New York Easter Parade 1900

The New York Easter Parade started as a spontaneous event in the 1870′s and had continued ever since. From the 1880′s throught o the 1950′s, it was one of the main cultural expressions of Easter in the United States. In the mid-19th Century, churches began decorating their sancturies with Easter flowers. As the practice expanded, the floral displays grew even more elaborate and those who attended the churches incorporated these values into their dress. By the 1880′s, the Easter Parade had become a vast spectacle of fashion. It was an after-church cultural event for the well-to-do decked out in new and fashionable clothing. People from poorer classes would observe the parade to learn the latest in trends. As the parade and the holiday together became more important, dry goods merchants and milliners publicised them in the promotion of their wares. Advertisements of the day linked an endless array of merchandise to Easter. By 1900, it was as important in retailing as the Christmas season is today.

Easter Bonnet

As the year’s have progressed the parade’s religious aspects have faded and it has mostly become a fun day out giving people the chance to dress up and wear wonderful hats!

Easter Bonnet

From a hat lover’s point of view I think it looks like a marvellous day out and I’m sure my milliner friends in New York have been kept busy producing theses works of art. I hope everyone has the chance to enjoy the holidays.

I’ll write soon with all my news…I promise!

Lots of love Pea xxx

Niki de Saint Phalle

Beautiful, flamboyant, daring, provocative and fiercely independant French artist Niki de Saint Phalle emerged in the 1960′s as a powerful and original figure in the highly masculine international arts world. After moving to the United States as a child Niki’s teenage years were spent being a fashion model, appearing on the covers of Life magazine and Vogue. After eloping with author Harry Mathews when she was 18 she began to paint, experimenting with different media and styles. A nervous breakdown in 1953 was overcome by her painting and her subsequent move to Spain introduced her to Antoni Gaudi. Gaudi’s influence opened up many unimagined possibilities and Saint Phalle continued to paint then took up collage, work that often featured images of violence.

GoMA

If you have never heard of Niki de Saint Phalle you may be familiar with some of her work without even realising it. In 1996 she was commissioned to create the mirrored entrance to the Gallery of Modern art in Glasgow along with the mirror mosaic which is installed above the exterior columns.

Saint Phalle loved wearing hats and always asked that people visiting her exhibitions wore one. In preparation for the opening of a 15 month exhibition the GoMA asked me to run some millinery workshops to allow students to make their own hats to wear on the opening night. The workshops were a great success and I hopefully will be running more next year.

Gallery

The exhibition itself is quite simply a gift to the people of Glasgow. Glasgow Museums own two important works by Saint Phalle, which the artist gifted herself. These 2 works will be shown alongside 15 new works that have been donated by eric and Jean Cass through the Contemporary Art Society. The work in the exhibition ranges form angst-ridden to joyful in one fell swoop. Nothing is quite as it seems in a Saint Phalle artwork. If you are in Glasgow please go along and see for yourself.

You can find out more at www.nikidesaintphalle.com or www.glasgowlife.org.uk

I can’t quite believe it’s December! I’ve had such a wonderful year with my hats and hope next year will be even better! I’m thoroughly enjoying being part of Fashion Foundry and love my new studio and fellow Fashion Foundry designers. I have been asked to collaborate with the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland for their graduation ballet next year and I hope this will lead to many more great things. Thank you to everyone who has supported me and I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and lots of luck for the year ahead. Lots and lots of love Pea xxx

My Studio

My new studio is based in Room 236 of South Block, a 50 000sq.ft, four storey studio complex in the heart of Glasgow’s Merchant City. Developed by Wasps Studios (www.waspsstudios.org.uk) and designed by award-winning architects NORD (nordarchitecture.com), there are 96 studios in total for visual and applied artists, cultural social enterprises and creative businesses. All four floors in South Block have been designed with their own distinct character and every studio is of high quality with fantastic natural light. The studios are pitched at a range of levels to suit the different needs of the artists. My studio is huge and it is home to the Fashion Foundry designers, giving us access to all sorts of industrial sewing machines and other fabulous items of machinery! And it was through my buddies in Fashion Foundry that I learned about the MAKlab!

