasions. Why? It was a phase she went through. So when I was older it was hardly surprising that I ran straight for glamour, dying to wear anything that was shiny and ultra-feminine. I was a street kid for a long time and couldn’t afford anything other than thrift store vintage clothing — little slip dresses I wore for around 10 years.

When Kurt and I were together in the Eighties and early Nineties, neither of us were into fashion at all. It was another planet — a moon somewhere. I didn’t know anything about it. I thought I could make my own fashion and didn’t need other people to tell me. I had a kind of punk attitude towards it all. You just wore what you wanted to wear, whatever made you look good. Kurt was the same. So one time, I remember, we were lying in bed and opened The New York Times to see ‘fashion’ pictures of him splashed across the paper. We were both amazed. Kurt didn’t get it. He’d always shied away from anything to do with fashion and it freaked him out.

Grunge Glamour 7 show all Grunge Glamour 1/7 helmut lang SS18 FilmMagic 2/7 No21 SS18 3/7 olivier theyskens SS18 4/7 coach SS18 5/7 No21 SS18 6/7 Paco Rabanne SS18 Yannis Vlamos/www.pixelformula.c 7/7 peter pilotto SS18

In 1992, Marc Jacobs came out with his famous grunge collection for Perry Ellis. It was inspired by the whole Seattle grunge scene and Kurt’s band, Nirvana. It was unlike anything that had been on the catwalks before. Imagine plaid shirts with granny dresses and Doc Martens, baggy cartoon nighties with knitted hats. Everyone hated it, the critics were ferocious and Marc was fired. Sadly he’d lent us a lot of those clothes, and, stupidly, we got rid of most of them — because, I don’t know, we were really frightened by them. I regret that hugely as I’d love to have some pieces. It was a very special collection and Marc is one of my dearest friends now. But I didn’t get it at that point.

Then Kurt passed away in 1994, so by the time I was doing movies and started getting into fashion a couple of years later, he wasn’t around. It started with a call from Gianni Versace, asking me to come to a fashion show. I think it was 1996. They used to pay a fee back then to go to a show and I had such a hard time with that, thinking I don’t want to sell out, this is not what I do. But Gianni was so nice and so sweet on the phone, and I justified my decision to go by giving the money to a friend to open a bakery in Portland.

Then when I did the Versace campaign with Richard Avedon, I was allowed to keep all those beautiful couture dresses. I wore one of them to a party I threw in LA for Edward Norton when we were dating. We’d met in 1996 when we were both starring in The People vs Larry Flynt and were together for four years. It was a crazy party and I spared no expense. Everyone who was anyone came, old Hollywood, new Hollywood, from Charlton Heston to Harrison Ford, from the Spice Girls and all these other new pop stars, to Leonardo [DiCaprio] who was really young back then — but still with a ton of pretty girls. The dress was made of crepe with silk on the bottom, but on top was some kind of almost plastic textile covered in rosettes. It was incredible and weird, but beautiful. So I guess that was when I well and truly bought into fashion, and from then on, I was like, I LOVE IT. COUTURE! So, that’s how I went from grunge to glamour.

