INTERVIEW: JANE AVERY ABOUT ECO-COUTURE

Today, we have the privilege of speaking with Jane Avery, the talented designer behind Lapin, an extraordinary eco-couture label that merges a deep respect for nature with a commitment to sustainable fashion.

”The Lapin journey actually began in the mid-1990’s when I was working as a television reporter in New Zealand’s South Island. There were great rabbit plagues in the high country and I was assigned stories about what was being done about it. I couldn’t help but see the rabbits, their numbers so helplessly out of control and so far away from their natural habitats in the Northern Hemisphere, as a resource.” – Jane Avery

With this newfound perspective, she spent the next two decades honing her passion for sewing and tailoring, culminating in 2016 when she decided to pivot from her career in journalism to pursue her dream of creating a slow-fashion label. Lapin was born out of a desire to fuse beauty, quality, and ethical responsibility, thereby redefining what luxury means in today’s world. A significant milestone in Jane’s journey was her collaboration with Mooneys Furriers, located just ten minutes from her home. With the mentorship of Max Wilson and Heather Kirk, Jane acquired invaluable skills and access to specialized equipment that would nourish her creative vision. Jane’s dedication to the mindful use of materials and the creation of family heirlooms is at the heart of the Lapin ethos. Each piece is a celebration of couture craftsmanship, grounded in the belief that luxury fashion can be both environmentally responsible and exquisitely beautiful. With a focus on quality over quantity, Jane’s approach elevates the conversation around eco-couture, embracing its history while also championing a more ethical future.

As we explore Jane’s creativity, her design philosophy, and her insights on sustainability in fashion, we look forward to diving deeper into the stories behind the Lapin Collection, and her vision for the future of eco-couture.

Welcome, Jane Avery! We’re eager to hear your thoughts on the evolving landscape of fashion, the importance of sustainability, and your commitment to creating meaningful connections through your work. Can you take us back to your early days as a designer? What sparked your interest in fashion, and how did your upbringing shape your perspective on creativity and design? Please share any specific childhood memories or influences that guided you toward a career in fashion.

My sewing pedigree began with my great-grandmother Emma. This skill was inherited by my Grandma Lily and my ever stylish mother Kareen. My earliest memory of fashion and wanting to create something is a kindergarten memory, age 4. I hid a pair of trousers in my bag and changed out of my skirt after Mum dropped me off. She loved telling that story. I also recall making a pair of yellow drawstring pants on my Mum’s Bernina, age 11. I believe my need for creativity and design is written in my DNA. Mum got me started and I am self taught from there. With perseverance, patience and an enduring love for beautiful clothing I’ve clocked up the hours to master my craft.

For 25 years I was a TV news reporter, independent television producer and mother with the welcome respite of sewing as a hobby. Apart from basic wardrobe pieces I made most of my clothes. I’ve got quite the archive collection and I still wear pieces made 20+ years ago. Now that I make coats and jackets for other people for a living, sewing for myself is a luxury.

Can you elaborate on the journey that led you to focus on eco-couture and this specific material? What experiences or research led you to see the potential in using wild rabbit fur as a responsible choice?

I dreamed for many years of becoming a fashion designer. In 2011 I moved south, with my husband and son, from sub-tropical Auckland to the colder clime of Dunedin. My wardrobe changed from a focus on dresses, shirts and breezy trousers to warm coats and jackets. As I honed my tailoring skills and creative mind I thought about making use of the rabbits running riot in the South Island high country.

To this day in New Zealand rabbits are an overly abundant, environmentally devastating, introduced species. In the 1990’s as a TV reporter I filed stories about farmers faced with plagues of land-destroying rabbits. I could see a resource begging for a solution. Serendipity stepped in and I discovered that New Zealand’s last commercial furrier, Mooneys Furs of Dunedin (est 1912), was ten minutes drive from my house. Max Wilson and Heather Kirk apprenticed me for five years in their time honoured craft before their retirement and the close of the company in 2020. I launched Lapin with a capsule collection at iD Dunedin Fashion Week in 2017 and began my bespoke maker journey.

I believe in conducting my business with integrity, respect and a commitment to making an excellent product with my own hands. As sentient creatures, rabbits did not deserve to be transported from Europe to New Zealand. Sadly they were introduced by Colonial ancestors in the 1830s. Protesting about the supposed evil of wearing fur doesn’t help our environmental situation. I value the human ability to discern nuance and context and recognise that by wearing New Zealand wild rabbit fur, and New Zealand possum, we honour animals whose resource would otherwise be wasted as part of a necessary pest management process. I value many things in my practise but most of all my ability to question the big picture and be grateful for the role I’ve taken on.

How has this dual perspective shaped your approach to materials and craftsmanship in your collections? Can you discuss specific lessons or techniques you’ve learned that inform your design philosophy today?

I make every Lapin piece myself and I relish the process of designing, making and presenting my work. I fall in love with fabrics for their colours, textures, and for their natural origin stories. Wool and silk feature in my work along with vintage textiles from around the world. I was fortunate to travel in India and bring home the vintage saris and embroidered dupattas you can see in my designs. I’m also an advocate for working with what’s around me. There’s generally no need to source from afar when what I find in my immediate world is beautiful and inspiring. This encompasses my choice of New Zealand wild rabbit fur as a primary material. As a wild resource the fur must be carefully graded and quality controlled. I love creating harmony from the duality of fabric and fur. When fur meets fabric its either a harmonious greeting, or it’s not. Sometimes fabrics I adore sit for years in my cabinet, waiting for their perfect fur match, be it rabbit, possum or vintage.

