Voted ‘Fashion Designer of the Year 2013’ at last year’s Irish Fashion Innovation Awards, Niamh O’Neill’s star is certainly on the rise. The Louth native tells us that she has always been creative. "As a child, I was very much into crafts and painting," she says. "As I got older my interests developed into sketching and designing and I knew before secondary school that I wanted to study fashion design.”

After graduating from NCAD in 2008, O’Neill honed her design skills in New York, London and Paris working alongside some of the biggest names in fashion, including Diane Von Furstenberg, John Galliano, Philip Treacy and Martin Grant. She returned to Ireland in 2012 to launch her own label. The Autumn 2012 debut collection highlighted a signature style, combining clean lines and contemporary cutting with luxurious fabrics, creating an instantly identifiable look of understated elegance that marked her out as a key new player in the world of Irish fashion.

Reviewing her first collection, O’Neill says that she was inspired by “the life and style of the 1930s actress Marlene Dietrich. I wanted to channel her style, but to give it a more feminine look. Dietrich was the first woman to wear a tux style outfit, which caused outrage at the time. It was this tux outfit which influenced my signature bow tie. Though I've used other sources of inspiration through my collections, the bow is a constant.”

Her looks are graceful, classic and feminine, combining flattering silhouettes with beautifully subtle accents. Her understated yet perfectly shaped formalwear has echoes of Victoria Beckham’s form-fitting dresses, sharing that designer’s emphasis on simplicity and perfection.

O’Neill’s Spring/Summer 2014 collection brings a fresh palette of pastel pink and champagne, with bursts of shocking pink and azure. Niamh's innovative cutting technique combines deceptive simplicity with exquisite detailing in the form of her signature bow. Spring/Summer 2014 includes some playful pleats and colourful contrasts, in a fabulously feminine collection.

Never one to rest on her (beautifully dressed) laurels, O’Neill is already working on her next collection. “I am currently putting the finishing touches to my A/W 2014 collection which takes inspiration from the work of contemporary architect, Frank Gehry. I have mixed clean, structured lines with softer, more fluid elements. Colours include a base of black with fuchsia, tangerine and scarlet and hints of gold.”

For more information and a complete list of stockists, see www.niamhoneill.com.