Stella Nina McCartney was born in London, England, the daughter of former Beatle Sir Paul McCartney and Linda McCartney, an American rock music photographer famous for her support of vegetarianism and range of vegetarian food. As a strict vegetarian herself, Stella McCartney does not use fur or leather in her designs and supports PETA . Some of McCartney's designs have text that elaborates on her no animal policy; for example, one of her jackets for adidas says, \"suitable for sporty vegetarians\" on the sleeve. Her father and stepmother, Heather Mills McCartney, have also been known for supporting PETA through such actions as protesting against well-known fur wearers, like Jennifer Lopez , and against designers who use it in their collections.

As a little girl, McCartney travelled the globe with her famous parents and their rock group Wings, along with her siblings: older half-sister Heather (who was legally adopted by Paul McCartney), older sister Mary, and younger brother James. According to Paul McCartney, the name of the rock group was inspired by Stella's birth, which was premature and traumatic; Stella and her mother both almost died. As his daughter was being born by emergency caesarean section, Paul sat outside the operating room and prayed that she be born \"on the wings of an angel.\" Wings toured from shortly after her birth in 1971 until 1980.

McCartney's high profiled parents wanted their children to lead as normal an existence as possible so Stella and her siblings attended local state school in East Sussex. McCartney said that while attending state school, she was a victim of bullying. She became interested in designing clothes at age 12, when she made her first jacket. Three years later, she interned for Christian Lacroix, working on his first fashion design collection, honing her skills on Savile Row for a number of years.

McCartney studied Fashion design at St Martins College of Art & Design in the early 1990s. Her graduation collection in 1995 was modelled by friends and supermodels Naomi Campbell, Yasmin Le Bon and Kate Moss at the graduation runway show. The collection was shown to a song penned by her famous father, called \"Stella May Day\". The show made front-page news, and the entire collection was sold to Tokio, a London boutique. The designs were licensed to Browns, Joseph, Bergdorf Goodman and Neiman-Marcus.

Chloé, Gucci Group, Adidas, H&M

After two collections, in March 1997 McCartney was appointed chief designer at Paris fashion house Chloé, following in the footsteps of Karl Lagerfeld. Lagerfeld was less than impressed with the house's choice, famously stating: \"Chloé should have taken a big name. They did, but in music, not fashion. Let's hope she's as gifted as her father.\" McCartney's designs enjoyed considerable commercial and critical success. She was accompanied to the design House by her assistant and friend Phoebe Philo, who later took over as design director after Stella McCartney left.