Courtney Love - In pictures 42 show all Courtney Love - In pictures 1/42 Courtney Love attends the Theo Fennell Show Off cocktail party, at the Royal Academy of Arts, London in 2007 Dave Benett 2/42 Courtney Love arrives for the 69th Academy Awards ceremony in 1997 AFP 3/42 Courtney Love with her band 'Hole' 4/42 Courtney Love performs at the Bowery Ballroom, New York in 2004 AP 5/42 Courtney Love receives the "Best Personal Style-Female" award at the VH1 Fashion Awards in 1997 AP 6/42 Courtney Love and members of her group 'Hole' pose backstage after performing at the MTV Video Music Awards in 1998 AP 7/42 Courtney Love and actress Drew Barrymore arrive at the MTV Music Awards at Radio City Music Hall, New York in 1999 Reuters 8/42 Courtney Love arrives prior to the taping of the fifth annual Blockbuster Entertainment Awards on 25 May 1999 in Los Angeles Reuters 9/42 Courtney Love poses for photographers during the 57th Golden Globe Awards in Beverly Hills on 23 January 2000 AFP/Getty Images 10/42 Courtney Love snowboards during the filming of a VH1 cable television special "Lift Ticket To Ride," during the Sundance Film Festival 2001 in Park City, Utah Reuters 11/42 Courtney Love poses as she arrives at the Vanity Fair post-Academy Awards party at Mortons in Los Angeles on 25 March 2001 Reuters 12/42 Courtney Love in Los Angeles on 27 October 2004 AP 13/42 Courtney Love appears backstage at the 46th Annual Grammy Awards in 2004 AP 14/42 Courtney Love arrives for the grand opening party of Rokbar Hollywood on 30 June 2005 Getty Images 15/42 Courtney Love attends the presentation of British designer Stella McCartney's ready-to-wear fall/winter 2006-2007 fashion collection in Paris on 2 March 2006 Reuters 16/42 Courtney Love arrives at the premiere of "Borat: Cultural Learnings Of America" held at the Grauman's Chinese Theatre on 23 October 2006 in Hollywood, California Getty Images 17/42 Courtney Love arrives for the ELLE Style Awards 2009 at Big Sky London PA 18/42 Courtney Love attends the 8th Annual Elton John AIDS Foundation's "An Enduring Vision" benefit at Cipriani, Wall Street on 16 November 2009 in New York Getty Images 19/42 Pixie Geldof and Courtney Love attend Vogue.it during Milan Fashion Week Womenswear Autumn/Winter 2010 on 26 February 2010 in Milan, Italy Getty Images 20/42 Courtney Love arrives at the Shockwaves NME Awards 2010 at Brixton Academy Getty Images 21/42 Courtney Love performs on stage during the 2nd Annual amfAR Inspiration Gala at The Museum of Modern Art on 14 June 2011 in New York Getty Images 22/42 Courtney Love attends amfAR's Cinema Against AIDS Gala during the 64th Annual Cannes Film Festival in 2011 Getty Images 23/42 Courtney Love arriving at the Metropolitan Opera Season Opening Gala, New York in 2012 AP 24/42 Courtney Love arrives at the annual British Fashion Awards ceremony held at the Coliseum Theatre, London in 2014 EPA 25/42 Courtney Love attends the after party for the launch of Salvatore Ferragamo's Signorina fragrance at Palazzo Chupi on 20 March 2012 in New York Getty Images 26/42 Courtney Love performs at Vinyl inside the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino during the venue's anniversary celebration on 22 August 2013 in Las Vegas, Nevada Getty Images 27/42 Courtney Love arrives for the amfAR Inspiration Gala at the Museum of Modern Art, New York in 2014 EPA 28/42 Courtney Love is seen on stage during the Lifeball 2014 in Vienna, Austria Getty Images 29/42 Courtney Love performs during the Philipp Plein fashion show as part of Milan Fashion Week Spring/Summer 2016 on 23 September 2015 in Milan, Italy Getty Images 30/42 Courtney Love attends the premiere of "Kurt Cobain: Montage Of Heck" during the 2015 Tribeca Film Festival Getty Images 31/42 Courtney Love attends the Coach 1941 Women's Spring 2017 Show at Pier 76 on 13 September 2016 Getty Images for Coach 32/42 Courtney Love attends a special In Conversation event with Courtney Love as part of the Liberatum 'Women in Creativity' series presented by St Martins Lane on 21 March 2016 in London Dave Benett 33/42 Courtney Love performs at the Linda Perry celebration for the song "Hands Of Love" from the Film "Freeheld" on 5 January 2016 in Los Angeles, California Getty Images 34/42 Courtney Love attends the launch party hosted by Christopher Bailey and Jefferson Hack to celebrate the Burberry and Dazed cover featuring Jean Campbell at Makers House on 20 September 2016 in London Dave Benett 35/42 Courtney Love attends the opening night of "Hedwig And The Angry Inch" at the Pantages Theatre on 2 November 2016 in Hollywood, California Getty Images 36/42 Courtney Love, wearing Gucci, attends the 2016 LACMA Art + Film Gala honoring Robert Irwin and Kathryn Bigelow presented by Gucci at LACMA Getty Images 37/42 Courtney Love attends the GQ Men Of The Year Awards at the Tate Modern in 2017 Dave Benett 38/42 Courtney Love attends 'The Talk Of The Townhouse' hosted by JO MALONE LONDON in 2017 Dave Benett 39/42 Courtney Love attends the premiere of Focus Features' "The Beguiled" at the Directors Guild of America on 12 June 2017 in Los Angeles, California Getty Images 40/42 Frances Bean Cobain kisses her mother Courtney Love as they arrive at The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute benefit gala in 2017 AP 41/42 The launch of the new L'Oreal Paris X Balmain Paris lipstick collection at L'Ecole de Medecine in 2017 42/42 Courtney Love and Kate Moss attend a private dinner celebrating the launch of the KATE MOSS X ARA VARTANIAN collection at Isabel on 17 May 2017 in London Dave Benett

