Legendary Kiwi fashion designers Adrienne Winkelmann and Patrick Steel are joining forces for new collaborations.
Legendary Kiwi fashion designers Adrienne Winkelmann and Patrick Steel are joining forces for new collaborations.
Kiwi design icons Adrienne Winkelmann and Patrick Steel have joined forces. Ricardo Simich talks to them about their fashion legacy and what the future holds.
They’re couturiers to the rich, famous and powerful, seen as New Zealand’s answer to Coco Chanel and Christian Dior, and now Adrienne Winkelmannand Patrick Steel have joined forces.
Former rivals in the 1980s and 90s, High Street in the CBD was the domain of their made-to-measure salons and where they often held court at The Melba with the who’s who of Auckland society.
Now, Winkelmann has enlisted Steel to create bridalwear at her atelier in Auckland’s Courthouse Lane, while Steel is keen on them looking at designing for a cruise line.
Steel is famous for his stunning bridal creations and he points out that many European designers have a cruise, resort or travel line. He says Chanel does this to perfection.
“Today’s women like luxury when they are relaxing, as much as for work or special events,” says Steel.
Many of the women Steel and Winkelmann design for now have their daughters wanting to emulate their mother’s distinctive luxury style and the collections are reflecting this younger demand.
Winkelmann has a staff of 18 in her work and design rooms across the square from her retail space, where bespoke fittings are done. She has more than 70km of fabric that is worth a fortune and won’t be slowing down any time soon.
They also have a third string to their bow – talented designer Sam Malloy has been under the tutelage of Winkelmann for seven years.
With dresses and suits costing between $2000 to $4000, the three designers say the luxury couture business is a constant.
“Events and demand for a special suit or the perfect dress have changed over the decades, but wanting to look powerful and glamorous never goes out of fashion,” says Winkelmann.
Next year their names will be combined in a label for very special customers as their joint fan base is a who’s who of Auckland over the generations. It looks like those lofty days of the 80s are coming back!
“Adrienne and I share the same DNA, our tailoring and embellishing are quite similar,” says Steel.
Legendary NZ fashion designers Adrienne Winkelmann and Patrick Steel are joining forces for new collections and collaborations.
Talking to Spy in an exclusive interview, Winkelmann and Steel’s repartee is respectful, warm and nostalgic, with a little bit of bitching at each other thrown in – in a way that only two people who have been there, done that can do.
They argue about who dressed British icon Dame Joan Collins when she was in New Zealand a couple of decades ago. The Dynasty queen walked out with a number of both of their creations.
Collins captures the aesthetic zeitgeist of the 80s, a time when glamour and power dressing was key, and Winkelmann and Steel dominated the market for decades to come.
In those heady days, Steel was often thought to be a contributor to the feared Metro magazine’s Felicity Ferret column, where he and Winkelmann often appeared, whether in the social pages or in column inches.
“I didn’t write it, I lived it,” Steel says. “Why do you think my nickname is Chook? I would go into restaurants and look around like a startled chicken just waiting for the scandal to come at me.”
Steel catered to well-heeled rich listers for decades. To wear a Patrick Steel creation was almost a rite of passage for the uber-wealthy.
Steel won’t name names of his clientele, but famous rich listers the Fays, Myers and Hortons are all known to have been regulars. The creations and the events to which Steel’s designs were worn are the stuff of legends.
Winkelmann shares a similar high-end clientele, but the designer has also cornered the market in dressing corporate power women, from lawyers to CEOs.
“She walked by my side for 40 years and I feel lost without her telling me to ‘put on your lippy darling’,” says Winkleman.
“One moment I will never forget is Rosie and Michael taking my husband, Steve, and me to dinner at Buckingham Palace with The Queen and Prince Charles, it was truly a magic moment,” she says.
“The Three B’s - black dinner jacket, little black dress, black tailored trousers – are basics I like all my clients to invest in,” says Winkelmann.
New first lady Amanda Luxon wore Winkelmann on election night and new NZ First MP Tanya Unkovich wore the designer for her maiden speech last week. The country’s most famous newsreader, Judy Bailey, former Prime Ministers Helen Clark and Dame Jenny Shipley, former US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and corporate legends Theresa Gattung and Cindy Mitchener are all Winkelmann fans.
“My customers are fearless and know what they want - the AW woman is a leader,” says Winkelmann.
Now in its fifth decade, Winkelmann has carried her business with aplomb. Along with her high-end Auckland customers, she has grown a loyal customer base in Wellington, Sydney and Hong Kong, where she regularly travels for bespoke appointments.
Steel has things covered in Auckland when Winkelmann is travelling.
His became a household name when he was named Young Designer of the Year at the Benson & Hedges fashion design awards in 1979 and went on to take out the coveted award more times than any other designer.
He closed his last atelier in Parnell in the mid-noughties to care full-time for his mother Doreen, who was his constant champion and mentor.
Over the past 18 years he has taken interior design work and “very special” design commissions.
With his mother now at rest, Steel was keen to get back into the cut and thrust and readily accepted Winkelmann’s request to collaborate.