There are practical techniques I learned during my training that apply to how fabrics can be manipulated in relation to fur. A main consideration is how will fur attach to fabric. For instance fur is machine-stitched without a seam while most fabric requires seams in it’s construction. Sometimes I test the limits of my fur machine and hand stitching is the only way.

Starting a fashion label comes with its set of challenges. What hurdles did you face when launching the Lapin brand, especially in relation to its sustainable focus? How did you navigate these challenges and what were some key milestones in overcoming them?

It’s been nearly nine years of this business now. It’s no get rich scheme but the artist in me is stronger than the accountant and I box bravely on. I think a big hurdle is that I’m only one person. This raises questions of how much work I can sustain as a sole artisan. There isn’t a furrier network or ready skills to draw on here in New Zealand. It can feel a bit lonely and like I’m making it up as I go along. But that’s just life, isn’t it?

I’m grateful I’ve been able to make a living from this kind of work here in New Zealand. As a furrier here I’m a rarity. My work includes servicing clients wanting vintage fur repairs, repurposing and remodelling, and also making decor items like possum fur rugs and cushions. This work-a-day routine can make it challenging to sustain my own creative ambitions for Lapin. Overcoming is all about perspective, expectations and accepting that realistic time-frames don’t necessarily match my “want it done yesterday” attitude. My years of sewing have taught me patience. The very fact you’re interviewing me is proof my work is being recognised on a bigger stage. It’s my life’s work and I just keep creating and see what happens next.

When designing a piece for the Lapin Collection, what is your creative process? Could you walk us through the steps you take from initial inspiration to the final product? How do you balance creativity with practicality during this process?

I think a key concept is knowing how to be decisive. In balancing creativity with practicality I accept the decision making and problem solving journey, and trust that I can amaze myself.

I don’t usually sketch my designs as I’m a visual thinker and they’re well composed in my head. If I sit about thinking too much not much gets done. I trust my experience and my hands. I have a desire to make my work as well as I can and I live and breathe the process until it’s done. Major questions often find answers while I’m sleeping. I’m a big believer in the power of the sub-conscious. Hand making a coat is a journey with a trusted pathway and a few detours. There’s always an element of surprise in the finished object governed by factors such as how the fabric handles or construction decisions that are points of no return. The one of a kind hand making journey involves being focussed on perfection while being kind to oneself. It’s hard sometimes but within the realms of human fallibility and acceptance, I generally like what I see and thankfully I have the bravery to present what I’ve manifested with my heart, head and hands to an audience.

Fashion often evokes strong emotional responses. What feelings or narratives do you aim to evoke in those who wear your garments? Could you share an example of a piece designed to convey a specific emotion or story?

I wish for wearers of Lapin a tangible connectedness to narratives that go way beyond myself. I create with materials that resonate with my sense of beauty and integrity. I want Lapin wearers to imagine the sheep a wool fabric came from, to imagine the hand embroiderers who worked on a textile that’s now termed vintage, the designers and weavers of an Indian sari now repurposed into a coat. For the fur component I wish for Lapin wearers feelings of warmth, comfort and beauty and also gratitude and humility that other creatures are clothing them. I invite people to feel differently about fur when encountering my work and consider the human history that led to this confluence of materials. I personally believe I am making good with a tragic colonial legacy that displaced rabbits from their evolved habitats to parts of the world where they would no longer be part of ecological balance. Wearing natural fur is a very human thing to do, it always has been. I invite Lapin wearers to be conscious consumers by reestablishing a cerebral and physical connection to source and narrative and to feel a part of the story of their coat. And that they want to wear it like something they hold dear and then pass it on to someone who can appreciate the same sense of story. Is it presumptuous to think my work should hold such gravitas? I’m merely creating so matter will journey onwards in new forms.

In an industry driven by trends, what does the concept of creating a family heirloom mean to you, and how does it reflect in your designs? Can you provide an example of a piece that exemplifies this idea of timelessness and legacy?

Could constantly being on trend be even possible for a practitioner of slow fashion? A little trend trickle down isn’t such a bad thing. Inspiration comes from many places be it mainstream fashion, historical costume references, from the natural world or from striving to visually embody concepts like being truly cocooned in a piece of clothing. It’s how a piece is perceived by its wearer that gives it heirloom potential. Well made clothes can surpass human life spans and that’s what makes heirlooms. I have hopes, for example, that my Lapin ‘Neo’ coat, which I’ve had the good fortune to make bespoke to fit a variety of sized/shaped clients, has the ability of a true classic to be visually desirable and of practical use for the next generation. It’s certainly constructed with longevity in mind. Another example would be the vintage sari coats I’ve made. They’re all so different and individual and quite beautiful and not the sort of things you’d wear to death and throw away. I hope their owners consider them special enough to hand on.

As for legacy, if my little Lapin label sparks enough curiosity for someone to look me up someday way into the future … I’ll be beaming down from heaven. That’d be really nice. I like making my clients feel happy.