The MAKlab

MAKlab

MAKlab (www.maklab.co.uk) has its home in The Lighthouse, Glasgow and it’s an open access fabrication workshop which gives anyone from young people through to communities, individual entrepreneurs and businesses the opportunity and capability to turn their ideas and concepts into reality. MAKlab is part of the global Fablab network, a concept started by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2005. Fablabs release people’s potential, empowering them to make things for themselves. These can be made to suit local or personal needs in a way that wouldn’t be practical or economical for mass production.

Fablabs have spread around the world from America to Europe, the Far East, Africa and now Glasgow and across the world people are using them to make all sorts of things including tracking systems and even houses! The range of machinery is incredible, from Laser cutters to Router machines there is something there for every would be designer. I was especially astounded by the 3D Printer that enables you to print small plastic objects from your very own design, and the digital sewing and embroidery equipment has made my imagination run wild! It really is an amazing place and well worth joining.

The Lighthouse

The Lighthouse

For anyone who hasn’t heard of The Lighthouse (www.thelighthouse.co.uk) it is Scotland’s Centre for Design & Architecture. Situated in the heart of Glasgow city centre it was Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s first public commission. Part of the Mackintosh trail, it’s the ideal starting point for exploring Mackintosh’s work.The Mackintosh Interpretation Centre in the building is a permanent exhibition dedicated to his life and work. Architecture and Design Scotland run a rich programme of exhibitions and workshops on Level 2 promoting quality in design and placemaking in the built environment and Gallery 1 on Level 1 has a changing programme of exhibitors focusing on Scottish design. The ground floor is a new Digital Design Gallery showcasing Scottish digital design and animation. A wonderful hub of creativity under one roof and it just so happens my friend has an exhibition opening there this week!

Laura Spring

Laura Spring

Laura is a Glasgow School of Art graduate and a fellow Fashion Foundry designer. She designs and prints the most wonderful fabric and turns it into fabulous luggage that would make any other traveller jealous! This exhibition will showcase some of Laura’s luggage aswell as showing her new work of kites, inspired by the early meteorological kites of the late 1800′s. I personally love her work and can’t wait to see the exhibition which runs from the 25th October till 3rd December.

I hope to be doing some work in the MAKlab soon and I’ll keep you updated when I do.

Lots of love Pea xxx

Fashion Foundry

Fashion Foundry is a new iniative, led by the CEO (www.culturalenterpriseoffice.co.uk), to support up-and-coming Scottish fashion talents. The designers will be introduced to business and creative mentors to help grow and sustain their own labels. Ten of Scotland’s most promising fashion designers have been chosen from thousands of entries to take part in the creative business iniative. The scheme, which has been given £150 000 of funding from Creative Scotland (www.creativescotland.com), Wasps Studios (www.waspsstudios.org.uk) and Scottish Enterprise (www.scottish-enterprise.com) will allow the designers access to subsidised studio space at Wasps South Block in Glasgow. Wasps Studios is a charity that provides affordable studios to support artist and arts organisations. They currently house 650 artists and 22 arts organisations at 19 buildings across Scotland. Six of the Fashion Foundry designers will be based full time at the Glasgow studios, while the remaining will continue to work from their own spaces. I am very pleased to say that I have been selected for Fashion Foundry and Pea Cooper Millinery will be moving into her new studio space in a few weeks time! I’m delighted to be part of such a prestigious scheme as the quality of other candidates was really high. At the press launch last week I got to meet my fellow Fashion Foundry colleagues and even got to meet Fiona Hyslop, Cabinet Secretary for Cultural and External Affairs!

Pea meeting Fiona Hyslop

Fiona Hyslop said “I think this is very inspiring for the industry but also inspiring for the individuals. They’re not in isolation and they have a chance to be supported and to expand their own thinking in a way that allows them to have their creativity stretched but also very practical things in terms of the markets”

The Designers

So alongside myself participating in Fashion Foundry we have Lauren Day producing the most wonderful womens knitwear, Jennifer Kent designing stylish mens knitwear, Laura Ironside using leather to design exquisite womenswear, Mairi McDonald, graduate of London College of Fashion with her beautiful occasional womeanswear, Tonni Roddie and Emma Noble launching their Saunt and Sinner label, Rebecca Torres (www.rebeccatorres.co.uk) producing amazing Womenswear/ Sportswear that I wish I was tall enough and slim enough to wear, Hilary Grant (www.hilarygrant.co.uk) who makes the most divine knitted accesories for home and fashion, printed textile designer Laura Spring (www.lauraspring.co.uk) whos weather inspired luggage is so fashionable it makes me want to book a holiday just to give me an excuse to buy some, and last but not least Kirsteen Stewart (www.kirsteenstewart.com) an Orkney based designer who produces clothing and accessories with UK and Fair Trade makers, who also happens to be a fellow Starter for 6 mentor and a good buddie of mine! So there you have it! A very exciting time for all concerned and I will keep you up to date with moving into my studio and with the rest of Fashion Foundry.

