Tutor Biographies
Paul Anthony
Paul Anthony designs and manufactures unique and individual garments from his salon on Chapel Street. Employing high levels of fit, function and form, his work is seen on the most discerning women of Melbourne, interstate and internationally .
Ruth Belfrage
Ruth Belfrage is a practising senior secondary teacher. She has worked with dyes and pigments for the past twenty years after majoring in textiles for 4 years at the Melbourne State College. She has worked at RMIT as the technical assistant for 5 years, Kraftkolour as a dye and screen-printing technician and the Printintin art studio as a dyer and screen printer. She has worked with both natural and synthetic fibres and has a good technical understanding of the uses and applications of both mediums.
Tania Di Berardino
Tania Berardino is a practising textile artist, dye technician, and art and paper consultant with Zart Art. She earned her Bachelor of Fine Art majoring in Textiles.
Dawn Bourne
Dawn Bourne creates individually designed headpieces and fascinators to complement the garments her clients are wearing. She also designs and makes fashion jewellery. Her signature designs incorporate hand beading on wire along with the glamour of feathers, diamante and crystals. All her headpieces are completely flexible, a feature that hairstylists really appreciate. Most of her business comes from the bridal industry.
Sandra Buchanan
Sandra Buchanan has been involved in the fashion and clothing industry for more than 20 years and presently runs a successful couture and teaching business from her salon in the Melbourne suburb of Camberwell. She is known for her use of innovative techniques. Her creations have been showcased at fashion, racing and charity events and have been worn in all parts of the globe
Patty Carter
fter completion of a 4 year apprenticeship with D & W Murray’s, Brisbane, Patty Carter worked for master milliner Patrick Ogilvie. She has been teaching for more than 40 years including Bundaberg and MacKay TAFE, McGregor summer schools on campus USQ, travelling workshops around Queensland and both the 2003 and 2005 “Hats off to Adelaide” conventions. Patty Carter had a solo exhibition in 1994. She made hats and garments for Miss Le-Ann Dick, Miss Queensland and Miss Australia 1982 and many winning entrants for “Fashion of the Field”, most recently “Magic Millions”, Gold Cost 2007.
Doris Chivers
With almost 60 years of experience, Doris Chivers claims she has the fewest number of hat blocks of any Australian milliner, yet creates exquisite and original hats gently hand moulded using only a pressing pad, iron and even sometimes an upturned wok! She learned her trade as a young woman sitting next to the senior milliners in Melbourne studios and worked as a model milliner in 5 workrooms including famous milliner Thomas Harrison. Soon to be a lost art, Doris has been teaching millinery using 1950’s methods to younger milliners for over 15 years.
Georgina Conheady
Georgina Conheady has been in millinery for more than ten years. Her innovative take on classical designs with a funky edge makes her hats a statement. Her success as a milliner has led to her working with TAFE/Colleges and private workshops. Her studio, Millinery by Georgina is all about details: hand beading and stitching adorn hats trimmed with hand made French flowers from luxurious fabrics of silk and organza. Georgina’s pieces have been incorporated in the designer ranges of Julie Goodwin and Charlie Brown and have been worn by high profile celebrities. She was awarded the 2004 Millinery Award, ‘Fashions on the field’ at Flemington.
Jaycow
Jaycow is a Hong Kong based Milliner, who makes hats for show business. Previously a fashion stylist, she entered the world of Millinery only 3 or 4 years ago, studying in London and Melbourne. Her experience as a stylist show in her fantastic millinery creations worn by Hong Kong’s pop stars, fashion designers and catwalk models !
Lorraine Gill
Lorraine Gill has been making hats since the early 1990’s and has been teaching for TAFE, SA since 1995. She is well known for her dedication to the promotion of millinery and fashion headwear. Many heads have worn a “Lorraine Gill Creation” to events such as the Melbourne and Adelaide Cups and related luncheons, weddings, and the Ascot Racing Carnival and “Lorraine Gill Creations” have been worn by a number of celebrities including Carolyn O’Connor of Moulin Rouge fame. She was a member of the team that organized the 2003 and 2005 conventions.
Edwina Ibottson
dwina Ibottson has been running her millinery business in Londonsince 1991selling to department stores and boutiques all over the UK. In 1995 she opened a shop where she makes hats to order and no longer sells to trade. Her clientele are ladies of all ages needing a hat or headpiece for a social event. She studied millinery in New York with Ann Albrizio, in London at the London College of Fashion with Marie O’Regan and with Rose Cory and Rolande Bequet. Edwina’s millinery skills have been shared several times in The Hat Magazine’s “workshop” feature. Her millinery is made to the most exacting standards, always with a twist .
Peter Jago
Melbourne’s most famous and flamboyant milliner and designer, Peter Jago, is renowned for his exotic millinery creations. A long-standing judge of the prestigious MYER Fashions on the Field competition at Flemington over the Melbourne Cup Carnival. Peter’s keen eye for detail and originality has made him an expert in his field.
