New Orleans Fashion
Week First Look
There may be no better city than New Orleans for a designer who believes getting dressed should be part fashion, part performance, and at least a little bit of fun. On Monday evening, notable designer Andrew Clancey welcomed a New Orleans Fashion Week crowd into Any Old Iron's brand-new Magazine Street home, where the guests seemed determined to prove his point.
Inside, a disco-ball-headed mannequin stood beneath purple light while racks covered with sequins and metallics lined the store. Cheeky framed art included a skeleton under the words "Stay Golden" and another image declaring "I'll Stop the World and Melt With You," while a "God Save New Orleans" T-shirt showed off the British punk influence woven throughout the space. Guests arrived in rhinestones, embellished suits, metallic minis, and enough sparkle to nearly compete with the merchandise. At one point, Clancey put the enormous mirror-ball head on himself and joined the fashion show, turning the opening into exactly the kind of playful spectacle his clothes seem designed to encourage.
Asked why New Orleans was the right place for Any Old Iron's newest store, Clancey answered, "Why not?" He said what really drew him to the city was its people and their willingness to dress boldly simply because they want to. For a designer whose clothes are meant to get noticed, that attitude felt familiar.
Any Old Iron itself is a collision of British irreverence, punk attitude, rock-and-roll energy, and unabashed glamour. Clancey, a Yorkshire, England native, comes from a family whose scrap-metal business dates to 1872, and the label's name nods both to that history and to "Any Old Iron," an old English music hall song about sartorial dandyism. The brand began in New York before moving to Nashville in 2014, where Clancey found an audience among musicians, performers and fashion lovers willing to treat clothing as part of the show.
That audience has included some very famous names. Any Old Iron's client list includes Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, Cher, Ozzy Osbourne, Kate Bosworth, Taylor Swift, Elton John, Miranda Lambert, Cardi B, and the Jonas Brothers, among others. A lookbook at the New Orleans opening offered a glimpse of that history, with red carpet and performance images spread across page after page, while a look designed for Cher was displayed alongside a photograph of her wearing it, giving guests the chance to see the piece up close and take a photo with it.
Clancey, however, is less interested in celebrity than that list might suggest. He explained that what matters to him is making people feel like celebrities themselves, with the goal being less about who is wearing the clothes than what happens when someone walks into a room wearing them and everyone notices.
That philosophy may be exactly why New Orleans makes sense for the brand. This is a city where dressing up often happens without permission, where sequins can appear at brunch, costumes linger long after Carnival, and an ordinary afternoon can become an excuse for a dramatic outfit. Clancey seems delighted by that instinct rather than surprised by it.
One New Orleanian he would particularly like to dress is Jennifer Coolidge. Clancey said Coolidge's stylist has already visited the store and that he would welcome the opportunity to work with her, but even that conversation quickly returned to his larger point: celebrity itself matters less to him than the confidence and attention his clothes can create for whoever wears them.
The New Orleans location is not simply carrying the same collection found elsewhere. Clancey said the evening was "really [about] the collections that I've been working on for New Orleans," adding that the pieces will be exclusive to the local store. Those designs incorporate black and gold, as well as Mardi Gras purple, green, and gold into the brand's already glitter-heavy vocabulary.
That local collection gives the Magazine Street shop an identity of its own. Any Old Iron's website now lists New Orleans at 1900 Magazine St. alongside its Nashville location, making it the brand's second permanent U.S. storefront.
Clancey's partner, designer Laura Citron, also has a collection represented in the store and is accomplished in her own right. Her Nashville-based label, founded in 2016, celebrates maximalist glamour and has been featured in publications including Vogue, Rolling Stone, Forbes, and The Wall Street Journal. Her designs have been worn by musicians including Lainey Wilson, Little Big Town, Lauren Alaina, Jennifer Nettles, and Greta Van Fleet. In 2025, she appeared on Tamron Hall's Up & Coming Designer series. Her work sits naturally beside Clancey's, giving the space the feeling of a shared creative world rather than a single-label showroom.
The opening itself felt more like a party than a conventional retail event. Fashion show footage played on a screen while a red carpet cut through the store for a live presentation, and guests circulated between racks of sequined jackets, embellished shirts, metallic dresses, and statement pieces. A featured "Clear Action Margarita" mixed Patrón Reposado tequila, fresh lime juice, and roasted jalapeño-pineapple simple syrup, while Elektra Cosmetics offered glitter for guests who somehow still felt they needed a little more shine.
The crowd was just as much a part of the aesthetic as anything hanging on the walls. Guests arrived in mirrored skirts, sequined coats, rhinestone boots, patterned suits, and metallics, making the party feel less like a group of shoppers and more like an extension of the brand itself. Many of the patrons were already wearing Clancey, unsurprisingly, which made the line between fashion show, party, and shopping experience even harder to define.
Clancey's path from England to New York, Nashville, and now New Orleans has followed cities with strong creative identities. When asked whether he had been following the music from one place to the next, he offered an even better explanation: he was following the fun, a philosophy that feels especially appropriate for a New Orleans fashion store built around the idea that clothes should make people smile, turn heads, and maybe cause a little trouble.
The party itself seemed to prove the point. Even after generous raffle prizes had been drawn, no one seemed particularly eager to leave. Guests lingered, kept talking and laughing, and continued enjoying the clothes and Instagrammable moments well past the point when the evening's scheduled activities had concluded.
Any Old Iron may have built its reputation dressing performers and celebrities, but its New Orleans chapter seems especially suited to people who do not need a stage to dress like one is waiting for them. The brand's British punk roots, Nashville music history, and fondness for sequins have landed in a city where irreverence and glamour have long been comfortable sharing the same outfit. Judging by the crowd packed into 1900 Magazine St. on opening night, Clancey has found exactly the kind of people he was looking for.
Any Old Iron is located at 1900 Magazine
St. The store is open Monday and Wednesday through Saturday from 11 a.m. to 6
p.m., closed Tuesday, and open Sunday from noon to 4 p.m. Shop online at
anyoldiron.us.