Millinery Workshops

I am teaching 2 millinery workshops in the GoMA, Glasgow on November 4th and 11th. First class we’ll be learing how to make Avant Garde headpieces and in the second class I’m teaching traditional pillbox techniques. Classes are £45 each and you can book through gomabookings@glasgowlife.org.uk

The Italianist

My work is featured on a great Italian blog called The Italianist. It’s a good read for anyone interested in fashion www.theitalianist.com

Well that’s all my exciting news for today. I’m looking forward to the next 18 months of my life with Fashion Foundry and who knows where me and my hats will end up!

Take care

Lots of love

Pea xxx

The islands of Lewis, Harris, Uist and Barra make up the Outer Hebrides of Scotland. The islanders have long been known for their excellence of weaving but up until the middle of the 19th Century, their cloth was only used on their crofts or sold at local markets. This all changed in 1846 when Lady Dunmore, widow of the landowner of Harris, the Earl of Dunmore, chose to have their clan tartan replicated by Harris weavers in tweed.

Catherine Murray, Countess of Dunmore

The results proved so successful that Lady Dunmore began to devote much time and effort to marketing the tweed to her wealthy friends further afield and as a result of her enthusiastic work sales and trade of the island cloth were soon established with merchants across the country.

Weaving

For over a century Harris Tweed has been woven with skill and care by crofters in their own homes just as it is today. With skills passed from generation to generation, Harris Tweed is crafted by hand without the aid of automation or electricity. Woven on treadle powered looms, the low-impact production and reliance on natural materials throughout make the cloth a truly ecologically sound textile.

Weaver’s skills take months to learn and years to master and every step of the Harris Tweed process is in the hands of skilled islanders, from dyeing to delivery. The cloth is literally dyed in the wool, with separate pigments of wool carefully blended to ‘special’ recipes before being spun. Just one single yarn can contain several different colours in order to obtain the perfect tone or hue, each reflecting the natural surroundings of heather, mosses or mountains. Each length of Harris Tweed can be traced right back to its individual weaver and mill. Made by 100% Pure New Wool, the cloth is dyed, blended, carded, spun, warped, woven, finished, examined and stamped only in the Scottish Outer Hebrides by local crofters and artisans.

The Orb

The Orb

By law all Harris Tweed must be produced in the Outer Hebrides and nowhere else. The Harris Tweed Act of 1993 enshrines in law that every metre of Harris Tweed will conform to exacting standards and adhere to legal definition. When you see The Orb you are guaranteed the cloth is authentic. Harris Tweed is a unique fabric in that it is warm in winter and cool in summer. It resists water and wear and tear with ease, cleans easily and can be repaired with the simplest of tools.

Fashion Designers

The world’s best designers, fashion houses and artists have embraced Harris Tweed, showing their appreciation through their wonderful creations with every passing season. Dame Viviene Westwood is a great ambassador for the company and a great number of Scottish designers are using it innovately too. My friends at Jaggy Nettle (www.jaggynettle.com) make the most wonderful shoes from it and the lovely Judy Clark (www.judyrclark.com) makes the most divine clothes from it.

Harris Tweed Centre

Harris Tweed Collection

And then there’s me! I was asked by Louise Butler who works for Harris Tweed Development if I would make some hats for the new Harris Tweed Centre that is opening up later this year. Of course I jumped at the chance! Harris Tweed has such a prestigious name and great reputation I couldn’t wait to get involved and being a Scottish company too makes me really proud. I chose 3 very different colours as I wanted to make 3 very different styles of hats. Firstly I chose the Bubblegum Pink cloth (matches my hair!), with this, using my wok as a block, I made a vintage 1950′s style hat and added a piece of black lace to add a wee bit of quirkyness. For the second hat I chose Vintage Check Harris Tweed. I wanted to make something extravagent with this and also add a feminine touch as I feel this cloth is quite masculine, so I turned it into a giant bow and added cream paper flowers and luckily it turned out just how I imagined! The final hat was made from the Fuschia/Black check. I decided to do a little jaunty hat, a mixture of a riding hat crossed with a trilby. Again, I was pleased with the outcome. The photo doesnt do them justice, much better to see them in real life!