Peter has held his own couture label for 21 years and is the proud recipient of 3 national grants and 1 international award for his ability. In 2003 he was the inaugural inductee into the Millinery Association of Australia Inc.Hall of Fame.
Serena Lindeman
Serena Lindeman’s millinery has been guided by her interest in design. Millinery is a second career for Serena and it has become a consuming passion. Her work pays respect to traditional techniques and reflects contemporary design. Serena constantly searches for inspiration to help her reinterpret the language of millinery. She made the hat on the cover of the programme , which won her the inaugural Myer Fashions on the Field “Millinery Award” in 2006.
Louise Macdonald
Full time milliner for 17 years, Louise Macdonald trained in London and worked as a costume milliner making hats for the BBC’s "Pride and Prejudice" and "The House of Elliot". She now works from her studio in Melbourne making fashion hats for local and international clients.
She has been a contributor to the Australian Millinery industry for many years, not only as a maker and designer, but as an educator and promoter of Australian millinery. She offers classes with herself and other leading Melbourne milliners in her studio and publishes the millinery resource website www.millinery.info
More recently she teamed up with Hugo Boss Melbourne to design a range of hats to go with their woman’s wear range.
Mandy Murphy With over 20 years in the industry Mandy Murphy’s practical and elegant designs range from fashion and race wear to stage and film. Mandy has exhibited extensively, notably at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and the National Gallery of Victoria.
National Art Gallery – Victoria The breadth and depth of the NGV's collection of international art reflect a philanthropic tradition of which Melbourne can be proud. The International collections of the NGV are regarded as the most comprehensive in the country; indeed, in certain areas, their collections rival in quality and depth the best in the world
Richard Nylon
Melbourne based milliner Richard Nylon has continually impressed with his innovative design concepts, and imagination. This creative approach to headwear has been witnessed over the last nine years whilst collaborating with clothing designer Gwendolynne. Nylon has been a prominent fixture in the fashion scene since 1985 where he regularly showed clothing and costume as part of the Fashion Design Council collection shows. Richard manipulates crinoline, straw, feathers & vintage veiling creating abstract form and pattern with his contemporary designs.
Phillip Rhodes
Phillip Rhodes trained in Melbourne long ago in the period known as PS, a time when sinamay was unheard of and sheer brims were the stuff dreams were made of! Phillip has worked extensively in London in both the fashion and theatrical worlds before returning to Melbourne to establish his own label and peripatetic reputation.
Waltraud Reiner
From Austria, via London to Australia. Since her Graduation from Fashion School in Austria in 1976, milliner Waltraud Reiner has made her name in millinery and fashion and followed her passion for hats. She lived in London and trained under Royal Milliner, Rose Cory, who she regards very highly. After migrating to Melbourne, Waltraud opened her made to measure studio. Waltraud has been a lecturer at Kangan Batman TAFE since it first started in 1995 – Melbourne. She was also part of the curriculum development for the 4 year Millinery Certificate course in Australia. She is a writer for the 'Fibre Forum Magazine' and instigator of Hatweek and Hat Extravaganza.. Besides solo exhibitions in Australia, Waltraud exhibits and travels as a lecturer regularly to USA, UK, Europe and Scandanavia.
Liza Stedman
Liza Stedman has her own millinery business. She attended St. Martins College of Art and completed a millinery apprenticeship in London. Her 23 years of experience includes teaching, made-to-order for exclusive clientele and stocking Myer and selected boutiques. Liza emphasizes unique, quality products maintaining traditional millinery techniques.
Wendy Stone
Wendy has been dyeing millinery products, parisisals, sinamay and feathers in a commercial capacity for approximately 7 years for Ilana Hats, Kazmo Designs and for individual orders for other milliners. Wendy’s methods of dyeing are suitable for the milliner who needs to produce a wide range of coloured materials at short notice, and it will give the milliner her own individual colour palette.
Gabriella Verstraetene
Gabriella is an established textile designer and fibre artist. She has worked with artists in schools programmes, designing community based visual arts projects, writing and designing articles for national magazines, presenting workshops and seminars at the Stitches and Craft shows, Bernina sewing machines and Madeira threads with whom she wrote and presented two videos. Gabriella specialises in the art of Freehand Machinery Embroidery. She has developed a distinct and individual, original style. She is a master artist with the sewing machine, stitching sumptuous surfaces of fabric reminiscent of plundered treasure. Since 1994, Gabriella has escorted annual textile study tours for Interasia tours, destinations including China, Vietnam, India and South America.
Christine Waring Christine Waring is an established professional Canberra milliner. Her hats have been shown in venues as diverse as Tilley Devine's women's bar and the National Gallery. Sometimes art, always wearable, her headwear combines professional skills with edgy flair. Her signature, handcrafted winter wool-felts are a concept born of NSW's cool Southern Tablelands. Starting as the finest Australian merino fleece, dyed in distinctive colours, and hand felted using techniques she has perfected. Trimmed, they become either high-fashion headwear or something nice to wear to the football. Christine also runs felt and felt hat making workshops - for private groups, at the Canberra Museum and Gallery and as far away as France.
