From the Source started without me even realising late in 2025.
I had been wanting to work with Paris Roche since first meeting her at a photography exhibition in Weston. She was curating and hanging the exhibition. I noticed Paris had a great eye and way of speaking about the work. It's difficult to describe but she had the 'right stuff'.
A year later Paris and her partner Tom (who also has the right stuff) came to me pitching a project for their new creative studio. I was so nervous!
The pitch was as if Paris had been in my head, unjumbled all the chaos and pulled out a beautiful way of going forward with my work. The best thing was that she could see what I couldn't, and it was right in front of me all along. I just needed her perspective.
Que No place like home by Jessie Buckley on the Wild Rose Soundtrack.
I had spent my life looking outward, a great thing for a lone rural girl to do, but at the cost of missing the beauty that was right beneath my feet. The environment that surrounds me, the landscapes I knew so well and took for granted. I was so dazzled by sequins and escapism, I forgot to add the real magic of my landscape too.
So we discussed and I sketched and we tested and finally went on up to Black Rock in Cheddar with a mannequin and metres of white muslin in the rain. I was to drape the dress organically in the landscape.
Tom filmed, Paris directed and photographed and I draped and it worked.
The footage was beautiful, stark and elemental. I started seeing differently straight away.
The next layer of the dress was draped here at the studio, working with tulle in the garden. The footage was built upon just as the dress was.
That afternoon just as the light began to fade we made a last minute dash for Brean beach to film the final segment with silk. We were going to wait for a future date but the Sun performed and Paris and Tom captured the beauty of the light perfectly.
The dress came from the source of all my inspirations over the years, the materials themselves and the environment I was standing in, working with the wind.
Over the following months the dress was stitched in place, tweaked and added too. It evolved and the next stage will evolve further.
This project has now turned into something bigger than just a single dress. That spark of direction, of outside observation from Paris's eye has nudged me to take stock, re access my work and where I want to focus, in a really positive way.
Creativity can't happen in isolation all the time, conversations are important and make things develop for the better.
From the Source is now drawing in so much inspiration that this will be an ongoing project / collection. I love the idea of not finishing, just continuing to build and see where the inspirations lead my design, sourcing and curation.
Thank you to Paris and Tom Roche .
Link to Paris Roche - Artist and creative director
Link to Tom Roche - photographer, film maker and creative studio
The proposal - From the Source
To design and produce a collection of garments and accessories taking inspirations from my environment alone as the source.
Initial Inspirations sourced from my environment within a 5 mile radius. (keep returning to the source)
Working with natural and sustainable materials
Working with ultra local textile sources where possible
Explore rural textile crafts, materials and techniques produced by hand.
Gather vintage and antique examples
Follow the Seasons
Develop the collection over two - five years as a continuous evolving collection.
Two work in progress pages ....
I have spent so long looking far far away from my rural environment, thinking it clashed with fashion and my ideas of beauty. The ballet aesthetic may be ingrained but I'm wanting to explore the local geography that I take for granted, and combine the local with conversations far away to find common ground.
An arts and crafts approach, minimalist in materials, quieter and wild. Taking inspiration from Powell and Pressburger film characters, Mary Webbs Gone to Earth and the film Man of Aran to start with. Researching rural crafts, having conversations with farmers on wool, materials and regeneration and design a collection that brings my work to a balanced space that can inspire others to respect the land and making process.
Initial draping ideas in the environment with materials muslin, recycled tulle and hand woven silk.
The ballerina silhouette has been with me since childhood, I want it to stay but it needs to be accompanied by others that contrast and challenge me.
Notes whilst walking. The rain fell on the silk making a subtle ikat pattern. The otters had dragged a pike up onto the river bank and all that was left were hundreds of iridescent scales shimmering in the sunlight.
Three images starting the from the Source project ....
I always used to say to myself when designing, go back to the source. The original techniques, inspirations, references. (Instagram is not the source)
These three images start my seeing ....
A white flowering hyacinth bulb. Gifted by a great friend and it brought hope this miserable wet winter.
I love the waxy structure of the hyacinth flowers and love white. They remind me of those delicate vintage flower crowns from the 1920s / 30s.
A Depressed River Mussel Shell. Gifted by the river Otters and found in field by the river bank here in Somerset. These are rare and I usually only find one or two a year walking along, usually just the one side of the shell.
I love how 'depressed' they look on the outside, all grubby and dull from the mud, but inside they shimmer with pearlescent iridescence. One of the coolest things and only found by Otters.
Pike Fish Scales. Sparkly, iridescent, shiny. I found hundreds of these discarded on the river bank one sunny winters day. It was like a mermaid had been dragged out of the river and all these shimmering scales were strewn across the field. A large pike and the otters catch. Nature, the source was such a gift and just as I was feeling uninspired it appeared right beneath my feet!