find.) That sibling peer pressure has never quite left me and I still love collecting. Mum drew and painted and my eldest
sister is a potter, so art was always in the family as a thing to do, but it was on foundation in Scarborough that I first discovered textiles as a subject. Besides loving the colour and textures, I think I was also attracted to doing something different that I could discover for myself. I studied textiles at Farnham and it was a
wonderful course. We did everything, from dyeing and screen printing to spinning and weaving. Encountering fibres and fabrics in this very hands-on way made a big impression, and has left me with a sort of unconscious textile bias in the way I notice things. I loved experimenting with what fabrics can do, and after seeing an exhibition by Mariano Fortuny, I became inspired by the mystery of his pleating techniques. This led to me making a collection of fabrics combining the structure of pleating with printed edges. I still love the effect now, whether it’s doing it or noticing it. There’s so much pleating in nature, from the way a caterpillar bunches up to how a leaf is crammed into a bud. In 1984, I moved to London and set up a
workshop doing pleating. Although I made scarves for Liberty, I was actually a bit scared of fashion. My plan was to find a designer to use my fabrics for garments. With the boldness of youth, I put five slides of my work in an envelope, with a handwritten note, and sent it to fashion designer Jean Muir. I remember her calling on the workshop payphone and asking me to bring in my fabrics. She held my pleated samples up to her head and said: “Make me some hats.” It was brilliant but terrifying, and I was
in at the deep end, having never thought about hats, let alone how they might stay on a head. Designing and learning and hiding my ignorance as best I could (but not always), I managed to make the essence of my pleating into headpieces and find the millinery engineering to get them onto a head in the right way. If I’d had more time to think, I might not have had the guts to manage it. Jean Muir was such an iconic designer of that time and was renowned for her beautifully cut little black dresses, embellished by quirky accessories. But she was also known for caring about the fashion industry and encouraging and supporting young designers. I made headpieces for her collections as a freelancer for five years and it gave me the confidence to step into the world of millinery.
Next issue: Evolution through lilies
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www.tesihats.com site Let's talk together on
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may 2022 | 55
Italian elegance with attention for details
Creativity Skilled hands only,
through the different processing steps, giving shape to our thoughts and ideas which are our hats
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