MY STORY

CHAPTER 1

I was born in Canberra in 1983, then moved to Christmas Island, in the Indian Ocean, when I was 6 months old. My Mum was as an incredibly talented and creative primary school teacher and my Dad was an Ornithologist and the only National Parks and Wildlife ranger on the whole island. It was a wild and wonderful first 4 years of my life and provided an integral foundation for much of my creative pursuits later in life.

We moved back to Canberra when I was 4 and then up to Townsville in North Queensland when I was 9 where I spent the majority of my childhood. Holidays and weekends were filled with adventures to rainforests and tropical islands as my Dad continued his work with the Great Barrier Reef Marine Parks Authority. Mum brought magic in to the everyday with her creativity and passion for life. I graduated school at 16 and repeated Grade 12 in Japan - yet another wonderful experience that influenced my designs later in life.

When I returned from my gap year, I moved to the Gold Coast and spent 5 years studying a Bachelor of Exercise Science and Masters of Physiotherapy. Although my heart was always with the creative industries, at 16 Physiotherapy seemed like the “right'“ thing to do. I went on to work in hospitals, private practice and then sat my Canadian entrance exams allowing me to practice there for a wonderful 3 years. My experience as a Physio provided excellent communication, analytic and interpersonal development opportunities, all of which have been wonderful assets in my current career in the creative industries.

CHAPTER 2

Living in Canada in my late 20s and recently engaged, I was torn on whether to follow my head or my heart when moving back to Australia. I worked with a career coach and finally understood why I was never fulfilled with Physiotherapy. Test results showed that I was 95% more creative than the norm for my age and gender in Australia. I remember her saying “Christie - you are SO creative! If you' don’t work in the creative industries, you will never be happy!”. It was if I had finally been given permission to follow my heart.

Ever since I was a little girl, I loved the transformational quality of fashion. I was in awe with the movie My Fair Lady, watching it on repeat and knowing every word. I always had a strong wish to go and study Millinery, even though there was no sense to it. So on my return to Australia, I moved to Melbourne and enrolled in the Mebourne School of Fashion’s year long “Fashion Millinery” program. It was the first time that what I was studying felt right! I then moved to Brisbane and completed Certificate III and IV in Millinery at TAFE which is the highest level of training available in Australia. It’s no surprise that my graduate collection was based on Birds of Paradise, as as homage to my tropical childhood adventures! I was also very honoured to take home the Millinery award with my wonderful teacher Robyn.

CHAPTER 3

My first collection on graduation was called “Come to life” as I felt thats what Millinery had done to me. I loved the idea that the headwear became part of the wearer and wanted to explore the narrative of a secret garden. The following is a behind the scenes of the collection coming to life and my first ever (bless!) branding all those years ago. I loved those first few years of fearless self expression and it sparked my passion for emotive, creative storytelling.

After finishing a Millinery business series with acclaimed British Milliner Piers Atkinson, I went on to stock my headwear in my first retail store “Designer Forum” alongside other amazing Australian labels such as Aje, Lover, Manning Cartel, Nicholas, Ellery and Alice McCall. I worked creating headwear for some amazing creative shoots and had a pop up on James Street where the Calile Hotel currently is and in Melbourne at the Block Arcade. I was also the first accessory designer accepted in to the Queensland University of Technology Fashion Incubator program and took my collection to Australian Fashion Week having showings with buyers from David Jones and other small boutiques. I ran spring racing fashion workshops with Westfield and judged “Fashions on the Field” competitions. It was a busy and beautiful year of firsts and also lead to the next chapter and an exciting opportunity as a young designer.

CHAPTER 4

Whilst at my Pop-Up on James Street, one of the team from CAMILLA visited and later contacted me to do an exclusive collection for all of their stores around Australia and David Jones. It was the most incredible opportunity - and a baptism of fire in to the Australian fashion industry! And I was there for it! As a designer in residence at the Fashion Incubator, and with an incredible team of industry mentors behind me, I decided to go for it. What did I have to lose?! The next year was a whirlwind of creative meetings, production schedules, project management, many sleepless nights and flights back and forth from Brisbane to Sydney. Myself and a team of 8 other Milliners worked tirelessly to produce hundreds of pieces. The result - an amazing collection of 4 handmade designs for their following Spring collection - all inspired by Camilla’s recent trip to Africa. I learnt so much from this experience. It gave me a unique top down insight in to how a successful fashion label operated - it’s structure and creative process, the level of detail that went in to every part of a collection, the fabrication, branding, packaging, logistics and roll out. It was so inspiring and challenging and cemented my love of the business of fashion.

CHAPTER 5

My second headwear collection Wild in the wind launched alongside the CAMILLA collaboration and I continued to explore my unique brand voice. This was my first season working with influencers, stylists and magazines and I had headwear featured in VOGUE and Harpers Bazaar.