Timaru designer creates winner

Press, Volume CXIII, Issue 33370, 31 October 1973, Page 6

Timaru designer creates winner

By

LEONE STEWART)

Trish Gregory is one of New Zealand's best young designers, although her talents have been largely unsung outside Canterbury. From her Timaru studio comes creative design that has all the smooth professionalism of an international couturier. This year she won the day wear section of the Benson and Hedges Fashion Design Awards with an entry that was unmistakably a winner. With her “flappers” she has produced a design that, if it were commercially exploited, could well be a trend-setter. Working in virtual isolation from the mainstream of fashion production has, she finds, advantages and disadvantages. She lacks the stimulation of the thriving Auckland scene, but is not influenced by what others are doing. With all the natural instincts of a designer, she’ can sense a trend, she says, a season before it “hap- i pens.”

ELEGANCE Her award-winning design is a fine example' of her ability to create elegant clothes that relate to today’s tastes. The concept came, she explains, from the vogue for wearing long skirts during the day. To Mrs Gregory’s fastidious eye the long skirts i being worn in the streets looked untidy. So she set about finding a style that combined the elegance of a long skirt with the freedom of trousers. The first sketches were begun in mid-winter, with [the awards in mind, as has been her custom for the last four years. The finished product has the simplicity by which she places great store. And yet it provokes the envious incredulity that marks the work of most really creative fashion—an uncommonly cunning piece of work that she makes look disarmingly easy. “Well,” she says, smiling enigmatically, “it was quite tricky to work out, but really its very simple. I always try to work out a new concept to show in the awards, and if I think about it long enough, it comes.” “ARTIST” Trish Gregory describes herself as an artist interested in colours. Four years architectural draughting no doubt has done much to give \ her the discipline and sense of perspective her work displays. On an overseas trip some years ago she also ' took time out to study at [the Vancouver School of Art.

Since selling her boutique recently, she works, with a * staff of four, for private ■clients. But she adds her i voice to what seems to be [an awakening sense of nationalism on the fashion [design scene. i She wants to see New Zealand design developed in mass-production industry. “At present too many manufacturers use franchise agreements instead of New Zealand talent.” New Zealand design would; naturally follow, she bei lieves, international themes., [But she can see no reason* why we should not be trend-; setters. RESERVATIONS Mrs Gregory does have some reservations about the present form of the Wellington Polytechnic fashion j design course. “It’s good* that we have a course; when! I left school there was noth-; ing of the kind. But now, I’m told, graduates are having trouble getting jobs. 1 employed one who was talented, but really knew very “Miss Australia.” — Miss Randy Baker, a brunette secretary of 21 from Perth has been" named “Miss Australia.” —Perth, October 29.

little. Knowing the best ' techniques of cutting and sewing is very important.” More use should be made here of wool, she says, suggesting that the New Zealand Wool Board employ a team of designers who would be an exciting meium. For the last five years Mrs Gregory has been a professional designer working in a field that has allowed her plenty of scope for individual expression. But she believes mass production woult be an exciting medium. “The most exacting part of designing is putting an idea on the drawing board and working out the cut.” Mrs Gregory is not wrapped in the youth cult. Like a true professional she would regard firtding a middle way’ to suit mass taste a challenge. “And I do think,” she says, “that we underestimate what the public wants. Women are prepared to pav a little more and get something better.” Her award winning design will be among a large collection of New Zealand fashion at the showing of the awards in Christchurch this evening.