I thoroughly enjoyed making the hats and the Harris Tweed itself is such a beautiful fabric to work with. The actual colours of the cloth are so vibrant, it’s quite hard to believe it’s made so naturally. It is also so soft to touch with a great amount of ‘Stretch’ in it which enabled me to block it easily. I can’t recommend Harris Tweed enough. I want to become a spokeswoman for the company!

For more information go to http://www.harristweed.org

I don’t have an exact date for the opening of the new centre but I’ll let you know asap, hopefully end of September.

So that’s what I’ve been busy doing over the past few months! I have lots more exciting things going on but I’ll keep that till the next time!

Happy hat wearing

Lots of love

Pea xxx

The Queen has reigned the UK for 60 years and in her public engagements throughout that time she is seldomly without a hat! Being called upon to design for the Queen could possibly be the highlight of a designers career but it could also herald the most daunting moment of their life.

Couturiers and milliners will be contacted by the Queen’s dressers and asked to provide sketches. Frequently, they will recieve no further detail-no hint as to the nature of the event, or even the time of year the outfit will be required for-making it very difficult to supply something precisely to her requirements.

Frederick Fox

Philip Somerville

Rachel Trevor Morgan

Philip Treacy

Elsa Schiaparelli

Vidal Sassoon

Glasgow Film Theatre (www.glasgowfilm.org) is one of my favourite places to visit in Glasgow.

Glasgow Film Theatre

Bill Cunningham New York

Bill Cunningham is a fashion photographer for the New York Times.

Born in 1929, this cultural anthropologist has, for decades, been cycling round New York obsessively and inventively chronicling fashion trends

Bill on his bike

and high society soirees. Documenting uptown fixtures, downtown eccentrics and everyone inbetween.

Patrick McDonald

Cunningham’s enormous body of work is more reliable than any catwalk as an expression of time, place and individual flair.

William J

I went to see the film for a couple of reasons, one being my interest in fashion (even though I don’t follow fashion myself as personally I’m stuck in the 1960′s!) but the main reason I went was because I feel a certain affinity with Bill. Before Bill ‘fell’ into his career as a photographer he used to be a fantastic milliner who worked under the name William J.

Hades magazine is an international online fashion publication dedicated to providing a high-quality approachable platform to showcase emerging talent. Working with a team of budding entrepreneurs and artists, they aim to explore, seek out brilliance and leave no corner of the underworld uncovered! The magazine is published quarterly and the first issue features some of my S/S 12 collection and me being interviewed.

You can read this and lots more at www.hadesmag.com

St.Peter’s Seminary

The photoshoot for the magazine took place on a cold January morning in the concrete husk of St.Peter’s Seminary, situated in the woods behind Cardross Village. A rhododendron lined track takes you behind the golf course and eventually brings you face to face with the A-listed architectural masterpiece.

Architectural History

The building was commissioned in 1958 and completed in 1966. Designed by architects Isi Metzstein and Andy McMillan, it is a modular concrete structure, considered to be a good example of collegiate buildings from the 1960′s. It was awarded the Riba architecture award in 1967 but as Historic Scotland notes: “It has been systematically vandalised and is now reduced to a ruinous skeleton”.

Images

So far no purchaser has been found and the building is being slowly eaten away by the elements, which is a shame as it really is a mecca for those who love architecture.

I personally loved the place! Set in magical woodland the building is engulfed in an eerie silence that is strangely peaceful. The graffiti that adorns the walls is a spectacular scene and mixed beautifully with my hats.

Laura McKinnon

The photographer for the day was Laura McKinnon. Laura is an international award winning photographer specialising in fashion, commercial and portraiture photography. Originally from Newcastle and now living in Helensburgh, this girl is a wee dynamo! Her talent has taken her round the world and she’s just back from shooting lots of shows at London Fashion Week. The shots from the day at Cardross are marvellous and she was an absolute dream to work with. I can honestly say she’s the best photographer I have ever worked with and I look forward to working with her again. Also at just the tender age of 19 she is young enough to be my daughter, which is quite scary! Have a wee look at her website www.lauramckinnon.co.uk. I can’t praise her enough!

