I first encounter the cult costume and set designer Max Allen on an external staircase, halfway down a sun-dappled street in London. An ascending star, he has worked with a frankly intimidating roster of tastemakers and cultural heavyweights. Whether he’s decorating Dalston’s hottest new queer bar, the Divine, producing bold and brilliant costumes for Shakespeare’s Globe or dressing sundry London It-girls (Emma Corrin wore a bespoke design he co-created for their Vogue España cover in 2023), it seems there is not a corner of the capital that hasn’t been ‘Max-imalised’. And this, a kaleidoscopic live/work space in the Harringay Warehouse District, is where the magic happens.
Up the stairs and over a spacious roof terrace we go, past scraps of fabrics and storage shelves bursting with past commissions, before arriving at a communal space and kitchen featuring a colossal dining table and dozens of chairs for the warehouse’s nine inhabitants. Giant prints adorn the walls here, of Rita Hayworth, Marie Antoinette and Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights (found on the street). I imagine they’ve witnessed some legendary parties. Right now, though, Max is cooking chicken stock, despite the summer heat. Once the pot has been set to simmer, he walks through to his bedroom, taking a brief detour into a light, airy studio buzzing with activity. An over-enlarged photo of Hedy Lamarr printed on fabric wafts in the breeze. ‘I’ve been thinking about curtains…’ he mutters.
Originally from Derbyshire, Max moved to London in 2008, working the door at a series of east London bars to get by. He rose to drag-queen/club-rat status under the tutelage of legends such as the artiste Jonny Woo, while completing a fashion design and marketing degree in the hallowed halls of Central Saint Martins. More recently, in 2023, he co-founded a design studio with Elliot Adcock, taking his glittering vision to new audiences. The pair have since produced dazzling, campy costumes for the Globe and Royal Court theatres and the Selfridges Christmas window among others.
Packed with enough tinsel and tat to rival any festive display, Max’s room is generously sized, with high ceilings and a mezzanine bed, reached via a rickety, red-painted ladder. Below this platform is another, smaller studio. The walls here are dense with pictures and objects: framed illustrations, family photographs, a row of Donald Duck heads, brooches, sequin trims, fairy lights, ceramics, plastic dolls, puppets, film posters, gig fliers – it’s all here. A hand-embroidered sofa upholstered in Garfield-print fabric faces shelves laden with second-hand trinkets and a dish of Party Rings and Percy Pigs.
A veritable mélange of his memories, philosophies, processes and thoughts, these highly curated walls were a long time in the making, Max tells me. ‘It’s only now, after living here for nine years, that it has become what it is. Being a nervous renter in London, it started off as little bits here and there, a memory, or a mood board, and it grew organically.’ Creating a space of one’s own is a challenge for renters everywhere, particularly when landlords are so often opposed to abundance (in décor, not hoarded wealth, mind you). But Max’s space stands in resolute defiance of the timid magnolia cells sold by the month all over the city. ‘This room isn’t an archive, it’s a collage. It’s a response to the space itself. That wall hanging is a blanket to cover the draught. I put up sequins and glitter curtains to cover patches on the walls and ceiling.’ Indeed, a surprisingly pragmatic approach underlies the high-kitsch creationism.
This mini-studio underneath the bedroom mezzanine also houses Max’s dressing space. Rails of colourful garments, strings of fairy lights and more precious pictures abound. A pair of opera gloves are draped over a hanger, decorated with stills from hardcore gay porn videos. ‘I made these for Emma Corrin, but their stylist thought they were a bit much,’ Max divulges. Who is the perfect Max Allen muse, I ask? ‘Sharon Le Grand wears my clothes the best,’ he says of the London-based drag artist. ‘She’s not afraid to put them on and get them dirty, to really live in them.’ Speaking of dirt, this space must be a nightmare to keep clean, I suggest. ‘I don’t dust. As Quentin Crisp said, the dust doesn’t get any worse after the first two years. I did glitter a spider web once though,’ he quips. ‘My mother told me that you can clean all you want, but if you’ve got [dirty] mirrors and windows then it all looks like shit. So I always try to keep those shining.’
Mirrors and reflective surfaces decorate this room, catching the light and creating a cavern of rich textures and images. ‘I love this constant turning of colour, of confusing the eye. When you look in this mirror, it frames everything like a piece of art. I would love to be able to cut this vision into a textile. It informs my work constantly.’ Witch balls hang from the ceiling like giant baubles, immediately reminiscent of the Christmas displays Allen and Adcock produced for Selfridges. ‘The intersection of Pop art and folk art, that’s what my taste is, especially coming from drag and queer culture. It’s all folk art, entertaining the community with stuff that you find from the pound shop, a perfect mix of tackiness and spirituality.’
As the interview draws to a close, Max imparts a string of advice for fellow renters in London: invest in good bedding (he sews his own pillowcases and linens); buy more flowers (‘I’m 35, I deserve beautiful things’); and, last, live as if your landlord. isn’t watching. ‘I’ve spent so long scrubbing and cleaning when moving out, only to get ripped off,’ he tells me. ‘You will never get your [deposit] back, so paint that wall if you want. Put up the Blu Tack. You have to enjoy it.’
For more information, visit allenandadcock.com
A version of this article also appeared in the December 2024 issue of ‘The World of Interiors’. Learn about our subscription offers. Sign up for our bi-weekly newsletter, and be the first to receive exclusive stories like this one, direct to your inbox
