Joan Millar is moving the production end of her knitwear company to China, and collaborating with her daughter, writes Deirdre McQuillan.
Joan Millar never intended to be a knitter. Instead, the former Co Down-born PE teacher played hockey for Ireland, got married, had two children and left aside dreams of a career in art. In 1982, she made a sweater for her sister Mary in Paris and was taken aback when more orders followed; thus began a small native knitwear business that grew into one of the most successful in the country, with healthy home and export orders. At its height, her company based in Killiney, Co Dublin, was producing 1,000 sweaters a week.
Today, 22 years later, with the home industry facing higher costs and increasing competition from abroad, Millar is moving production to China, one of the first Irish knitwear companies to do so. "It is the hidden costs of manufacturing in Ireland that make it so expensive, like heating and insurance, not the actual making of the garment," she explains.
She has also set up a design partnership with her daughter, Louise Knatchbull, a former head of design in Burberrys. "China is going to clothe half the world by 2008," says Millar. "Whatever can be made here, they can make it better there, but you need to know the right people. You have to have the right contacts and quality control. If you don't, you die."
The only textile company on President McAleese's trade mission last year, the experience has changed the whole course of her business.
At Showcase later this month (January 23rd-26th), Louise will present her first own-label babies and children's wear collection and, as design director for Joan Millar, her first collection in collaboration with her mother. "We are now concentrating on design," they say. "Production can be done in China. We are offering design concepts to companies and if they want their own label, we can do that. The knitwear can still be made in Ireland, but it will cost more."
Louise, who graduated from the Scottish College of Textiles in 1995 with an honours degree in Industrial Textile Design, has been making her mark with leading European companies ever since, designing at all levels of the market from high-street knitwear for UK multiples such as Miss Selfridge, Jigsaw and Dorothy Perkins, to collections for Paul Costelloe, Calvin Klein, Jean Muir and Bergdorf Goodman.
As head knitwear designer for Burberrys at the age of 25, she masterminded five collections, streamlining design and moving production to Italy before branching out as a freelance consultant, introducing innovative concepts such as seamless and multi-gauge knitwear. Married three years ago to an English banker, she is now the mother of two small children and moved back to live in Ireland with her husband and family last April.
Her first children's wear collection for Burberry, a cute collection of small, chunky Aran cotton sweaters with zipped hoodies and frilled cardigans, goes on sale in leading outlets in New York, Milan and London this month and already Burberry want to discuss further designs. Mother and daughter are also in the throes of discussions with a leading British retail giant on a design partnership which would represent another huge step forward for them. Their collaboration has given new energy and vitality to the Millar label.
"We are now aiming at trans-seasonal knitwear with fine silks and lightweight mohairs," says Millar. Some of the new shapes are gauzy and featherlight variations of wraps and shawls, while others are new takes on her familiar Aran and Fair Isle patterns. Little vests, cardigans and T-shirts come in the finest silk gauges, while black moss stitch cardigans in cotton/cashmere mix are trimmed with black velvet and rich embroideries. "It's an Irish stitch that doesn't look like an Irish stitch when you do it in this gauge."
She designs with pencil and paper rather than on screen, keeping all her samples and swatches in a large old leather Gladstone bag.
More opportunities lie ahead; already there's the possibility of selling a children's wear range in China, getting involved in the retail end as well as manufacturing, another significant step forward. In the meantime, it is obvious that both mother and daughter are enjoying working together, sharing expertise and experience and planning future projects.
"I have seen huge changes in the business," says Joan. "Now that production can be done in China, it is design that people are looking for. People are outsourcing in India and Eastern Europe and I get e-mails all the time from Turkey where companies get huge backing from their government. I just happened to choose China because of the trade delegation trip and it has turned things around for me."
From Naturally, Schull, Co Cork; Kilkenny Design, Kilkenny; Kylemore Abbey, Connemara, Co Galway; House of Ireland, Nassau Street, Dublin; Kilkenny Design, Dublin; Blarney Woollen Mills, Dublin and Cork; Magee, Donegal; Millars of Clifden, Co Galway; Quills shops in Co Kerry