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| Featured Designer |
| Please welcome Susan Gowin to the featurered designer page. Susan is an incredibly generous person who gives us all so much. Susan has donated to Colleens' of Canberra from the beginning, not one but two designs and now she follows that up with two more!! She is always willing to offer advice and give tips. Along with her trusty colleagues Tess and Gina, Susan has revolutionised the sale of Irish dance dress designs by putting them onto CD's and giving people so much choice. |
| Have you always sewn? I’ve always sewn – self defense. I’m 6’ tall and when I was young there were no clothes in the stores that would fit. There was a “tall girl shop” but they operated with two guidelines: 1) If you are tall enough to buy clothes there, then you must only want to dress in black, navy blue or dark brown and 2) Bust is proportional to height. Didn’t work when I was 12 … |
| Did you learn Irish dancing as a child?
No. A box step is a challenge! I had never heard of Irish dancing before I started making the dresses, and never actually saw any dancing until about a year afterwards |
| What made you first decide to try your hand at designing dresses? It's fun. I have always been a sketcher-doodler-painter (Being desperate, I attached a scan of one of my watercolors - unfortunately I had to scan it in two passes, so you can see the line - oh well..) I was the encouragement of other dressmakers that really got me to take myself seriously. |
| How long does it take to draw a design?
Sketching a concept is relatively quick. I do the front panel of the skirt in pencil and then ink it. I usually do the skirt back next or the bodice. Sleeves and shawl last. Getting it ready to actually use it on a dress - that takes me much longer than drawing it. I just had a customer who asked me to make ready another designer's concept design posted on Colleens of Canberra. It had a continuous zig-zag border around the bottom of the skirt. It took be about 20 hours to do the math, draw out the pattern pieces so that each zig-zag would be the same size, and design a skirt back and shawl. Continuous borders are extremely time consuming to draft. |
| Do you use computer programs?
Yes, I use a Vector graphics program and spreadsheets to help calculate the lines and angles for each dress. |
| What is your inspiration? I like knots and interesting shapes and textures. I did one design that was based on the decorative carving on my grandmother's platform rocker (Rose Kennedy picture). |
| How does designing fit with your family time?
Do you work long hours or tend to stay 9-5ish? My family think I spend a lot of time at the computer! |
| Can customers only order designs from the CD or will you work with customers on a design from scratch? I do custom designs and school dress designs, too. I'm also working on developing a set of "school dress" patterns. Around here, the school have a lot of trouble finding someone, anyone, to sew the dresses. And a lot of the problem is that they don't have a pattern. I've come up with a basic skirt pattern that would be drafted their specifications (type of skirt, pleats, princess lines/darts, necklines) and provide a set of interchangeable pattern pieces. The seamstress would fit a bodice and then pick a skirt back that fits that back waist measurement. Then the front would be selected - center panel based on how wide the top is and the side panels on the remainder of the waist measurement. |
| How many designs have you created? There are 122 designs on the current CD. The new batch of designs I’m working on started with #158. I try to do at least 25 new designs for each version of the catalog. I think almost 50 were added last time. Out of that, we’ve sold about 70 different designs – many of the reuseable (not exclusive/one use) have sold several times. The most popular design (not counting the ones on Colleens' of Canberra) has been #86 – the flame design. |
| Are the buyers of your designs mostly professional or home sewers?
Most of my customers are in the USA and are “cottage” dressmakers – they make dresses for more than just the dancing daughter. We encourage non-sewing customers to choose a dressmaker first. That way we can work with them though the dressmaker and provide the design in whatever format works best for her. |
| How does the design process work?
I print out the outline of the pattern pieces and then draw on them while I’m doing something else – watching TV, waiting at the clinic, getting the car repaired. I redraw the design with a vector graphics program (Canvas – http://www.acdamerica.com/) when someone wants custom sized design. It is very time consuming; it takes me a day to get one dress design redrawn with my graphics program. With the new designs I’m completing, I have decided to draw them into Canvas now. They will be crisper and more professional looking. |
| What do you enjoy most about designing?
I love drawing the designs on paper. I find it relaxing to be doing something with my hands. I always read a recorded book or watch TV while I draw. It is also rewarding and a hoot to see the designs sewn up by other people. It is so exciting to see how each person adds their own twist. A lot of times I look at what has been changed and think, "you know, that is how I really meant to draw it in the first place". And when someone makes one up "by the book", exactly how I drew it, that is a thrill, too - a big compliment. |
| What part of a dress do you design first?
I always start with the front of the skirt. When I’m happy with that, everything else falls into place |
| How has designing dresses changed during the time you have done it?
When I first started the dresses were all knotwork. No random triangle or diamonds. |
| Funny design stories?
