VoEL

My story begins on my family’s water buffalo farm where I was raised. To paint you a picture of how rural we were, I can tell you a story of how my grandma as a child had to sleep under the house with the dog; one evening she was attacked by a wild tiger and only escaped when one of the dogs sacrificed itself for her. Our values and currency may seem very strange to many people in the western world, for example my grandma once gave my grandfather a white buffalo, which would be equivalent of a Rolls Royce in Australia! I lived in the rear of a textile factory with my mother when I was little, where I watched all the printing, dying and production of textiles. Before we left our home country, my father had a very high profile job as a one of the senior police in our province, my mother had to leave everything behind when he tried to give me away to his sister, who couldn’t have kids While we moved around Australia and around the world, I continued being involved with my mum’s sewing clothes, and watching her sewing for hours. It was a mixed experience seeing both her frustration and successes as she worked her craft trying to meet her expectations of perfection with everything she did. So I think you could say sewing and textiles and creating clothing from nothing has been a big part of my journey and what I can offer back to the world.