Lucy Nagle: The Irish designer who knows what women want

Her ‘Cosy’ cashmere sweaters have become a modern classic. Now, Lucy Nagle is back at the design board with a new line of luxury sleepwear, writes
What does ‘cosy’ mean to you? Perhaps it’s simply “giving a feeling of comfort, warmth, and relaxation”, per the dictionary definition, or maybe it’s closer to the loftier ideals of hygge. With their aspirational Scandi chic aesthetic, the Danes have turned ‘cosy’ into a more than just a feeling; ‘cosy’ is a state of mind; a lifestyle even.
But for Irish fashion fans, ‘cosy’ isn’t a feeling, it’s a thing. It’s ‘the Cosy’; a snug sweater that bears the word, in the most luxurious Mongolian cashmere; beloved of celebrities and coveted by their fans, it’s an icon of contemporary Irish design, and the ultimate testament to the business acumen of its creator, knitwear designer Lucy Nagle.

With its high-profile fans and its high street knock-offs, the Cosy has fast become a modern classic, emblematic of the easy, understated luxury Nagle has become known for: basics that are anything but.
“I did the Cosy two years ago,” she tells me when I ask about the instantly recognisible design. “I didn’t want to get into slogan sweaters – there’s loads of brands doing that – but I just felt, it was cosy cashmere; as slogans go, it wasn’t loud or in your face; and yeah… they’ve been really popular,” she says.
I’m probably asked what colour I’m doing the Cosy in next more than any other piece.
You can be the most talented designer in the world and never have a hit like the Cosy, or – like Lucy Nagle – without any formal training you can conjure up a thriving fashion brand simply by having an uncanny sense for what women want.
That she’s picked up so many celebrity fans along the way attests to her appeal, but though she admits that’s an exciting element of what she does, it’s far from what drives her. “I didn’t start out thinking, I want famous people to wear my clothes,” she says, emphasising that it’s a thrill to see anyone wearing Lucy Nagle, be they a star blogger or a school run mum.
“My customer is mainly women in their thirties and forties; busy young professionals or mums juggling it all.” Women, in other words, just like Lucy.
“I suppose when I started off I did design things I wanted to wear; that I felt my friends and peers would want to wear,” she says. “Comfortable clothes in luxurious fabrics, that you can throw on and that feel good. Everyone’s in a rush these days; we want to feel comfortable and look good in as short a time as possible, and cashmere does that.” Her instinct wasn’t wrong.
What started as a small collection of cashmere pieces in 2013 expanded this spring to include soft bamboo T-shirts, and for winter Nagle is adding a luxurious range of silk pyjamas to her eponymous line.
For a brand that’s all about feeling good, luxury sleepwear hints at an obvious move into the lifestyle realm, almost a given considering her background is in interiors. Her eye for design has translated seamlessly to fashion though, with fabrics the common thread.

“Cashmere, silk, bamboo… for me they all just work really well together; they’re beautiful to wear, they drape well, they feel gorgeous. I like working with the best materials,” she states.
“I want everything I do to be about luxury, but luxury that’s within reach. My favourite part of designing interiors was always choosing textures, colours and patterns, and that’s really my focus with fashion as well. It’s about texture and colour and going with what I like.”
By any definition of the word, Nagle has now followed her instinct down the path of business success, cracking that infamously hard nut – the luxury online retail market. She relaunched her website in April of this year, realising her customer was as likely to shop her cashmere essentials from the Luas as from the floor of Brown Thomas; and clearly Brown Thomas have realised this too.
On the day we speak, Lucy Nagle has just gone live on the Brown Thomas website, and with her own site enjoying exponential growth, it’s safe to say her days of packing orders at her kitchen table are behind her.
Her relationship with Brown Thomas dates back to the start of her business. With a chutzpah founded more in naivety than arrogance, Brown Thomas was the first store she approached when she got a small range of samples together back in 2013.
I’d just moved back from London and I went to a women in business event and got chatting to a girl at the Brown Thomas stand,” she recalls.
“I said I had some samples but didn’t know who to contact, and she suggested Shelly Corkery. I sent a cold email – I’d never met Shelly or been introduced – I just said, ‘Hi, my name is Lucy, this is what I do…’ I didn’t hear back for about a week, then she replied, we arranged a meeting, and it all went really well,” she says.
A month later, Lucy Nagle launched at Create, Brown Thomas’ annual Irish design showcase.

“Shelly had said, if you can get these into production in six weeks we’d love them for Create.” Lucy recalls. “She told me, ‘don’t worry if you can’t, we’ll put you in next year’, but I didn’t want to lose the opportunity. It was all a bit of a rush, but it was great. I learned so much from Create, and I learned very quickly. You’re in there, selling and talking to customers, finding out what they like; it was an amazing experience.”
Five years on, Corkery is both a mentor and a friend. “She still says to me, ‘Designers never contact me. You were one of the first people who ever just emailed me!’” Lucy says.
“I look back now and I suppose I just boldly sent an email saying, can I come and see you? But Shelly has been amazing. She has really guided me. We meet regularly, and she and Brown Thomas have been so supportive.”
The store’s Marvel Room was the perfect place to launch her nightwear collection; priced from €150, they’re the ideal gift for the woman who loves the quieter luxuries in life, and they’ve inspired Lucy to start thinking beyond cashmere. “Cashmere will always be my main focus and my biggest collection,” she states, “but going forward I’d like to work with silk again.
We love layering here, especially with our Irish weather,” she notes.
The T-shirts were a logical progression, because, she says, “People were asking me for something to wear under the cashmere.”
In the same vein, she’s thinking now of silk shirts or camisoles, layerable pieces in keeping with her core aesthetic: simple with a fashion flourish.
“My clothes are investment pieces, so they’re not going to date from season to season,” she says.

"There are the fun fashion elements – this season it’s an edgy camouflage print here and a frilled sleeve there – but this is not trend-led, throwaway fashion. The thing with cashmere is, if you mind it, it lasts forever. It softens with age, so it becomes even more luxurious with time.”
For this reason, as her range expands, the luxurious yarn will always be at the heart of what she does. “I’d love to do children’s cashmere,” she adds, “and I wouldn’t rule out things like cashmere throws for the home – I’ve lots of ideas.”
If the last half-decade has been a rollercoaster, you sense it’s only going to get bigger. “It’s been a really busy five years,” she says.
“I was just about to get married when I was working on those first samples. I met Shelly about two weeks before my wedding, and I’ve had two children since then. I’ve loved that I’ve kind of been doing all this in the background, but now that my children are a little bit older at two and three, I’m getting to focus more and more on the business.
“I’m excited,” she says. “I really want to grow it even bigger and look into the export market. It’s grown more than I ever could have hoped, but at the same time, I knew starting out that I was going to put everything into it, because it’s your name above the door; you’re going to give it your all; you’re not going to do it half heartedly. You’ve only got one chance, so I was determined to make it work.”