AN ART-inspired felt coat took out the top wool fashion awards, writes SARAH HUDSON
Who knows what Van Gogh, Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci would have thought.
But it doesn't really matter because the judges at the Australian Wool Fashion Awards loved it.
In fact, the judges loved a coat - featuring Van Gogh's sunflowers, Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel designs and da Vinci's Mona Lisa, among other great artworks - so much that they awarded it the supreme winner at the Sydney awards ceremony earlier this month.
The coat, titled Famous Paintings, also took the gong in the Wearable Art category, which includes categories for knitwear, woven, men's, children's and evening wear, bridal and recycled.
Creator Jane Robson, who made the garment with friend Annette Jahauri, admits a felt, Merino wool coat is not the normal canvas for such iconic paintings.
"We took the major artists, pictures that are readily recognisable, and put them on the garment as we thought they may be hung on the wall, in frames, with sticky tape and with beading so they'd glint," says Jane, who lives in Eden Park near Whittlesea, while Annette lives in Melbourne.
"The coat itself is like an artist's smock with a beret to match. We took our inspiration entirely from the title: how would you wear your art?"
Jane and Annette, who have been felting for just seven years, beat a field of 100 finalists to take the coveted award and aside from winning jewellery and $900, also won work experience with fashion guru Alex Perry.
"I said I'm too old for work experience," jokes Jane, who retired from teaching two years ago. "Most of the other finalists were student designers and their work was just beautiful. To see what we were up against was very humbling.
"It's good to see us oldies can still win with a fabric many believe is old fashioned."
Jane, who grew up in Geelong, was a late comer not just to felting but to designing.
She says her mother was a dress maker but she firmly resisted the skill until necessity - the birth of her children and the need for clothes - forced her to take up sewing.
"I would go to Savers and see a skirt in a beautiful material that was two or three sizes too big and turn it into something else.
"About seven years ago I was in a shop in Ivanhoe and saw a skirt that was just wonderful. It was $700, felted wool with leather bits on a gaberdine skirt that was scrunched."
Jane asked the shop keeper about who had designed it and immediately contacted designer and felter Leah Jones, from Euroa.
"Annette and I had two workshops with her and then we joined the Victorian Feltmakers. It was just another world, they offered so many different things, sculptures, fabric, silk and hats."
Jane says her first creation, scarves, were in hindsight "awful".
But gaining confidence and skill, she moved on to jackets and even jewellery, and says when she retired two years ago, she planned to be a full-time textile artist - although this hasn't eventuated as planned, thanks to the quick arrival of four grandchildren.
For the Famous Paintings creation, which they started making two years ago, and which is now owned by award organisers, Jane discovered her love of drawing and art.
"I applied fine strands of fibre to the felt like you'd apply brush strokes to a painting. You have to wet it so the colours blend, so it's a very slow process.
"It was great fun. I think possibly there is an artist screaming to get out of me."