I am not good at predicting the popularity of any given design. So far, the ones that I love, well, I seem to be the only person that sees the creative genius within them. On the other hand, there has been more than one that I almost tossed away but I sent them on to my “review panel” just to give them a laugh. These are the designs that everybody wants – the ones I thought were no good. It must be my female brain not being able to visualize what the drawing will look like once it is made up into cloth. |
| Did you know that while over 200+ dresses have been made using the designs from Colleens' of Canberra very few donations have been received. If you use these designs please consider making a donation to help keep this website operational. |
| How then did you get into Irish dance dressmaking? I “retired” from the real work world 14 years ago when my daughter (Marliese, although more graceful, she is also a non-dancer) was born. I was a software developer for a mainframe database/systems vendor. I’ve also been a special ed teacher and a secretary. Helen, the AA in the office, was from Ireland. She and a friend decided to start an import business and bring over mushy peas and Cadbury chocolates for their UK buddies. Helen’s husband’s sister “Mary” made ID dresses so they added those to the product line. But when the dresses arrived, they didn’t fit. Every time they crossed the ocean it cost $75, so Helen asked me if I could help. That was the first time I ever saw one of these creations and I couldn’t stop laughing. Helen didn’t sew and we both wondered if Mary had cut up cardboard boxes to make them stiff – we were so clueless it was scary. Next thing I knew, Helen had arranged with a local dance studio to have new dresses made and wanted to know if I’d do it. Not knowing any better, I said “sure”. Damn. That’s when I discovered there was no commercial pattern available. Mary had some source of designs but wouldn’t tell us what it was (or what made them stiff). So Helen brought over 4 or 5 dresses and I stared at them for 2 days. I knew how to measure the dresses and duplicate each individual dress, but I couldn’t figure out the principle behind the skirt. Then the light dawned. I taught myself pattern drafting and I’ve been tweaking my skirt pattern ever since. Now I’m finally happy with it. I draft all the bodices by hand based on standard sized slopers (http://pattern.stringcodes.com/). |
| How did your Design CD come about? I had drawn up 20-30 skirt fronts that I put together in a notebook to show customers. The idea was to find a starting place and some common ground. Women often find it difficult to visualize what a drawing will look like once it is executed in cloth. And they are very easily swayed by color. By then the Celtic Flame board had started up and I had a website. Terrie Dluehosh (Tucson, AZ) and I had been trading info and stories for a while, and she asked if I’d send her a set of the skirts so she could use the designs. Shortly after that Tess Gleave (Babinda, Queensland, Australia) wanted designs, too. Before I knew it I had 5 dressmakers to whom I’d send designs every so often. Then Tess came up with the Catalog on CD idea and ran with it. She’s figured it all out and distributes the CD and manages the sales for Oz and Europe. Gina Foster (Tampa, FL) is my North American distributor. We’re adding some “how to’s” on the CD; How to measure, How to enlarge a design, How to make a skirt from the design templates, How to draft a custom bodice – that kind of stuff. Gina and Tess each puts together their own CD, and I do all the drawing and writing. Unfortunately, we get very little feedback on the usefulness of the information, so I don’t know if I’ll be adding to it any time soon. I couldn’t do the CD without the help and encouragement of both Tess and Gina. They are wonderful! |
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| Thanks to Susan for these two new beautiful designs which are best viewed from pdf files on Susan's website. These files include the full designs including the back and sleeve and reverse skirt option for one skirt. Here are the links www.feisdress.com/colleen/sg167.pdf www.feisdress.com/colleen/sg170.pdf You will also need Adobe Acrobat to view the files. Click here to download a free Adobe Acrobat. Wow! Thanks Susan. |
| 6/10/05 |
| Some trivia about yourself? You know how some people have "perfect pitch"? I have perfect color - I can match colors from memory. I don't NEED to carry swatches. (Drove my mother nuts - she never believed anybody could do that so she always wanted me to explain how I did it.) |
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| Quality control engineer Tom Marvolo Riddle checks an embroidery sample |
| Susan checks out some cool fabrics! |
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| Fabric at Vinas, one of the shops Susan likes to find fabrics. |
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| This dress was made by Rose Kennedy using SG98 from the CD of designs. |
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| A water colour that Susan painted. Obviously Susan has a talent for art. |
| And if people want to buy a design after reading this page how can they go about that? They contact Tess (feisdress_designs@glitterbugs.net) or Gina (designs@feisdress.com). They'll explain how to order. Gina is North America; Tess is everywhere else. |
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| Made by Jo-Ann MacNeil |
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| This dress made by Colleen O'Neill |
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| Made by Margaret Carroll, Sydney, Australia |