“I was born on a houseboat near the Spit Bridge, Sydney in 1966. My parents had just immigrated to Australia from which was then Rhodesia. They are both English. I lived in Sydney on and off until I was about 16 but I lived in the Northern Rivers when I was in Primary School. My family were boat builders in Smith Drive, Ballina. We were involved in a business with another family who we also lived with and built drum line fishing boats.
My older brother has been a boat builder since then. He’s a Boilermaker and he’s probably built over 50 yachts. There’s no real boat building industry there anymore, no wooden boat industry anyway. Most recently we had a beautiful 120 year old pearling lugger we restored called The Waitoa from the Tiwi Islands. I’ve had a long connection with the area, I’ve come and gone from here since I was eight years old.
The first time I arrived on the bus in the wee, small hours of the morning as an unaccompanied minor. I then went to the UK as a child, back here, then to Coffs, then Sydney and then Melbourne. I’ve been back in this area for over ten years but prior to that I spent about 25 years in Victoria where I had a family.
I did a Fine Arts Degree at BCA and a Masters and then I taught at the University of Melbourne and Victorian College of the Arts up until I decided to leave Victoria when my youngest child had finished Uni.
I went overseas for a gap year which was fantastic and then in 2016 I opened my first shop in Bangalow. It was a tiny shop in Station Street where I did one off pieces. It was called Queen Mabs which was a name I found years ago and I’ve always loved it. When I was in Victoria I loved making outer-wear like coats but I now live here in the Northern Rivers so I don’t really make coats (laughs). I then moved into a bigger shop next the pharmacy and that business was going smashingly until Covid . The QLD border closed, suppliers dried up and no deliveries. It was a disaster. At the end of Covid when the landlords decided to put the rent up…Again, I pulled a big lever.
I sold my house in Alstonville and I bought this beautiful old building in Woodlark St, Lismore on 30th October 2021 and of course the shop got wiped out less than four months later with the biggest flood Lismore has ever seen in Feb 2022. So suddenly we went from looking at growing a business where I did the manufacturing and designing, textile production and my own label to cleaning up mud. It was so full on and sad to see all my beautiful things washed down the street, totally trashed. Everything went, sewing machines, boxes of handmade shoes, hats and jewellery. beautiful shop fittings that were French antiques.
I’m in a three story building and the water came up 4.7 metres in my building. I had an olympic pool on the ground floor. The building is 110 years old, all rainforest timbers. The beams are all Red Cedar, the beams are Hardwood and Swamp Mahogany and the floorboards are all hoop Pine.
I have a crane out the back that was installed when the building was built so I can lift. When we had the cyclone in March everything just went up in the crane.
I was pretty fortunate that the Living Lab approached me and asked if they could lease the space to set up the community engagement aspect of their organisation so they were here for three years. I installed their exhibitions and did catering. They had lots of events here and it does feel lovely. The ground floor was pretty scuzzy when I found this building and the upstairs was mostly derelict with asbestos, cork shelving, rubbish and dead birds but I could see the bones.
It was built for Tailors, Milliners and glove makers in 1914. They were called Maloney and Wilson, Gentleman’s Outfitters and Tailors. they were here until the mid 50s. The ground floor was the reception area and it was built to flood. The floor drops away on both sides and it’s higher at the front from the back. They would open the doors and let it run through.
The building was built before there was electricity. You notice the press metal is different. There was a void where the roof is now and it went all the way to the third floor to let the natural light in through a huge roof window.
The community and the women of Lismore have been amazing so far. To my great surprise I can barely keep up with sewing enough stock. I have Artist Laila Page’s work in here as well and she paints on a table out the back while I’m teaching upstairs.
My son died eight years ago. He became schizophrenic when he was 16 and he was ill for 13 years. He hung himself when he was 21 and got an acquired brain injury on top of mental illness. He was in a coma when they called me. He then became an addict. He died of a fentanyl overdose in the toilets in a pub in Carlton on the 24 October 2017.
I’m doing this thing called internal family systems with my Counsellor and all this stuffs coming up. Usually all this is jammed further down but …….He’s gone now. His name was Jack. He was funny and I loved him so much. He started smoking heaps of dope when he was teenager and their frontal lobe is not fully developed. People say it doesn’t cause mental illness but it’s well documented. I would still have Jack.
I got hit by a truck four years ago and have nine permanent fractures in my spine which I’m really conscious of now as my nerves deteriorate. I also think the many years of stress has dissolved my bones. I now have super advanced osteoporosis but I still run up and down the stairs and get everything done.
So, the sewing school, I was hugely encouraged by two people. Sharon Mullen who had approached me and asked if I knew anyone who could teach her to sew. I said, I could do that! She came once a week and we developed this beautiful travel wardrobe for her over about 6 months. A friend of hers asked as well so then I had two students. It was a lovely, social community building touchstone for people as well, there’s no pressure, no judgement. I’ve been told I’m a very patient teacher. Bec who runs Bec’s Bespoke said, you should just do it. I was feeling pretty depressed because my family had gone and my husband had left. I am the queen of hardware, I know how to use every power tool and I couldn’t get an interview at Bunnings. I renovated this three story building myself physically.
So I built a website, started advertising on August 8 and by August 26 I had a dozen students and started teaching classes. I’ve built it up since then and have about 35 students now. I have people lining up to do classes next year. I’ve also started buying beautiful fabrics from a new supplier so I can stock and sell fabrics to anybody which is awesome. Everything is provided in the classes, all the patterns, materials and equipment apart from your final garment fabric.
My aim is to keep the shop going and keep the sewing school going. I have another Designer and maker from Bangalow called Doss handmade here. She uses all vintage fabrics and makes beautiful one off pieces.
It’s been the loveliest thing to be engaged with all these people in the sewing school with such diverse knowledge and backgrounds and ideas. It’s been wonderful to see this big heart and core to everything here in Lismore.”