That’s all for now folks. Next time I’ll tell you about the work I’m about to start with Harris Tweed!

Lots of love

Pea xxx

As the winter creeps upon us folks in the Northern hemisphere it got my wee brain thinking, what kind of hats can I make that are stylish and also functional in keeping us warm?

It didn’t take me long to come up with the answer and last week I found myself on a boat, sailing to a lovely little island off the west coast of Scotland, to do a bit of business!

Location Location Location

The Isle of Bute (http://www.isle-of-bute.com/) lies in the Firth of Clyde and is approximately 15 miles long by 5 miles wide. To get there you take a ferry from Wemyss Bay (about 40 minutes from Glasgow) and in 30 minutes you are transformed into a world of calm, packed with charm and so much history.

Architecture

There is something for everyove here but I particularly enjoyed the architecture, with a variety of styles from the amazing Art Deco Rothesay Pavilion to the Gothic stately home of the Mount-Stuart family, which captured the heart of fashion designer Stella McCartney (http://www.stellamccartney.co.uk/) so much, that she got married there in 2003.

Bute Fabrics

I was on the island to visit Bute Fabrics (http://www.butefabrics.com/). They are a modern company with a traditional heritage, who produce wool and tweed fabric. Although founded more than 50 years ago by the 5th Marquess of Bute, they are now more at home collaborating with leading designers,and providing upholstery fabrics the world over, from the Welsh Millenium Centre to Hong Kong airport.

The company’s design director Catherine Murray kindly showed me around the factory and I got to see the weaving process from start to finish. It was a fantastic experience! I’d recommend it to anyone who’d like to see how fabric is produced.

So, after a great day with Catherine, a collaboration was born and I’m going to be making a limited edition of tweed and woollen hats that will be sold through my website.

Timourous Beasties

My problem at the moment is deciding which fabrics to use! The selection is immense and the colours are just so vibrant. One that is especially appealing to me is the Ramshead fabric designed by Timourous Beasties.

Timourous Beasties (http://www.timourousbeasties.com/)was founded in 1990 by design duo Paul Simmons and Alistair McAuley, who met while studying textile design at Glasgow School of Art (http://www.gsa.ac.uk/). They are noted for their surreal and provocative textiles and wallpapers. By depicting uncompromisingly contempory images on traditional textiles, they have defined an iconoclastic style of design once described as ‘William Morris on acid’. Check them out! The collection should be available next month.

Paisley Museum

Staying with the subject of weaving. I spent a lovely morning with Dan Coughlin at Paisley Museum (http://www.renfrewshire.gov.uk/) learning about the history of Paisley’s weavers (http://www.smashot.co.uk/). Dan is a weaver to trade and is also the head of Design & Textiles at the museum. I was lucky enough to be allowed to see the archives of the Paisley Pattern designs that go as far back as 1834. The designs have been so well preserved that they look as though they could have been drawn yesterday. Dan has such a fantastic knowledge on Paisley history considering he is Irish! He went to art school with Philip Treacy so that made me like him even more!

Paisley Pattern

My home town of Paisley, in Scotland, used to be a hive of industry with silk mills, cotton mills and at one point there were over 7000 weavers here. We adopted the ‘Paisley Pattern’ from its home in India and to this day the little tear drop shaped pattern is still synonymous with my home town. The museum has a great shawl collection that is a recognised colection of national significance to Scotland, and well worth a visit if you’re in the area.

La La Land

With all my galavanting it’s a wonder I get time to make any hats but luckily I manage to fit it in somewhere! As I said before, with the cold weather coming earlier than expected it was time for me to get my adored vintage hat blocks out and start making felt hats. I love working with felt, to me it’s a milliners dream! So, I’ve come up with a collection of vintage inspired hats that are being sold in La La Land (http://www.livinginlalaland.co.uk/), an independent boutique located in Creswell Lane, in the heart of Glasgow’s West End.

The shop is owned and run by the fabulous and witty Sarah Graham, and it stocks clothing, accessories, art and cult fashion books. It is a delightful place with lots of little treasures to be found. It is good to support local independent businesses, and this one I highly recommend and not just because it stocks my hats!!!!!

Well, that’s all for now folks. I’m away to dream about hats!

Lots of love

Pea xxx