Jenny Kee

Jenny Margaret Kee, (born 24 January 1947) is an Australian fashion designer.

Early life Kee was born on 24 January 1947 in Bondi, New South Wales, Australia, to an Australian Born Chinese father and a sixth-generation Australian mother of Italian-English descent. Kee's great-grandparents had migrated from Guangdong, China, to Cooktown, Queensland during the 1870s gold rush. Kee attended East Sydney Technical College but did not complete her studies in fashion there. At age 18, she left Sydney for London.

Career In 1965, Kee moved to London, England, and became involved in the Swinging London and underground scene, In 1972 she returned to Australia, and in 1973 opened a fashion boutique, Flamingo Park. and started collaborating with fashion and textile designer Linda Jackson to create a national fashion identity. They formed a partnership creating outfits including bright and colourful pure Australian wool knitted jumpers with fauna and flora emblems. Among them was a knitted koala jumper nicknamed "Blinky" that was owned by Diana, Princess of Wales, who wore it to a polo game at Windsor Castle in 1982. In October 1982, Karl Lagerfeld incorporated a couple of Kee's designs for his first Chanel collection. She was also in a long-term relationship with artist Danton Hughes, son of the art critic Robert Hughes. Danton Hughes died by suicide in their Blackheath home in 2001. Kee and her daughter Grace are survivors of the Granville rail disaster. In the 1980s, Kee became acquainted with Tibetan Buddhism; in a 2016 interview with ABC News, she described the Bardo Thodol as her Bible.

Depictions Kee features in a memoir by Richard Neville, editor of the Australian satirical magazine Oz, and is portrayed by Nina Liu in the unreleased British film adaptation of Neville's work, Hippie Hippie Shake.