I still collect Galliano bias cut gowns — they’re comfortable and so much easier to wear than all those structured, beaded dresses that came in with the Noughties. I’ve never embraced that look, or worn anything sculptural in my life. At the GQ Men of the Year Awards last September, I wore vintage Galliano which I’d rented, as I’d run out of Galliano gowns that I hadn’t worn. They’re hard to find; I go on eBay all the time.

I also collect vintage Chloé, especially Phoebe [Philo] and Stella [McCartney] era Chloé, like the pineapple bathing suit [Stella for Chloé 2001] and blouses with little collars. I have a ton of Victoria Beckham dresses too, mostly crepe and wool crepe. I have some of her neoprene stuff too, but it’s not that comfortable, apart from the workout wear. I keep fit by hiking, usually in Kate Hudson Fabletics, as she gave me a whole bunch of her workout clothes. My other favourite designers are Roksanda — the dresses are really pretty, with cool, modern shapes — Monse, Oscar de la Renta and Narciso Rodriguez. Narciso’s style, especially, is a throwback to the Nineties because he hasn’t really changed all that much.

To get away with wearing a bias cut dress, you have to be pretty confident and in somewhat okay shape, as the fabric skims your butt and stomach. It’s best to wear high shoes so everything is lifted up and your boobs have to be kind of together, because you can’t wear a bra. For as long as my body holds up, I’ll keep wearing them. My daughter [Frances Bean Cobain] has a style that’s very different from mine. It’s more jeans and T-shirts, but she’ll wear Saint Laurent jeans with Gucci T-shirts. She loves vintage too, but doesn’t borrow my clothes because we’re different sizes. She’s very tiny and definitely has her own style.

I’m not big on accessories because I tend to lose things. For an event, I borrow a maximum of two items of jewellery, as I don’t want to have to keep checking my wrists — or my ears — all night and making sure the half-million-dollar earrings are still there. At the Vanity Fair Oscars party a few years ago, I lost a vintage diamond tennis bracelet. It fell off when I was talking to Lady Gaga. I had to go down to the police station and fill out a report. The policeman asked me who the last person I’d seen was. I said, ‘Lady Gaga’, and he looked at me and said, ‘Lady GA? GA?’ — he’d never heard of her. It was really quite funny. In the end I had to pay for the bracelet and got really gun-shy about borrowing stuff after that.

My all-time favourite dress is probably one by Galliano from his ‘homeless’ collection, which he did for Christian Dior in spring 2000 and which I wore that year to the Golden Globes. Again it was inspired by street fashion — in this case by street people on the banks of the Seine in Paris. It was black taffeta with little bits of silvery-blue tinsel on it, and when it first arrived it had pieces of twine with chicken legs on it, which I took off. It was really crazy, all shredded and ripped, with my tits almost coming out. I wore it with Manolos and some sapphire jewellery, and although it wasn’t that comfortable, it looked fantastic. Joan Rivers, who was covering the Globes, came up and laughed right in my face and I told her I was going to strangle her.

I’m still always thinking about what I’m going to wear to the next big party. A designer — I don’t want to say who — is making me a dress for the Oscars. I’ve asked for something body-conscious and not too wacky, and I’m hoping to see a sketch this week. I do just love fashion and the people in it. I can go and do a fashion week and it’s fun to see friends like Kate Moss and Fran Cutler, but I don’t have to do it all the time. I’m excited for the new generation of Nineties clothes, especially Miu Miu and Gucci. It’s a great excuse to refresh my wardrobe and start all over again.

As told to Katie Law