Stylish family behind love of fashion

Award winning Rotorua fashion designer Kharl-William Wirepa, right, comes from a family of stylish dressers. Photo / Stephen Parker

It is unlikely you will find Rotorua fashion designer Kharl-William Wirepa wearing his pyjamas to the corner dairy.

The award-winning Waiariki Institute of Technology fashion student doesn't include being a sloppy dresser part of his daily routine.

Mr Wirepa, 22, has been chosen as the Rotorua Daily Post Person of the Month for June for his outstanding achievement in winning the supreme prize at the Miramoda Maori Fashion Awards in Wellington last month.

"I like to include lots of sophistication with what I wear together with a hint of edginess," he said.

His everyday wear would include, for example, a silk shirt, chino pants, and designer dress shoes, topped off with dark eyeliner, he said.

His personal style has been directed by his family, all of whom possess a great deal of creativity, sophistication and style, he said.

"We are all very stylish and polished in our dress sense, and we live by it everyday.

"Both my grandmother, Mary Gundry Wi Repa, who was an art teacher at AUT in the 1960s, and my uncle Tutere Wi Repa, one of the first Maori doctors, both dressed with style.

"My father, Rod Wirepa, has great personal style."

As a result he had always been interested in fashion since he was a young child, he said.

"I was raised in a fashionable family."

Rotorua residents could probably do with a makeover in their dress sense, he said.

"I love seeing people on the street putting pride into what they are wearing.

"But in Rotorua there needs to be a lot of fixing to change the slobby image.

"The teenagers dress with great style with lots of personalisation but the older people they have a problem."

Mr Wirepa's long term ambition is to gain a haute couture licence from France to manufacture and sell hand-sewn high fashion to the world from Rotorua.

In the short term he has to prepare his evening dress range for the New Zealand Fashion Awards to be held in Auckland next month.

"It will be a magnificent week and I am putting a lot of work into my design entry."